In sympathy
I had to buy a sympathy card today. A coworker I’m friendly with lost her mom to cancer on Thursday. They thought they had 3-6 months, but apparently the universe had other ideas for this family. It seems doubly unfair, to know that you’re going to lose a loved one, and then to lose them even sooner than anyone expected. So much for the “is it worse to have time to say goodbye AND watch them suffer, or for them to go suddenly with no chance for goodbyes?” debate. These poor people got hit with both ends of a really shitty stick.
When I found out about the diagnosis, I prayed that she’d make it. My own grief was fresh, and I didn’t want my coworker to be facing the same horrible thing I was living. I remember one day coming out of the bathroom stall, to which I’d retreated to bawl my eyes out, to find her by the sink, eyes red from crying. And it was one of those moments where each of you knows the other is hurting, and you want to say something, and you think, “What can you say?” And you say nothing for a moment. I hadn’t said anything to her about my loss. I don’t advertise my personal business at work, and told very few people, so she didn’t know, and said nothing. So I said “I’ll keep a good thought for your mom and you, and your family.” And she said “Thank you.” Then we went our separate ways.
In the past, I would’ve just gone to the card aisle, picked out something that wasn’t too religious and didn’t have too lame a picture on front, and that would’ve been that. But it’s a different me reading sympathy cards these days. I was looking for a card that would’ve been meaningful to me, that would’ve felt like a kindness just reading it; however, I found most of them obnoxious. Either the people who write them have never experienced a loss of someone they loved, or they are so far past their own grieving that they forgot how raw the emotions are for the newly bereaved. I read a bunch that gave the same lame platitudes everyone gave me, about time and memories and blah, blah, blah. I was still offended, and I’m almost 5 months out from…what? What do I call it? The day the world ended? I need some B.C./A.D. kind of marker to delineate the time before and after my sweetheart died, for they are distinct eras. In any case, I wasn’t impressed. Some of them tried for greater wisdom and perspective, but when you are newly bereaved, you don’t want wisdom and perspective. What you want is your loved one back. What you want is for your broken heart to stop bleeding and screaming in pain. What you want is for anyone to understand, to really understand, what has just happened to you. Save the wisdom for down the road, when it can actually be heard. I can hear wisdom now, and it helps some, but it’s not a miracle balm. But then? No way.
Then there were the cards that said “I hope it helps to know that we are thinking about you in your time of grief.” Perhaps it’s just me, or my own grief, or the PMS talking, but I was staring at cards like this thinking “Yeah, it’s all about YOU. I had my heart ripped out of my chest, but now that I know you’re thinking of me, well, then, I’m fine.” I guess I will admit to some sensitivity on the subject of absentee friends in a time of crisis, as we all have discussed. I don’t want to know you’re thinking about me. I want you at my side, holding me as I cry, listening to me as I talk, reaching out and holding my hand when a tough moment or memory comes and you see me visibly shaken, asking about me and how I’m doing, really. Be there.
I received a single sympathy card when my sweetie died, from the same good friend who later said “I’m sorry, I miss him, too.” And it just said, “I’m sorry for your loss.” No platitudes. No condescending “wisdom.” That’s all that needs to be said. Ultimately, I chose a card that said “I’m sorry, and I’m sending healing and supportive vibes your way.” It is exactly what I’m doing.
I find it interesting that a multi-billion dollar industry that specializes in having a card for every occasion, in saying the right thing at the right time, is just as lost and feeble when it comes to offering comfort to the grieving as the average person on the street.
I almost wonder if we wouldn’t be so inadequate in the face of grief if we actually FACED death as a society. We keep it so far away, and when it doesn’t happen to us, we want to keep it even further away, backing away from the bereaved as if what happened to them might be catching. I wonder if we actually stuck by our grieving friends, embraced death and the aftermath as a reality that cannot be avoided, if we might not get better at it, as a global society, and in turn, get better at life. It’s hard to cultivate compassion when you turn your back and edge away in some futile attempt at self-protection. Those who know laugh a joyless internal laugh, thinking “You can run all you want; your turn will come. It comes to all of us.” Avoidance will not save anyone the heartache. We’ve all tried that, and it works right up until the second you actually lose someone, and then you see what a thin charade it was all along. We’ve tried that. Maybe it’s time for something else.
Everyone here has felt the support ebb just when the magnitude and the reality of the loss finally becomes too, too, clear. Everyone here has cried out for a little support, a little understanding, in dealing with something that, after all, happens every day to millions of us the world over. Every time I log in to the group, I see that the number of members has ticked up a couple, and it makes me sad. It happens to everyone sooner or later; I cannot fathom why we, as a society, engage in this mass delusion that it’s an aberration, and therefore can be ignored as such, even when it happens to our friends and family, because it will never happen to me.
I don’t have any answers, I admit. But if we keep doing what we’re doing, we’ll keep getting what we’re getting. Everyone here has known the pain of the denial of others of what’s happening with us.
I don’t know what to do about it. But I know pretending that none of us will die, that none of us will ever be bereaved, or that none of us will ever be called upon to comfort the grieving, ain’t working. Because the way it’s “working” now is lonely as hell.