I was thinking how unhelpful it is when someone who has been chronically ill or disabled dies and people say things like, "Well, he is not in pain any longer," or "That is not the kind of life he would have wanted."
Not matter how sick he was, I didn't want him to die and I was just crushed when he did. It was absolutely the worst time of my entire life.
I have heard people say they DID feel that way after a person they loved suffered for years, that it was all for the best. Maybe if it had gone on a few years longer with him being bedridden, I would have felt that way. I don't know. What I do know is that, at the time, I did not feel it was 'for the best'. I felt it was the worst thing in my entire life.
On the other hand, when people ignore the fact that someone was very ill or severely disabled, that irritates me, too. My husband was injured in an accident and became progressively worse and worse. He also had a rare, genetic blood disease called Bernard-Soulier Syndrome . When he got to the point where he could only walk a few steps, he killed himself. When people ignore that he was sick that annoys me, too. It's not as if he was going to get better.
I suppose it is people like me who make it difficult to know what to say when someone dies. If there is a thing to say to make someone feel better when someone you love dies, I don't know what it is.
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross says that we are SUPPOSED to hurt and grieve after someone dies. Although there is a tendency, at least in America, to try to fix things and make people feel better, that really is not what we need.
I remember after Ron died, my friend Flo Kelley said to me, "You know if after eleven years together, you DIDN'T feel that bad after he died, it couldn't have been that good, could it? Probably the better marriage you had, the worse it is, and you and Ron had a pretty good marriage."
Saying, "I know how you feel," is appreciated as well-meant, but I am pretty sure that anyone who has lost a spouse or child privately thinks, "You have NO IDEA how I feel." They couldn't have imagined feeling this devastated before this moment and they are sure you can't either. At the time, the people who were most helpful were those who had also lost a husband or wife.
Now, when someone dies, I remember the story
about the little girl who was late coming out of preschool. Her mother
asked her what happened and she said,
"Sarah broke her doll. She really loved that doll and was so sad, so I stayed to help."
The mother said, "That was very nice. How did you fix the doll?"
The little girl answered, "I am only four years old. I can't fix a doll. I helped her cry."
That is the best we can do. Help them cry. Hug them. And help them remember the person.
After the one year memorial of his son's death, Erich commented, "White people's ways are when somebody dies to bury them the next day and forget them the day after that. You hear people say that - move on. Get on with your life. Our ways are not like that."
Having worked on the reservation for 17 years, I don't have the romantic view of Indian life that some people do. There are some things that could definitely use improvement and moving into the future, especially in the technology area.
However, when it comes to handling death and dying, I think the Indian way is far better. People are remembered all the time, not just on one day, and that is acknowledged. Because, all of us who lost someone we really loved know that is the way it is.
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