What to Say to Someone Coping with Death
by Teresa Sullivan
The airplane crash left Army wife, Shelly Hall, mother of five children under the age of six, a widow. She was 32 years old. They had been in Germany for eight weeks. Her husband, Kelly Hall, was on a 9 a.m. training mission that should have lasted only 40 minutes. Shelly was upset when he didn’t show at noon, as he promised, for their children’s dental appointment.
By 3 p.m., she went to the flight line to find him. The CWO behind the desk was on the phone, talking about the Safety Team’s arrival. Shelly knew that meant a crash. She interrupted him, “Survivors or not?” “Who are you?” he asked. “Mrs. Hall.” “I can’t answer you,” he replied. Said Shelly, “You just did.”
Hall describes the minutes following the news of her husband’s death as “wandering in mental and physical nothingness.” She rolled on the floor. She vomited. “I needed someone to touch me, to hold me,” Shelly recalls. “I needed someone to say, “I’m still a person. I needed something solid.”
What to Say and Do: The Basics
Knowing what to do and what to say to someone who experiences a loss can make all the difference in helping that person successfully work through her grief. When duty stations take her far from home, a military wife dealing with grief may have only the companionship of other military wives to help her navigate through her loss.
According to psychotherapist and certified grief therapist Lani Leary, Ph.D., a professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., the best thing we can do for a fellow spouse who is grieving is to “be present.” That means, “to listen without judging.”
When trying to comfort a person experiencing loss, it is imperative that you not talk them out of their feelings. Dr. Leary tells her patients, “I won’t take them. They are your feelings and they’re sacred. But I will be a container for your most difficult feelings. I will hold them, and then, I will give them back.”
If you feel awkward about talking to a grieving person, or if you simply have no idea what to say, be honest with them. “I don’t know what to say, but I want to say something.” Your sincerity will ring true.
There are phrases to avoid, however. Don’t say, “You shouldn’t feel … angry, depressed, sad, whatever.” To stifle or make a grieving person feel guilty for having such feelings will only delay and complicate the grieving process, says Leary. The same holds true for, “You’re young, you’ll marry again,” or “You’ll get pregnant again.” It trivializes the loss. As does anything that starts with “At least … he didn’t linger, … you had a few good years together.” Also, avoid saying, “You’ll get over it.” Grief is not a disease that a person gets over. They will work through it and incorporate their loss into a new reality for themselves, but they won’t get “over it.”
Leary notes that when it comes to helping someone through his/her loss, it is less important that you be a good talker, and more important that you be a good listener. Really trying to understand what the grieving person is feeling is the single most important thing you can do to help.
This may be difficult for military wives, especially if both of their mates are in harm’s way. The first reaction of a would-be helper when she hears the news of the death might be, “Thank God it wasn’t my husband.” That relief may cause feelings of guilt, which can interfere with her being truly “present” for the grieving wife.
Likewise, the grieving person’s reaction to that helper may be, “Why me and not her? It isn’t fair.” This resentment can be a roadblock. Before offering your help, Leary suggests that you search your heart to decide if you are the person with whom the bereaved can be most comfortable.