Such innocuous
expressions used by millions, including ourselves, every day. Until
death affects us personally and
then it’s not so innocuous any more.
Whenever someone
dies, it’s sad. Comments such as ‘well, he had a good innings’
or ‘she led a full
life’ abound. If a young person dies, it’s ‘tragic’. If they were
terribly
ill, it ‘was a
relief really’.
But until it
affects you and your life, they’re just words, they don’t actually mean
anything.
And most of the time, they’re not even true. Then, all of a sudden, you,
or
someone close to
you, loses someone and words become meaningless,
expressions such
as the above become trite and even offensive. And
nobody else seems to understand.
All of us face the
death of someone we love at some stage in our lives. In the most
natural way of
things, it’s an aged grandparent or parent, some experience the
premature death of
a spouse or a sibling, others suffer the agony of losing a child.
But when the
funeral’s over and the phone stops ringing, it seems as if
there’s little
support and few people who understand the situation. If you don’t cry,
you’re ‘coping’,
if you smile, you’re ‘moving on’, if you laugh, you’re ‘getting over it’.
If
you do neither and
you’re still crying, you ‘need more time, more space, I don’t want
to interfere’ and,
at the end of the day, life gets in the way for everyone and goes on.
Being part of a
church is a tremendous support, not just from the local vicar and
parishioners, but
bereavement visitors and support groups. St Stephen’s has its own
bereavement group
who meet regularly and give support through that. Other
churches have
volunteers who visit the recently bereaved for 6 months after a death to
ensure they are
getting the help, support and comfort, spiritually or otherwise, they
need to get
through a difficult time. They may have gone through something similar,
or been bereaved
themselves in the same situation, your local church is an ideal
starting point to
find support in grief, not just when organising the funeral but beyond
that, when the
grieving process really starts.
But there are
other people out there who can and do help, who can and do
understand, who,
quite simply, can and do. Below is a list of organisations who are
branches of the
main tree of bereavement. Some help any bereaved person, others
are more specific
and reach out to those who have a more particular form of
suffering.
Knowing about them and being able to tell others is the best way of offering
help when your own
words have either failed you or run out. When you’re faced with
the death of a
loved one yourself, it’s easy to let the practicalities take over initially
and you get fed up
of repeating the same old mantra, ‘I’m OK, honestly, thanks for
your offer of
help’, so people stop asking. When you’re faced with someone else’s
bereavement, the
words run out and you don’t want to ask any more. The people in
the organisations
listed below never run out. I was widowed in 2001, when my
husband died
suddenly of an undiagnosed heart condition. He was 42, I was 38 and
seven months’
pregnant. Despite the support I had from family, friends, colleagues
and church
(via St Stephens and the fact my father is a clergyman), I felt nobody
understood what I
was going through, I was grieving for my husband when I should
have been joyful
at bringing my daughter into the world. I found the support I needed
from The WAY
Foundation, which is a charity run by volunteers to help men and
women widowed
before the age of 50. I am now the Deputy Chairman of WAY, so
you can tell it
has helped me to become involved with it! I have also written a book
about my own
specific experience, of being widowed and pregnant, which has been
published
recently. Copies are available free of charge by contacting me. It
is my
story, and that of
4 other women in the same situation. It offers comfort, hope and a
light at the end
of the tunnel for women I know suffering the same
tragedy now. My
website is the greenwidow one
listed above. Because of my widowhood, I am
familiar with
most, if not all, the above organisations in some shape or form. They’re
not for everyone,
I myself didn’t want to tell people my story, as it only evoked pity and
‘I’m so sorry for
you’ comments. But eventually, I needed it. There is only so much
friends and family
can say; by making new friends via an organisation who fully
understands what
you’re going through, you feel normal again, capable again, sane
again. The
fact that there are now so many organisations set up to help bereaved
people proves
there is a need for them. Whatever use you make of them and for
however long for,
it’s a relief to know someone can empathise and offer the support
you thought nobody
ever would. I really
am a charity case now – and proud of it!
www.greenwidow.com
(widowhood during pregnancy)
www.wayfoundation.org.uk (for those widowed at
a young age)
www.winstonswish.org.uk
www.tcf.org.uk (The
Compassionate Friends)
www.crusebereavementcare.org.uk
www.bereavement.org.uk
www.natwidows.org.uk
www.samaritans.org.uk
www.samm.org.uk (Support
after Murder and Manslaughter)
www.sobs.admin.care4free.net (Survivors of
Bereavement through Suicide)
www.daisysdream.org.uk
www.merrywidow.me.com
Rachel can be
contacted via the St Stephens Church office
‘I nearly died’,