Helping Others Cope
May 04 '00
When I was 15 years old, I lost my mother in an 8 year bout with breast cancer. Throughout those 8 years, my mother, father, brother, and I were told countless times by countless doctors that she wouldn't last even 2 more months. So we were always expecting the inevitable. I'm not sure if that makes it easier to deal with or not.
The last months of my mother's life were terrible. The cancer had spread to her brain, and that in combination with heavy painkillers such as morphine, which she was on 24 hours a day, made her less and less like the person that she was.
If you know someone who is trying to cope with the death of a close friend or family member, be as open as you can. Listen to what the person has to say when they want to talk about it, and believe me, they'll let you know when they're ready to talk. When they don't want to talk, keep their minds off the negative. When my mom was dying, nobody invited me to go see a movie or anything because they thought that I was preoccupied. So I was left to constantly think about the situation that I was in.
After pneumonia caused by the lack of a sufficient immune system, my mother died in the hospital at about 2 am. This brings me to the most frustrating part of the whole process: the funeral. Bright and early the morning after, my aunts and uncles were throwing around the stuff that had accumulated in our house in an effort to make it presentable for the visitors. Having to care for my mother, and being at the hospital the majority of the time, housework was really the last thing on our minds. There were half a dozen people in our living room from the funeral home setting up little wooden chairs and a podium for the guests to sign their names on.
We were given plastic knives, forks, spoons, cups, and plates with the name and logo of the funeral home on them. A constant reminder of what we didn't want to think about. There were visitors in our teeny tiny house at all hours of the day, and I felt that I would be rude if I didn't welcome them. I knew that my dad didn't feel like hearing the incessant "I'm sorry" coming from everyone's mouth. Don't get me wrong, it was good to know that people cared, but having that many visitors that soon was terrible. All I wanted to do was go to my room and just cry for a good hour. But I had no privacy, I just had to sit and listen to people that I didn't know talk about their kids and grandkids and so forth.
And the wake....what is that all about? You have a corpse in the room that someone has put makeup on. So that people can come up and look at the body. Does that not sound strange to anyone? I think that this is definitely a tradition that needs to be broken. If you're going to have a night for friends and family to gather, put up pictures or something. I did NOT like seeing my mother lying in a casket in a dress she hadn't worn in a very long time, with makeup, when she never wore makeup. That wasn't my mom.
Perhaps something that people need to start thinking about is the family's privacy. I believe that during the first two days after the death, the immediate family should have perfect peace and quiet to talk amongst themselves about what happened. All I wanted when my mom died was to hug my dad and cry and tell him how much he meant to me. But I couldn't do that. I felt like I was in a cage at a circus. Perhaps after the funeral there should be a day or two of meeting with friends and family, once the immediate family has taken care of all the plans and has had a little time to come to terms with the overwhelming feeling of a death in the family.
I did appreciate the concern that others showed, but there's nothing that a stranger can say to make you feel better. My friends were good about not coming over unless I called them and told them that I needed them. And we definitely appreciated the food that people gave us, because we never ever had time to cook for those first few days.
I think that funerals are a really really bad idea. I had people come to my mother's funeral thinking that I would need their support, but I was too busy supporting my father and they didn't know what to say to me to make me feel better. I don't want people to go through this insane and terrible ritual when I die. Not being a religious person, the Christian aspects of the funeral simply depressed me even more. When I die, I don't want a ceremony. Two days after my death, I want people to visit my family and bring them food and sit down and watch movies. I don't want anyone from the funeral home giving my family things that constantly remind them of the fact that I'm in a casket 6 feet underground laying there rotting.
You may not agree with my opinion. Some people genuinely believe that the more people you have around you at a time like that, the better. But I know that all my brother and father wanted was to be left alone to think. It only takes a little time to get over it when you don't have people talking about it constantly. There were times when I wanted to talk about it, and I always did when I felt like it. I just ask whoever will read this to reconsider the method in which guests try to comfort the family.
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Epinions.com ID:
rebelgrrl
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Member: Melody Addington
Reviews written: 36
Trusted by: 19 members
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