DON’T Say This

07/24/2015

Anniversary after Death

Anniversaries are different after a loved one’s death. And there are more of them than there were before.

My first wedding anniversary after my husband died was/would have been our 25th. (Note my confused tense. Since he was gone, did I still count each new year as an anniversary? Or did the numbers freeze at 24, the last we spent together?)

Ten months into widowhood, I was “still” in shock. I remember only two things about my first widowed wedding anniversary:

  1. It hurt too much for “happy anniversary” greetings to be welcome.
  2. It hurt worse not having it acknowledged at all.

The kindest contacts let me know they were thinking of me — and of my loss. I read my friends’ support in texts, emails, Facebook messages, handwritten notes, and cards. Others left phone messages I heard later (because I didn’t feel inclined to answering the phone that day).

If you’re wondering whether (or how) to mention your friends’ wedding anniversaries after they’ve lost their spouses, here are some tips:

  • Say something before the anniversary if you can. For many bereaved, the days leading up to are as hard as (if not harder than) the day of. Even a belated acknowledgment is better than none.
  • Avoid cheery, cliché greeting-card greetings.
    Don’t say, “Happy Anniversary” as if this year is no different (even though you do wish them happiness).
    Don’t say, “Have a wonderful anniversary” (because without their beloved spouse that’s not likely).
  • Acknowledge the loss. Anniversaries after death are inextricably interwoven with that loss. Phrases like these are helpful:
    • “I’m thinking of you as your anniversary approaches.”
    • “You’re on my mind this week. I know this anniversary will be different.”
    •  “I know you’re missing your sweetheart.”
    • “You’re in my thoughts and prayers.”

At the start of the post, I mentioned there are more anniversaries after a death than there were before. Death marks a family’s calendar with its own darkly circled dates.

All the “typical” commemorations are there — holidays and birthdays and, yes, wedding anniversaries.

But for anyone who has lost a loved one (parent, child, spouse, sibling, best friend …) the death-added days are there, too — the death date, the funeral date, the day the death certificate finally arrived, the day the cemetery marker was installed, and (in cases where death was expected due to illness) the dates of first symptoms, first diagnosis, hospice care, etc.  All are anniversaries of their own sorts.

Even when death was expected (and perhaps welcomed) at the end of a long, productive life (ultimately impeded by a painful, protracted illness), such “sadiversaries” or “angelversaries” carry pain for the survivors as much as they bring remembered relief for the release of the sufferers.

(A quick side note here: As “happy” as I was for my 54-year-old mother’s release from the cancer that entrapped her body, and as “grateful” as I was that my 47-year-old husband was no longer imprisoned by the premature deterioration of his mind, I was — and still am — neither happy nor grateful that either of them died so young. I’d have much preferred decades more together. So, please. Please don’t tell me — or anyone mourning — why we should be glad or thankful for our loved ones’ deaths. Grieving is not compatible with Pollyanna’s “glad game.”)

I’d say all such dates are difficult to get through during the first year, but that would do a disservice to everyone who has lost someone close to them. Love has no time limits. Neither does grief. I mentioned not remembering much about my first widowed anniversary, but I don’t remember the second one, either. The shock of widowed fog (and other grief) can — and often does — blur more than a single year’s worth of seasons. 

We will always mourn those we’ve loved, but we won’t always be consumed by that bereavement. Given time and encouragement, we learn to live with the grief. We learn to live in spite of it. We learn to live forward again.

But as anniversaries approach — even years later — we can always use expressions of loving help and caring encouragement from our friends.

"The language of love is expressed in countless caring ways."

Snapshot taken by Mom, tucked in a Hallmark card from my late husband. Teresa TL Bruce, TealAshes.com

 

 

 

 

07/01/2015

Taboo Topics When Someone Dies–Part 5, Legal Status

When someone dies, what should you say to surviving loved ones about their legal status?

[While you wait for the answer, listen for sounds of shy, exhausted crickets …]

[… and wait …]

[… and wait …]

Is the silent treatment getting a bit uncomfortable? Only slightly? Then let’s wait a bit more …

[twiddling thumbs]

[looking around the room, avoiding eye contact]

[clearing throat to break the awkward silence]

… and … you’re still waiting, aren’t you?

Get used to it, because I can’t think of a single thing it’s appropriate to say about the legal status of deceased loved ones — or their survivors. Broaching the subject will cause far more discomfort than a pregnant pause.

What seems like a gazillion grief years ago, I started a mini-series of posts on taboo topics* with these assertions:

All grief is personal, but please don’t impose personal comments on the newly bereaved.

Unless the mourner asks you, or it pertains to your already established professional relationship, don’t bring up the bereaved person’s politics, religion, money, physical appearance, or legal status. 

Last week’s Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality reminded me I hadn’t yet posted about why legal status is a taboo topic if you want to console the bereaved. When your relative, friend, or colleague has lost a loved one, the only legal certification that should matter to you is the word deceased. 

Whether you’re a fundamentalist Christian preacher or the chief organizer of a pride parade or a number-crunching hospital administrator, whether the departed and their surviving loved ones are old or young, gay or straight, zealots or atheists, when you learn that someone died, your only concern should be to offer nonjudgmental consolation and comfort in any way you can.

  • Do estranged surviving spouses suffer more distress than long-term partners who stood by loved ones in unwavering fidelity? Should one group have a say in making funeral and other arrangements while the other has no say?
  • Does it matter to a mourning mother whether her child’s birth (and death) was connected to her by biology or by adoption? Does a father who truly fathered a stepchild (by day-to-day manning up to meet his kids’ emotional and physical needs — whether he legally adopted them as his own or not) grieve less fervently than one whose birth certificate – documented “fathering” was over and done with long before that child died?
  • Do bereaved best friends (who talked twelve times a day) deserve less consolation and consideration than surviving siblings (who exchanged little more than annual Christmas and birthday cards)?
  • Do legal residents mourn departed kin more than people without papers do?
  • Do felons (or their families) deserve less respect and support when someone they love dies?

Of course not.

Grieving has no limits graphic compiled by Harmony Bruce

Grieving has no limits graphic compiled by Harmony Bruce

Grief is an outcropping of love. When death severs us from those we love, grief pours from the wound. Like love, it cannot be legislated into neat little boxes on government-issued forms. What can be, and should be, and now has been legislated, is greater ability for people to decide who will deal with the business and legal sides of their final goodbyes.

Whatever the mourner’s legal status, whatever the legal definitions of relationships between people, it’s not up to anyone else to concern themselves with the details. For the rest of us, our job is to simply say “I’m sorry” and to show up without comment, bringing with us only our kindness — whether that’s demonstrated by casseroles, consolation, or (if appropriate) even cash.

___

*To see the first post in the taboo topics series, visit
Taboo Topics When Someone Dies–Part 1, Politics

06/16/2015

Grieving Lost Minds: Go Purple for Alzheimer’s and Brain Awareness Month

“Have you lost your mind?” For most it’s a rhetorical question, but for 47 million people, the answer is a tragic yes.

I’m not talking about “losing your mind” in heated moments when stress clutters thinking or when you’ve reacted rashly during a brief lapse in judgement.

I’m also not talking about the fog of grief that messes with your mind after loved ones die (although as a new widow I felt I had lost it).

I’m talking about dementia, a general term for impaired thinking caused by brain damage — dead brain cells. Whether dementia patients suffer because of injury, illness or age, they have literally lost parts of their minds. And that loss inflicts a unique grief.

I’ve written and rewritten this post for two weeks because, as much as I wanted to put the information out there, the topic is too close to home for me.  (More on that later.)

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, June is “Alzheimer’s and Brain Awareness Month,” and purple is its color.  You can find more information, including facts and ways you can help, by visiting their website here:
http://alz.org/abam/

Global facts and national statistics are important, but the devastation of dementia  is personal. It erodes people of every age, and it damages the health and well-being of patients’ families, too.

The grief and frustration of dementia come from living with two (or more) symptoms of life-impeding mental deterioration:

  • short- or long-term memory loss
  • illogical thinking or diminished reasoning
  • skewed sensory perception
  • unfocused attention
  • mangled communication

In many cases, patients recognize their own decline and grieve what they know they’ve lost. Let them know you recognize areas of cognition they still have.

Let them know you will “be there” to step in with them in whatever areas they need help in.

Let them know they can count on your friendship.

Other sufferers don’t recognize their own impairment and may resent the necessity of being cared for by others.  Caretakers need as much support as the patients.

I did.

My familiarity with “brain awareness” stems from other dementias which afflicted beloved, once-functional minds in my family.

I cared for Mom when breast cancer metastasized into her brain, and I catered to (and placated) her father when age dulled and bent his once razor-sharp mind. I listened as relatives on the other side of the country tended to spouses with mental deterioration from specific illnesses. I worked alongside family (and a wonderful home health aid) in dealing with my almost 95-year-old great-aunt’s diminished mental capacity.

And I endured the 24/7 stresses of my barely middle-aged husband’s mental deterioration.

He was 45 when symptoms appeared. At first, I didn’t realize my hubby’s occasional absent-minded lapses were evolving into debilitating short-term memory loss. One month he was “distracted” while paying bills,  and he mailed checks to company A (in amounts for company B’s invoices) inside envelopes addressed to company C. He returned from work or short errands with our car displaying an increasing number of dings, scrapes, and dents. (I later learned his spatial processing was amiss. More than once he “emptied” large, full trash cans “into” smaller, already full wastebaskets. Not successfully.)

By the time his boss called to express concern, things were worse. If asked to perform simple, familiar tasks in their necessary 1-2-3-4 sequence, my husband would dig right in — beginning with four, but completing it poorly. On good days he might then remember to do the first step (now out-of-order), but items two and three? — not at all.

A few months after that call, my husband began what we both hoped would be temporary medical leave as we sought answers and treatment for these (and other) increasingly bizarre symptoms he displayed. He was 46 when a neurologist, one of many doctors we’d seen, made a casual remark including the phrase, “… aside from your husband’s obvious dementia …”

(If my life had a soundtrack, this is where the record needle would SCREECH.) The voice in my head screamed, WHAT?!

I didn’t hear the rest of the neurologist’s sentence. I had to ask him to repeat it. 

Dementia?! That’s for old people, I’d always thought.

I had a lot to learn, and the school of experience was a harsh teacher.

Here’s what I wish I’d known then about how to support people who do or don’t recognize their own dementia — and how to support their exhausted, emotionally drained caretakers:

  • Give them a break. When one person cares for another round the clock, it gets to be too much. TOO MUCH. A change of face can give a boost to both the patient and the caretaker. Even if the patient is confused by the change in routine, even a brief respite can make a world of difference. Offer to sit with the patient (and show up) so the caretaker can get out and about. Or if health permits, take the patient to the store or out for a walk so the caretaker can tend to self-care or other tasks difficult to do with the patient.
  • Don’t take “no” at face value. Your help is needed, whether it’s asked for or not. I don’t mean for you to bully your friend into accepting the above offers, but be persistent and creative in finding ways to help that your friend can live with. If they won’t let you bring in dinner, send them a gift card (or even just a note of encouragement) in the mail. Do something.
  • It’s not worth fighting over. Patients with brain impairment see the world in illogical ways. Their warped perceptions are as vivid and real to them as yours are to you. Arguing to “make” them see reality is both pointless and cruel; it further upsets and agitates everyone, including those with already confused minds. Humor them whenever possible.

Here’s an oversimplified example I’ve fictionalized (by altering details) from one true situation. The father in this scenario, a retired teacher, is anxious and fidgety. “I don’t want to be late. They’re waiting for me.”

His adult children ask, “Who’s waiting, Dad?”

“I have parent conferences today. I need my students’ files so I can get their grades out.”

Each time the son says, “Dad, you retired ten years ago. You don’t have any students. You don’t have to go anywhere,” his father becomes more agitated.

When the daughter says, “Dad, it’s great that you don’t want to keep anyone waiting. You’re always on time. The parent-teacher conferences are done now. You turned in all the paperwork and grades before break started,” Dad (hopefully) is appeased, at least temporarily.

  • Safety first. Having said what I did about humoring the dementia patient, help the caretaker ensure safe practices. Enlist a doctor, home health aid, trusted friend, or neighbor to take away car keys when judgement or reflexes make driving unsafe. Install safety locks and/or alarms on doors and windows for patients prone to wander at 2:00 a.m. Remove the knobs on the stove in homes where a burner might not be turned off again. Lock up prescriptions for those who may think it’s a new day every time they doze off and take a week’s worth of morning medicines before afternoon.
  • Listen up, and let the tears flow. Crying can offer a healthy release of emotion for both patient and caretaker. The loss of mental function creates ripples of grief as caretakers mourn a myriad of associated losses. Future dreams are abandoned when a loved one’s personality dies bit by bit, changing their dear one into a helpless or demanding “stranger.”
  • Repeat. Whatever support you can offer will be appreciated and will make a difference, but as their loved ones’ ongoing deterioration chisels increasing degrees of independence and personality from them, your friends will need your help again.

And again.

Till death does them part.

Then the caretakers will need your understanding — again — as the permanence of new grief kicks in.

When that happens, don’t tell them how happy they should be their loved one no longer suffers.

Don’t ask if they’re relieved their responsibility is finally done.

No one should be made to express or justify grieving emotions until (or unless) they feel ready to do so. Just be with them in the meanwhile.

#ENDALZ #GOPURPLE

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Each summer solstice, the Alzheimer’s Association sponsors The Longest Day to raise awareness (and funds). For information on this year’s team-oriented event (June 21), visit
http://act.alz.org/site/TR?fr_id=6650&pg=informational&sid=20684

 

05/24/2015

Why Memorial Day Isn’t For You | SpouseBUZZ.com

I seldom repost other blog articles, but this one by Traci Moran has stayed with me since I read it a few days ago. My friend, Lynette Wilson, brought it to my attention on Facebook. This is what she said:

Please, for so many of us, Memorial Day is a solemn occasion, one meant to honor those men and women who gave the ultimate sacrifice in defense of their country. Please don’t trivialize the emotions by including “Happy” before it. Please know this weekend shouldn’t be about the big sales, the big barbecues, the big parties.

Take a moment and think of the fatherless and motherless children, the parents who outlived their sons and daughters, the wives and girlfriends, the husbands and boyfriends who miss their sweethearts every day. Remember those lives lost in defense of your freedoms. Freedom is never free. ——Lynette Wilson

Generations of my family have commemorated Memorial Day with graveside readings and remembrance gatherings for departed ancestors, including emphasis on those who gave their lives in service. On Memorial Day I cannot help but be mindful of my recently deceased great-aunt who belonged to the DAR and who every year made sure fresh flowers covered ancestors’ otherwise obscure graves. I’m achingly aware of my husband, mother, nephew, cousin, brother-in-law, father-in-law, grandparents, and all other loved ones who’ve crossed behind the veil where I can no longer see, hear, or touch them.

However, I also know Memorial Day isn’t about me or my losses. It’s about those who have served and died. It’s about remembering them, honoring them, mourning them, and living in gratitude to the debt we owe them — and their families. It’s about recognizing the prices they paid.

Please read Ms. Moran’s article:

Why Memorial Day Isn’t For You | SpouseBUZZ.com.

And please remember.

05/20/2015

Letterman’s Last, Rachael Ray’s Recipes, and Loss

David Letterman’s last broadcast. Rachael Ray’s five recipes. May 20, 2015, might be a tough TV day for mourners.

If you’ve watched any late-night American TV in the last 30 years, you’ve seen David Letterman on CBS’s Late Show (or in earlier years on NBC’s Late Night).  Whether you glimpsed him during rare bouts of sleeplessness or your rest depended on counting down his “Top Ten” instead of sheep, you’re probably familiar with his often irreverent and occasionally tender entertainment presence.

Like ocean waves, tax hikes, summer sun, and family genes, I took that presence for granted — until the announcement of his retirement.

Millions will tune in for Letterman’s final show.

I’m not sure whether I will or won’t.

Endings are harder now. My husband seldom watched late-night TV, but when I heard the news my thoughts ran straight to grief: “No! Dave was always on. He was on when my husband was alive. And now they’ll both be gone …”

The retirement of David Letterman and the death of my husband aren’t connected. I know that.

My moving-on-yet-still-grieving brain says otherwise.

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On a different TV note, I’m definitely avoiding Rachael Ray’s “5 More Recipes to Make Before You Die“ segment scheduled to air this same day. I usually enjoy her show, so I’ll give you the link to the promo clip that alerted me:

When you’re missing someone who died, you don’t want to hear that food is “to die for” or be told your life will be incomplete if you don’t make a particular meal “before you die.” Such phrases highlight the absence of the deceased, who will never have the chance to taste these decadent dishes because their too-short lifetimes were incomplete.

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While I’m harping about food and grief, I’ve bitten my tongue (for over a year) about a snack I saw at the Winter Park Art Festival in 2014. The deep-fried potato crisps were covered in bacon, cheese, and — who knows what else? It looked delicious, but they called it something they probably meant to be cutesy: “Heart Attack on a Plate.”

I was with another widow at the time, a woman whose husband died of a heart attack.

Not cool, marketing department. Not cool at all.