APPENDIX

How to Help a Grieving Friend

My essay on how to help a grieving friend is among the top three most

shared posts I’ve ever written. A lot of what I’ve mentioned in part 3 is

summarized in this essay, so I’ve reprinted it here. To give it to friends and

family who want to help, you’ll find a printable copy at

refugeingrief.com/help-

grieving-friend.

LOVE IS THE ONLY THING THAT LASTS

How do we end a book on loss if we don’t lean back on the expected

happy ending? If we don’t search for a tacked-on transformation, or a

promise

that everything will work out in the end?

I end this book with love because love is all we’ve got. It’s neither up-note

nor doom. It simply is.

We grieve because we love. Grief is part of love.

There was love in this world before your loss, there is love surrounding

you

now, and love will remain beside you, through all the life that is yet to

come. The

forms will change, but love itself will never leave. It’s not enough. And it’s

everything.

PART IV

THE WAY FORWARD

15

THE TRIBE OF AFTER

Companionship, True Hope, and the Way Forward

Companionship, reflection, and connection are vital parts of surviving

grief. As I mentioned at the beginning of this book, attachment is survival.

We

need each other.

RALLYING YOUR SUPPORT TEAM

Helping Them Help You

Our friends, our families, our therapists, our books, our cultural

responses—they’re all most useful, most loving and kind, when they help

those

in grief to carry their pain, and least helpful when they try to fix what isn’t

broken.

Most people want to help; they just don’t know how.

There’s such a huge gap between what people want for us, and what they

actually provide with their support. It’s no one’s fault, really. The only way

to

close that gap is to let people know what works, what doesn’t, and how we

can

all improve our skills in caring for each other.

PART III

WHEN FRIENDS AND FAMILY DON’T

KNOW WHAT TO DO

13

SHOULD YOU EDUCATE OR IGNORE

THEM?

If you’re like most grieving people, the response from people around

you has been clumsy at best, and insulting, dismissive, and rude at worst.

We

talked about the deep roots of pain avoidance and the culture of blame in

earlier

parts of this book. It’s also important to bring it all back to your personal

life, to

help you understand—and correct—the unhelpful support of the people

around

you.

FIND YOUR OWN IMAGE OF “RECOVERY”

Talking with people in new grief is tricky. During the first year, it’s so

tempting to say that things get better. I mean, is it really a kindness to say,

“Actually, year two is often far harder than year one”? But if we don’t say

anything, people enter years two and three and four thinking they should

be

“better” by now. And that is patently untrue: subsequent years can actually

be

more difficult.

WHAT DOES ART HAVE TO DO WITH

ANYTHING?

I want to tell you that the creative process will be healing for you, in

and of itself. But I’m a terrible liar.

I can’t bring up the creative process without being honest about my own

path. The arts, or any artistic practices, were hard for me in the early days

of

grief. I resented words and writing for a really long time. I resented any

creative

process for a really long time. Even as I needed them.

GRIEF AND ANXIETY

Calming Your Mind When Logic Doesn’t Work

Grief changes your body and your mind in strange ways. Cognitive

capacity isn’t the only brain function that gets wonky. Anxiety—whether

it’s

new to you, or you experienced it before your loss—is a huge issue in grief.

I used to struggle a lot with anxiety.