Christian communities who follow the church calendar celebrated All Saints Sunday on November 5. On that day they remember loved ones who have died in the past year, sometimes by name during the service, and give thanks for all of the saints who have gone before us. We also step into a series of Sundays now in which we reflect on the coming of Christ in glory (often referred to as “the second coming”) and Christ the King Sunday falls on November 19.

Bearing all of this in mind, I share with you my thoughts on the first year following the death of a loved one. Stock managers have replaced the Halloween and fall decorations with the Christmas ones (leaving the scantest of spots for a smattering of Thanksgiving items) and we remember that the major holidays lurk ahead of us, for good or ill. For those who lost loved ones this year, these days pose a challenge to balance the usual cheer of the season with the grief of no longer having a special person close to them to share in the celebration.

Sending love and light to all of you, but special boosts go to those in the throes of the First Year.

-Mary

The lack of grace and understanding we extend to the grieving astonishes me. Generally we expect the initial stage of grief to pass within three months. Truthfully a month after a loss we want to see the aggrieved out in public some without wearing a full mourner’s mask in their eyes and set of their mouths. We set the rule that for the first three months a mourner may smile, but not too much, and shed a tear now and again publicly but rarely openly weep. Too much smiling we assume either shows denial or heartlessness. Too much weeping means the one grieving can’t control their emotions. The beginning of those sentences speak to our cultural limitations for those who have experienced loss: they may not be “too much.”

Consider what we say about those who grieve, especially women: “She’s handling it well.” This means the individual behaves in adherence to our allowable standards. Within three to six months, a widow or widower may be out in public and well dressed, appearing put together and in control of their feelings. When asked how they are doing, acceptable answers include, “Well, considering…” “I have my good days and my bad days…” “I’m getting there, thanks for asking.” or “I’ll be ok. It’s tough but I’m managing.”

We build tight fences around what we consider “allowable displays of grief” while never fully defining them. Together we understand what should and should not be done when mourning the loss of a loved one and reinforce these understandings by how we speak of the aggrieved. “She’s not handling it well” merely means the individual in question strayed too far beyond the acceptable borders and deserves our judgment for it, judgment dressed up as “concern” but judgment nonetheless.

I hate this phrase, “She’s handling it well.” The dishonesty in its usage aggravates me. When I hear someone say, “She’s handling it well.” I understand them to mean, “I appreciate she has the control to not make me see her pain.” It does not matter that the widow in question may go home immediately to collapse on the bed and cry for hours. As long as she hides her shattered heart from the world, then she does grief “well.”

If a widower doesn’t join his friends for golf within the first six months, or begin attending again the local weekly lunches for a civic organization to which he belongs, or appear in church for his regular Sunday school class, then the gossip begins to spread. I wager twenty times more is said about him rather than to him at this time. “Concern” buzzes around his community but rarely inspires someone to pick up the phone for a genuine check-in. 

Six months to a year after, he should behave “normally” again and perhaps even consider a date or two. Certainly after the first year he needs to be out in public again like a normal human being. There’s that lovely widow from the women’s Sunday school class who would be perfect for him! We play the onus on the aggrieved to remind us not quite a year has passed and, oh, by the way, last week would have been our fifty-fifth wedding anniversary? Would it have been? Sorry.

The one year anniversary of the death comes and goes with perhaps calls with family members and maybe a close friend or two. Otherwise, the date passes as any other day on the calendar for the world around and the one in pain should not be so sensitive still. Sure, stay home or light a candle or visit the grave, but the next day show up for the birthday party, the dinner date, or the pickleball tournament with racquet in hand and ready to do battle.

My friends, that is not how grief works, and we uphold toxic standards and expectations for one another.

The initial state of grief lasts one full year.

Read that again: The INITIAL state of grief lasts one full YEAR.

The death of a loved one does not contain within it the totality of the loss experienced by those left behind. It marks the beginning of a year of loss; not a year of remembering the loss but a year filled with innumerable little losses that hold their own pain and justification for grief.

Of course I speak to the passing of would-be birthdays, anniversaries, and annual holidays. We expect those to carry pain in remembering the loss of a loved one. But that way of thinking of the passage of these important dates is inaccurate in and of itself. We don’t feel pain when those dates come because of the loss that happened, our heart breaks for the fresh losses embedded in living through significant days without the one we love. We realize this year we won’t go together to our favorite restaurant for our anniversary or we won’t go together to pick out the perfect, if off-centered, Christmas tree for the house. The absence of these traditions do not merely echo THE loss, they are losses in and of themselves. We feel fresh pain by the loss of these expected yearly moments. Yes, their loss is caused by THE loss, but we lose the feeling, the joy, the rhythm of these events as well.

The passing of these dates represent only a portion of the loss experienced in the first full year following the death of a loved one. As a community we allow grief on these occasions and teach one another to expect them. We fail to include in our paltry grief formation the many unexpected losses that the cycle of a year brings. I wrote a post about “sneaky grief” and I encourage you to read it for more on this but include a bit of the reality here.

Many more losses pop up on average days when we least expect them. Perhaps you find yourself struggling to catch your breath when walking on the first warm day of spring. You stop suddenly because you don’t know how to make one more step while also having no understanding as to why. Then, out of the corner of your eye, you spot the first daffodils as their yellow blooms still form at the tips of their shoots. Every year you took note of these early buds so as to bring the first handful of spring home as soon as they opened. You won’t be doing that this year and the loss of that moment crashes down around you.

Maybe you take your annual pilgrimage to the beach with your family and all seems well until you step out of the car and take your first breath of beach air. You grab the frame of the car door to still yourself because your knees feel as though they have lost all form and structure. Two or three days during these vacations your beloved and you made it a point to wake before the rest of the crew to take a stroll along the water, enjoying a quiet respite from the din and chaos of the house full of family members. Hand in hand you walked, talking about how the kids are growing and how proud you are of them then she would bend over to pick up a particularly lovely shell or you would spy the rare shark’s tooth and pocket it to delight your grandson. You hold the frame of the car to steady yourself in the wake of the loss of those moments. Will you walk one morning alone? Or will that prove too painful?

These are not remembrances of the loss that happened with the death of the loved one. These are fresh losses in and of themselves, worthy of our heartbreak and tears. We feel new pain as these traditions pass by us, never to return. They did not leave with the death but waited to surface only when the moment arrived. 

This is why I say the initial stage of grief lasts a full year. It takes one full year to hit against every one of our unrecognized traditions and rituals, the thousands of things we only do with that one important person.

As you walk the journey of grief yourself or serve as the companion for someone else, I implore you to reject the traumatizing and absurd standards our society attempts to enforce on your experience. You will have days that first year when you almost forget the person has died…then you will grieve this fact and possibly feel ashamed. You will have days six, eight, or eleven months after the death when you cannot get out of bed; not choose to stay in bed but physically cannot find the strength to stand up and move. Many days will fall between these two extremes as you begin to adjust and find your own way as one who mourns.

Be generous with yourself and others. Do not suppress the pain you feel but give it ample room to breathe. Nothing ever healed by holding it locked up tightly. Wounds need air and sunlight, the chance to heal in their own time and way. You do not fail at grief when you find yourself feeling fresh loss months after a death. You are experiencing a thousand new losses, ripples that push out from THE loss that rocked your boat, nearly tossing you into the stormy waters. Hold fast, my friend, but do not deny that the waves batter you. 

You will make it through, healed yet scarred, and ready in your own time for whatever next steps lie ahead.