Losing a Loved One
Death is real. It comes without warning. No one escapes it. Soon my body will be a corpse. ~ Buddhist passage
When my brothers, Jim and Dan, died a month apart in 2001, the reality of impermanence hit me hard. I’ve been reading about death and contemplating it ever since. Although I’ve experienced firsthand how it feels to have a loved one die, I still don’t understand death. Most of us don’t. We know it happens, but when it happens in our own family, our innocence is shattered and our understanding is reduced to that of a child’s. Where do we come from? Where do we go? How do you lose a person? Below are some of my attempts at putting into words the stages I’ve lived through coping with loss over the last few years.
~ In the first year, you look the same, but you’re different. Someone who was a part of you is gone. You feel as if you’ve been abducted by aliens who have conducted experiments that have changed you. You look around for others who have also been abducted (lost a loved one) to compare notes with. You know those who haven’t lost someone close yet will be abducted someday too. But you can’t tell them much about it, because they won’t believe you.
~ The first couple of years: You know how it is when you’ve lost a tooth, and your tongue keeps going to the spot where the tooth used to be? Your tongue is drawn to feel the remaining sharp edges and to repeatedly examine the huge gapping hole left in the tooth’s place. You realize you’ll have to learn to eat differently. It’s sort of like that, losing someone you love. Your mind is compelled to review every detail of your loved ones life and death. It’s a seductive kind of torture that feels good while it hurts.
~ By the 3rd year after losing a loved one, you’re busy with your life. You don’t cry much. Things seem okay, but then you remember: They’re gone. They’re still really gone. It’s like getting the punch line to a very bad joke, over and over.
June 3rd, 2005 10:20 am
Hello, Michele sent me..
I lost my brother 6 years ago now. He was 3 years old when he died. I had been 16 when he was born. He died 3 weeks before I was due with my oldest. I was ready to lay down and die with him. That was the worst pain I have ever had. And your right. Occassionally it comes back and hits. He was the love of my life. The center of my world. Its like a bad joke. I’m just not laughing..
June 3rd, 2005 10:30 am
Thanks for looking at my blog and responding. I must say your post hit me. And got me to thinking again. Im not really sure if it gets easier over the years or more painful. I think you just learn to cope better.
June 3rd, 2005 12:29 pm
Hi there, Michele sent me. Quite a heavy post today…thanks for sharing. Sorry for your loss.
June 3rd, 2005 12:37 pm
WOW Colleen…i really love your writing…(if only i could express myself this way)
i am going to blogroll you post haste…
Lu
June 3rd, 2005 12:48 pm
hey colleen–your descriptions of time in relation to grief and the metaphors you use (especially the tongue-to-a-lost-tooth one) are so true and clear. it has been three years since my mom died and still i am struck with the moments that i genuinely miss her, or at times think she’ll call on the phone and ask where i’ve been, which she used to do when she was here. thanks for adding words to your experience.
June 3rd, 2005 1:01 pm
And in the fourth year, you’ve moved on, but every now and then something jars you to remember the lost and you feel like you’ve been punched in the stomach.
Sometime after that it becomes eiasier to remember your sweet memories without the pain.
June 3rd, 2005 3:32 pm
Thank you for sharing the progression of your experience Colleen. I too am working on a book about grief, though mine is much different than yours because it is aimed at a child audience. The quote below is from a paper I wrote about the book. I truly believe that it is critical for people to learn to break the taboos about death that exist in our society so that we are able to deal with it in a healthy way. This section of my paper seemed particularly apt to your subject today.
Your “grief-bond” friend,
~Mara
“One healthy expression of the long-term effects of grief is the willingness and ability to share experiences and emotions in order to ease someone else’s pain. It is critical to be able to learn to put the experience into perspective, therefore offering empathy and understanding to someone who has no frame of reference for the process of grief and mourning. Death is a part of life. Sooner or later, we will all have to cope with the consequences of losing someone who is close to us. By preparing the child for the
actuality of this loss, they will be better able to adjust to the reality of it once they are
faced with it directly, no matter when it happens.”
June 3rd, 2005 11:40 pm
I have no siblings, but the sname h old true for my parents and my grandmother, who have been gone a long time. I sometimes forget, and think “I need to call Mom and Dad” today. It has been 15 years, but the loss is just as great today.
Michele sent me this time, but I come everyday.
June 3rd, 2005 11:42 pm
You certainly have a gift for writing and expression. This post was truly heartfelt.
Tracy
June 4th, 2005 11:00 am
I have only lost my grandparents recently..I can’t even imagine what it must feel like to lose a sibling, close friend or a parent. I just can’t go there until I have to. Love the post though..sounds like you processed through well.
June 4th, 2005 12:03 pm
Colleen,
Yep,
13 years( next week) since I lost my father. You NEVER get over it completely. I was 17 and it really wasn’t a good time…It never is I guess. We are all going there..it really just is a part of life.
N
July 10th, 2006 11:58 pm
I lost mom over 2 months ago. Although she was sick for a couple of years with various conditions, we never expected her to pass so suddenly. I guess in my heart I knew she would not live to see old age, and always lived on edge…waiting for a call from dad or for her to be diagnosed with something else. As I continue to flow through the stages of grief, I most of all cannot imagine that one moment she was here, and then gone the next. Like the wind blew this way and took her with it as it left us here. I see death all the time; as I work in a nursing home and many are there as a last place of rest before death. I have lost grandparents, aunts, and even cousins…but no one so close to me. My own mother; the woman who gave birth to me and protected me from this world. I am still in shock. People say, as I believe, that she is still here with me. I know that but if I could only touch her once more…You have a wonderful site and I only hope one day I am able to express so vividly the memories that I have of my mother…a woman forever young and forever beautiful
February 23rd, 2007 9:05 pm
I LOST MY MOTHER SEVERAL YEARS AGO.SHE SIMPLY WAS MY BEST FRIEND MY HEART AND SOUL.BUT I KNOW NOT EVEN DEATH CAN SEPERATE ME FROM HER.IN MY HEART I KNOW SHE LIVES ON.
May 5th, 2007 10:56 pm
I lost my mother seven months ago, my father seven months and my stepfather a month ago. Every night I hope of dreaming with them
its the only way I can be with them.
Sorry for you loss.
August 7th, 2007 7:27 pm
hi thanks for your site,i lost my dad when i was 17,it was hard but with mum there,coping was easier,she had a way of making you feel okay in every situation.im 22 now and recently ilost my mother its the worst thing i know that can happen to anyone. she was the smartest person i knew and all my hopes and dreams were shattered, its like with dad gone,i was living for her.
March 14th, 2008 9:48 pm
I just found your site & it really is helping to know that I’m not alone in this grief, although, I don’t wish this on anyone. I am 51 but still the baby of the family & I lost my Mother almost a year ago. She was 78 & lived alone. She had health problems but we had no idea that we would lose her so fast. In Feb. she could drive herself, a Very Vibrant Woman for her age. And within a few months, she was gone. I thought I was doing ok but realized today that it’s almost Easter again & I Miss her So Much. Even at her age & living alone, when you went to her house, YOU KNEW IT WAS EASTER! She loved to decorate & always put her Whole Heart into everything she did & Everyone around her. This world will never be the same. She was a Bright Shining Star that is no longer Here, but on the other side. I know I’ll see her again someday but for now, there is a huge hole in my life. Just when I thought I was accepting it, once again, my heart feels like it has sunk within me.
August 12th, 2008 5:06 am
I recently (like 3 weeks ago) lost my father. My two brother became so close that no one could break us apart. I grew extremely close to my older brother and today he was killed in a motorcycle accident. Please tell me how I accept this because I feel like my heart is being torn out and I want to lay down and die.
August 12th, 2008 3:20 pm
It’s only been 2 months since I have lost my mom. I miss her like crazy she was and will always be my best firend. Thank You all that have shared there stories it has givin me something to have hope for.
September 3rd, 2008 9:20 am
I’ve lost my father last year 02 september, it been a year now n i still remember him and miss him each day,he was my hero. A pain of losing a loved one is unbearable it never goes away. i feel so hurt when i see his friends, its like he should be there amongst them. i still cry a lot when i think about him. i feel so sad wen i look at my little sister who is only 5 years, i feel she became an orphan just too soon she is still gonna need a father figure which will be problematic.
September 24th, 2008 3:47 am
I had lost my father almost two years ago come november, and same as everyone else here.. the pain almost evolves in different ways over time. It’s still that same deep hole or void you always feel, yet it just has a way of growing with your soul as you learn more of who and what you perceive as your life after the loss. I have almost reached a new level of enlightenment as far as how I live my life after the loss. I feel in some sense more at peace with my daily life knowing that death is something we all reach, and that when it does occur, I will have my father on the other side to reunite with. That gives me the greatest joy ever. I also use the loss as a tool for strength when I am feeling the weakest. It’s almost like having a guardian angel. I know he’s there looking out for me, and constantly I am looking for signs of him trying to communicate with me in my life. It’s quite amazing, and rather miraculous. My dreams he visits me, and sometimes I know he uses a way to reach me when I am feeling at my lowest. I am finding that the loss has grown with my soul, and is now a part of who I have become. It’s like a tree that has years of drought, it will still live, but will bare signs of those tough times yet live on even stronger. Death is life, and life is death, all one cycle that blends into One whole . You can’t have one with out the other, like yin and yang… when you see it like that, it begins to transcend the pain that goes with death and leave you with a type of peacefulness.
September 24th, 2008 8:08 am
Grief carves us out, deepens us, so that we can hold more. It is a bittersweet process. I also feel like my brothers are pioneers, gone ahead into the great unknown. I know if they did it, I can.
October 6th, 2008 2:11 pm
in my opinion the sad part of life is losing a very close friend.. something no one deserves to experiance. my mother past away when i was 12 and i still long for the times when we could share special moments together and be in each other’s company. despite the circumstances i am truly grateful for all the wonderful memories and great love she had for me. although the grief i have i share in silence, i always fear i might forget her beautiful soul. each day without her feels like an eternity of worthlessness. it saddens me to think of a future without a friend to share it with, it is especially hard to cope with that fact during my youth. but each day is a learning curve for me in a sense that i begin to realize what happened in order to make peace in my heart to move on. although there is not a day that goes past without me having thoughts of my mom. my heart is with those who have lost a dear friend/s and i sincerely encourage you to endure all hardships despite how great or how small, and cherish the ones you love.
October 20th, 2008 8:58 am
The pain of losing a loved one is really unbearable. I just lost my brother a month ago and it hurts so much that i sometimes don’t know what to do. I knew he was sick but it was for such a short period and none of us thought that he would leave us so soon. I’m deeply hurt and cry constantly and at the same time full of anger towards the doctors who treated him as i believe that he was not given enough attention. His memories are waving on my mind everytime i’m not doing anything. I have tried to councel myself but it’s not helping. I can’t seem to accept the fact that he is gone forever. I know that i will never see him again that hurts the most.
October 20th, 2008 9:42 am
Your pain is still so new and raw. What you wrote sounds so much like what I would have said when two of my brothers died in 2001 and reading it brings it all back. Grief is a long journey that know one tells us much about. The first year is the hardest.
You might want to check out my book here http://silverandgold.swva.net/jimdanstories.htm Because it is specific to sibling loss and I have had feedback from others who have lost siblings and have read it that it helped them to feel more normal about the degree of grief they were experiencing.
Also, this site might be helpful. http://counselingstlouis.net/introduction.html
I wish you peace.
November 1st, 2008 9:44 pm
i go to a small rural school in nebraska, it has a total of 170 kids in the jr/sr high. im in highschool. my friends died in a terrible car accident coming home from working to raise money so that our highschool choir could go to new york city to carnegie hall. it was a huge tragedy. there were three of them in the car and what makes me upset is that i was gonna get a ride with them, and i should have because the two boys were like my brothers, i could tell them anything, i trusted them and they trusted me. they were great kids. now theyre gone and i have no one to talk to. they died october 26 of 2008 so just a week ago and their funerals were today at the highschool..it was very emotional. everybody was affected by this tragedy.. i dont know what to do or who to go to. because im kinda new at this “people dying thing”. i could really use some more advice
November 2nd, 2008 10:02 am
Grief is an expression of love. Allow yourself to grieve. Seek support — counseling, a support group, a family member. More of my writing on grief can be found at http://www.silverandgold.swva.net and http://looseleafnotes.com/notes/losing_a_loved_one/ I read a lot about death and grief after losing my brothers in an effort to understand it. I think it helped.
Thinking of you, Colleen
November 6th, 2008 8:48 pm
I recently lost my best friend, lover, soul mate, companion. was looking for help online but find it hard to read through the tears, you all know where I am right now and the blog I wrote was an exert from a letter to a friend in ireland which I have not yet sent nor did I edit it well but that is where I am so please forgive me… God rest my James I miss him so and dont believe this has happened….
November 6th, 2008 9:26 pm
Hello Heather. I can’t seem to access your site.
November 29th, 2008 10:44 pm
Hey,
I haven’t lost a loved one, and I have no idea what it’s like. I am sorry to hear about all of these losses. I need help though and I know that those who have experienced loss can help me more. My really good friend lost her boyfriend of 4 years in a car accident. Although she goes on with life, and very well I think, I know she’s still unhappy, which is completely expected. I wanted to know if there is anything I can do to help her. She does not want to talk about it so I can’t listen, which is really the only thing i’m good at when it comes to helping friends. Does anyone have any ideas? If so, could you please e-mail me at aimhi007@yahoo.com? I would greatly appreciate it.
March 11th, 2009 1:11 pm
My very best friend is in hospice as we speak she is only 40 years old….She is going to die any minute…and yet I am so afarid I am mad at the world I just don’t get it why her?! I wish I could bargain with god I would do anything to have her stay…I don’t want her to go…it hurts so bad inside but I know she is hurting too…..I don’t want her to hurt…But I dont want her to go….I want scream, I want to cry I feel like everyday I am losing her over and over again…..She is not well as we speak the doctor said that he is surprise she made it through the night…that scares me…it means she is just a step closer…I know I must face it but what do I feel like I can’t…..I miss her already…..I just don’t know what it will be like when she is no longer around…when I can’t call her anymore… 🙁 It just hurts soooo Much…
March 12th, 2009 9:02 pm
XO
March 17th, 2009 5:02 am
Thank you for this site, it brings tears to my eyes for all the loses, but it helps me heal and not feel alone. I recently lost my father, he passed 3/11. I cry when I need to cry. I talk to him, I feel that he is still with me, I also feel guilt, but I feel its about forgiveness, for yourself and your loved one. He was and is a great man that he had a lot of love in his soul. He gave me 3 brothers and 4 sisters to remeber him by. Love, Love is all matters to me now and living life to the fullest, my time in this world is short, and people are precious. I feel I want to appreciate my loved ones while they are in the physical realm and always be on good terms with everyone. Having faith in Higher Power and feeling that the soul lives on has given me great comfort. My father believed this as well, and he is not in any pain, He is free. I miss him and I wish I could give him one last hug and tell him I love him and thank him for giving me life. I will see him again.
Love yourselves and eachother.
Forgive yourselves and eachother.
be gentle with yourselves and others in the greiving process..
Blessings and may you find peace.