Our very special volunteer Graham also shared his thoughts and reflections about loss. Graham sadly lost both his wife and daughter to breast cancer. Here’s what he shared:
‘Grief is an individual reaction to the death/loss of a loved one. This means it is a personal thing and likely to manifest itself differently to different individuals. Consequently, individuals will find different ways of coping with it. And for some people that may mean not coping with it.
For me it is a matter of coping or managing because grief for me is always there, never ending just requiring management. The physical loss of a loved-one does not wipe out their presence in spirit and it is “normal” in my experience still to want to communicate with that spirit. You don’t stop loving the person simply because they are not physically there. The spirit exists even though the body no longer does. This means thinking about and talking to a departed loved-one are positive tactics in the strategy of coping with loss.
An extended dying process rather than a sudden death, in a car crash for instance, afford a measure of luxury in helping to cope with the trauma of loss when it finally happens. Some, perhaps all, of the practical decisions can be made in advance. This was the case when my wife and, three years later, when my daughter was dying the grips of cancer in both, although unconnected cases.
And then there is the question of guilt I cannot help the fact that my wife and daughter are no longer alive and that I am – so how should I react to that? Well, again I can only say “personally” and this depends on the individual beliefs which remain personal.
Speaking practically, I have personally adopted a deliberate strategy of believing in the fundamental kindness of human nature, even though we all know this is not exclusively so. Thus, contact with others is vital and to be practised even when one might prefer not to do so.
Strangely I found the Covid epidemic both a help and a hindrance, a help in the sense that it wasn’t difficult to accept the loneliness of isolation because everyone was having to isolate (well, with a few exceptions) and so I did not feel lonely knowing others were enduring the same experience. However, enforced isolation was a hindrance which technology for all its wonders was not able to overcome completely. And I imagine working at home for some people must have been, perhaps still is, a nightmare.
So what is my conclusion:
