Photo:SXC

So what to do in this case? I’d ask. Turns out this recently bereaved dad wanted to go visit the cemetary and leave flowers for his father. Maybe another dad would enjoy passing something his father taught him on to his son, like how to fish, golf, or swim.

Whatever you do, don’t pretend the grieving dad isn’t thinking about his father. It may be easier and less awkward to ignore the loss, but a, “Hey, did I ever tell you about the time your dad thought he caught a monster fish and reeled in an old bike tire instead?” is a great way to show that you are thinking about him, too.

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Father’s Day and Recently Bereaved Families

They were very close and she wrote a lovely letter, you must take a moment to read.

My grandparents died when I was fairly young, my paternal grandfather when I was 10 and my mother’s parents when I was 19 and 22. While I wouldn’t have wished them any extended suffering, I sometimes wish I had been older when they died, I really didn’t know what I had and I think I would have appreciated them more, or at least differently.

I also wish I had been more cognizant of what my mother (an only child like me) was going through when she cared for both of them. I was a typical self-centered young adult and certainly didn’t get the magnitude of the situation for her.

I know there’s nothing I can do now and I was probably doing just what I should have been doing at that age, but if I could go back, I’d do things differently.

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Grandparents

One of the things that stuck with me the most since I feel/felt the same way:

The world is filled with truly nice, kind, compassionate people who will go out of their way to make you feel better.

Even though it’s been over 2 years since my mother died, I am still struck by how people responded.

I’m sure I told you about all the things that people did for me and my father during that time. His coworkers made food for him for weeks afterward, former neighbors came from all over to attend the funeral, my friends cleaned my house from top to bottom and prepared the entire reception for me after the funeral and one of my favorite things was when his Jewish neighbors brought over a ham.

I’m not being flip, it was awesome. The experience and the ham.

I know I talk a lot about death, especially of aging parents around here, I don’t mean to be a drag, but I do want people to know they’re not alone and that they will get through it and people can be amazing.

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Freinds among us

I still can’t believe it’s been seven years.

I think it’s partly because, out of the past seven years, this one feels like the longest. We lost Sofia’s dad this year after a long battle with cancer. We spent the entire summer going back and forth to make more memories with him. The proximity to his death always made me think of you.

I would have loved to have made more memories with you. All I have are the ones from our time together.

Read the rest.

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Remembering Andy

WBUR has a podcast interview with Roiphe about her book and I think the comments on the site are just as interesting.

More than one commenter is male and reminds us that men lose spouses, too. It makes me wonder what my dad is going through after these couple of years without my mother.

If you’ve been around here for a while, you know my dad isn’t one to talk about personal matters, he grew up on a farm, had a very strict mother, he is also a Marine and the idea of “sharing feelings” really doesn’t compute with him. I make myself feel better by thinking about the fact that my mother was sick for a while and he learned to do many things by himself before she died, so perhaps he didn’t have as many things to get used to as some people who are widowed do.

(Thanks, Meredith!)

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“Epilogue” by Anne Roiphe

You must read Pierre’s beautiful tribute.

My condolences to the family.

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A love story

I would tell you how it went for me, but I was out of town and had my dates mixed up and I thought Sunday was the 19th rather than the 20th. When I finally became oriented to date and time, I did pretty well with the whole thing, it’s just really still so strange to me, almost surreal.

I didn’t talk to my dad that day because I was flying most of it, and I thought the significant day was the next day anyway.

I know he’s not going to forget about it or anything, but I still don’t really know what to say to him, sometimes. His mother was very strict when he was growing up, and he was always instructed that you don’t talk about personal things with people and it’s very much stuck with him.

If I wanted to talk to him I could, but he’s not going to reveal much about how he’s doing with it, so there ya go.

My mother always said that as you get older, you get more used to people dying. You don’t necessarily enjoy it, but it’s more naturally a “part of the plan” than it is when you are younger.

The only time I’ve really asked him how he was “doing”, he reflexively replied, “Fine, and you?” as he is not really a member of the Therapy Generation.

I think he’s bored to death here in the middle of the summer, I’m looking forward to him being back to work (he’s a high school teacher) because we certainly aren’t doing anything all that entertaining what with kids needing to go here, there and yonder.

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The second anniversary of my mother’s death

Tonight, I was cleaning out some stuff, and decided to tackle the box of things related to her funeral. You know them, the extra programs, the flower cards, the left over, “The Family of __________ thanks you for your sincere expression of sympathy”, cards.

It was all crammed in a box where I apparently thought I’d sort it out later.

Welcome to later.

Anyway, I was now prepared to get rid of most of it and I did, except for the most important things.

It’s hard for me to throw away cards of any sort, but I had no idea what to do with the sympathy cards, so, I went through them. There were so many nice cards from so many people, including some of you, some I didn’t even remember getting, so I was so glad I had saved them.

I saved a couple, one of my favorites being from my kindergarten teacher, and threw the rest away, and it was OK. It was time.

However, it reminded me of a promise I had made to myself at that time. Whenever know someone who has a death in the family, I’m going to send a card, even if I’m not sure if I know them “well enough”.

It really made a difference to me and I hope I can do the same for someone else.

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When in doubt, send a card

In Questions I Wish I Had Asked Mom, Spencer brings up a good point, I wish I had asked my mother more questions about her side of things when she was dying.

It’s hard toward the end, because you are tuned into taking care of “business” and attending to physical needs.

Other than the types of questions in the article, the thing I most wish I had asked my mother was, “How do you know?” the day she told us she “had to go”.

While I fully realize that was probably none of my business, she was lucid and would have realized that had never stopped me before.

I felt a little guilty about wanting to know that until my father admitted he wished he had asked it, too.

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Question I wish I had asked

When my mother died (nearly 2 years ago? Really?) I was away from work for nearly 2 weeks. I am blessed with friends and a wonderful workplace, so things were fine, yet I worried anyway.

But, when I returned to work, it took an enormous amount of time for me to get my mind back at work, too.

Actually, my mind was pretty much on leave during her illness, too, but you just kind of go into survival mode and muddle through.

I have no sage advice, I suspect it takes different amounts of time for different people to recover, but if it becomes disruptive to your job or life, it might be wise to seek help.

Otherwise, just give it time, it gets better.

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Working after death in the family