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| The Circle of Life - The Etiquette of Bereavement |
| By Mary Mitchell |
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I stared at the puppy as if it were an exotic life form from an unknown planet. A woman, a high school friend I hadn’t seen in 20 years, was offering it to me. “I thought a warm, furry friend was just what you need right now.”
I was standing in a reception line in a funeral home trying to get through my mother’s viewing. I was already shell-shocked and lost. That unwelcome “gift” stunned me into near-speechlessness. But I managed to thank her politely and also convince her that it was in the puppy’s best interest to be placed elsewhere. |
| There's Only One Wrong Thing You Can Do |
That was a situation for which nothing in all my years of advising and counseling about etiquette had prepared me. As it turned out, the experience of loss was to teach me a great many more lessons.
My mother’s death and all the sometimes agonizing, sometimes uplifting events in the days that followed have crystallized and altered my ideas about the etiquette of bereavement.
I have learned that there are many “right” things to do. But there is only one grievous and commonplace “wrong” thing to do, and that is - nothing.
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| It's Not So Much What You Say, But What You Do |
Not knowing what to say is no excuse for remaining silent. It really doesn’t matter what you say. I can’t remember one thing that anybody said to me after my mother’s death. What I do remember is that whoever spoke to me made the effort to reach out to me in some way.
Good manners are about kindness. To be kind to the bereaved, respond to their sorrow. You are dealing with a person who is damaged, who feels the way someone might after a car crash. They may not be physically injured, but they are dazed, disconnected, bruised in places doctors cannot touch.
What you do may be more important than what you say. In the days following the death of a loved one, the survivors have many responsibilities: organizing a funeral, taking over the unfinished business of the person who is gone, and juggling their own everyday responsibilities.
I learned the value of having someone anticipate your needs. The techno-savvy friend who offered to produce the program for the funeral has my eternal gratitude. That left me free to concentrate on the tasks of writing my mom’s obituary and eulogy. |
| Help The Bereaved To Stay On Track |
| Help people to stay on track with their own life. Doing chores is validating. They remind you that you are alive, functioning and vital. I needed them. I needed my job. I was reassured when my colleague called for a meeting to finalize a book project. |
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It is helpful to have gentle reminders that one has a context apart from that of grieving daughter. Yes, life goes on; but one needs a concrete reminder that it is so.
A message of bereavement in any form is welcome. I had once believed that condolences sent by e-mail were inappropriate. But I got an e-mail message that touched me enormously, in part because the response to my sadness was so immediate and thus consoling. I was equally grateful for the hand-written letters in black ink on good stationery. (See the Circle of Life Lesson on Condolence Letters using the link below). |
| Be Tolerant and Accepting |
Tolerate some weird behavior from the person who is bereaved.
For some reason, perhaps simply to convince myself that my mom was really gone, I had a need to tell my sad news to whoever crossed my path. A colleague greeted me with his customary ebullience. “Great to see you! How ya doin’?” “Not so good,” I replied. “My mom died this morning.” And I’m supposed to be the queen of polite conversation. Fortunately, the people I subjected to such idiosyncratic behavior all did just the right thing: they listened. They didn’t expect me to make any sense or make me feel embarrassed by my behavior.
One young woman I had mentored, and of whom I was very fond, left me a breezy message about how busy she was, and how well life was treating her. She called me belatedly, and she failed to mention my mother’s death although I was sure she was aware of it.
My anger flared, and I called back with a message of my own. "It was good to hear from you, but my mother died. You knew it, and you didn’t even bother to call." |
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The poor girl drove an hour in the rain to hand-deliver an apology, then called three times to make sure I’d received it.
I realized later that to her, I was the strong one. She didn’t think of me, her mentor, as a person in need of help and consolation. But in matters of life and death, we are all childlike, vulnerable and needy, and grateful for any gesture, however faltering.
So your overall guideline at such times is simply to reach out in some way to express your sympathy and support. And, please, no puppies. |
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