A little help?

By now you know I’ve lost a child. I’m not really sure why we say that – “lost a child” or we “lost someone”. Our dear one is not playing an especially effective game of hide and seek. That would be far preferable. What we mean, simply put, is that someone near to us has died.

Life as we knew it is no more. Period.

Friends and family now have lots of questions. They may want to know things like “What can I do to help make things a little easier for my friend?”, “How can I help them with their loss when I am hurting, too?”, “Is there something I can take to them, or do for them?”, or “What can I say that can bring comfort?”

Then later will come more questions like “Why is she not moving on?”, “Why won’t he go back to being more normal?”, or “Why do they cope that way?”.

Our own friends and even some family members had these same questions. Very few had known anyone who had gone through something similar. We all muddled through it, some well and some really not so well.

This is a crossroad. For the family most definitely, but for relationships and friendships as well. Things will never be the same. Just as the wrong things said or done at this time can bring further grief and devastation… the right things said and done can bring an enormous amount of comfort and healing.

I can’t stress the second part of that last sentence enough. The person grieving is still your family, still your friend. Just be there. That, in itself, is help..