H is for How to Help them Grieve - The ABC's of Inspired Hospice Volunteers

A little girl once went to visit a neighbor who had lost his wife.  When she returned, her mother asked what she’d been doing.  She replied that she had helped the neighbor.  When her mother queried her further on how she had done that, she said simply, “I sat with him and helped him cry.”

It really can be that simple! 

As hospice volunteers we work with many grieving people.  As we all learned in our training though, grief isn’t just about death.  We can lose loved ones to mental illness, divorce or simply bad choices.  We can grieve over lost jobs, houses or life styles.  We can grieve lost hopes and dreams. 

Our patients are grieving for the children or grandchildren that they will not see grow and have families of their own.    They are grieving the betrayal of a body that has seen them through so many years.  They are grieving the loss of friends and family that suddenly stay away because they don’t know what to do or say.  They grieve for the hobbies and skills they can no longer enjoy.  They grieve their lost independence.  They may grieve as they regret the way they lived their life.  Grief begins when they find out that they are going to die and then it morphs and changes throughout their last days. 

Please don’t negate their pain.  Don’t tell them that “everything will be okay”.  Acknowledge their loss. 

I have a dear friend whose husband lost his job and was forced to relocate to a distant state and while she remained behind trying to sell their home, in the middle of preparing for her daughter’s wedding, she got cancer and another un-related family crisis arose.  Just today, right after another surgery, she was handed more bad news.  Rather than try to paint a rosy picture and say everything would be all right, I wrote to her, “When this is all over you will look back on this time and think about how you grew more during these several months of trials than you did in the previous several years put together.  In the meantime though, only the language of our children can describe it adequately:  This SUCKS.  Big time.”

 As we visit with the patients we mustn’t be afraid to say that yes, they’ve been handed a raw deal.  Put yourself in their place.  When someone minimizes our pain, it seems to hurt even more.  Once our loss is recognized however, we can often move forward. 

Give them an opening, an opportunity to share and let them decide what to do.  Anger is natural.  Some may choose to scream, or beat on a pillow to vent their feelings.  Some people prefer to grieve in private and that is okay too. 

I have a long-admired friend who lost her young adult son in a terrible accident.  As the day that he was supposed to get married approached, I thought often of her and wondered if she might need some company that day.  When I asked her though, she said that she planned to send the kids off to school that day and have some private grieving time.  I was so inspired by her answer.  I had been going through my own grief and in the years after she told me that, it escalated dramatically as I watched helplessly while family members self-destructed.  There were several days where I followed her advice, sending the children off to school, turning off the phone and having my scheduled time to grieve.  By the time my husband and children came home I felt better and had applied make-up and a smile, able to fully function once again.  I also found that it cut down drastically on the nights that I’d wake up and be unable to return to sleep for the grief. 

When someone you know is grieving, it can leave you feeling utterly helpless.   You know that you cannot ever eliminate their grief.  It is something that each person must work through at some time in our lives, some more than others.  Nobody can do it for us, and it can’t be avoided, though many try through alcohol or other drugs.  You may not be able to lessen their pain, but you can bring them some measure of comfort, thus allowing them to work through it more effectively.   Open your training manuals often.  Refer to page 82 and review the information on how to help grieving people. 

Each person grieves differently and for different reasons.  If you are prepared and trained, then the right way to be there for each person will be apparent to you, whether it is talking, listening or simply sitting with them and helping them cry.  That’s Inspiration!