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My loss...and how to comfort those who've lost someone
Reading everyone's post feels kind of awkward to me. I have never felt any true loss. Sure, my Grandpa died when I was little. But I was just sad because I wouldn't get to ride his tractor anymore. I cried mostly because my Grandma was moving out of that cool farmhouse they lived in and I would miss it.
Just two years ago, my step-Grandpa died. I didn't cry at that funeral either. I sort of missed his funny stories about the farm life but after a week, he had just become another memory.
On the other side of my family just last year, my Grandma died after years of dementia and being in a nursing home. Try as I could, I couldn't force a tear out of my eyes. To be honest, I thought myself to be quite the uncaring bastard for being the only one NOT crying and actually enjoying myself hanging out with my not oft seen cousins.
But I really wasn't that uncaring. I just wasn't old enough to know my Grandpa. My step-Grandpa I just didn't know long enough. And my Grandma I had never really known because she was in the nursing home for most of the year I knew her.
The closest thing to genuine, close, personal lost was when my friend nearly died of cancer in elementary school. She missed almost a year of school with all the treatments and lost all her hair. It wasn't for another 5 years that I became close friends with her and truly appreciated what a strong individual it must have taken to get through that kind of trauma when she was only 9. When I used to write poetry, she evoked some of the best songs and rhymes I have ever written.
Nothing has come close since then. Of course, I stopped writing poetry after a bad experience in giving some of it to someone.
KOB this could almost be a good reason to start to write over again....
We handle loss in diferent ways-just because you don't cry etc. means nothing it certainly does not mean you are uncaring, you just don't cry that easily-no worries.
I however cry like a sooky la la over almost anything! embarrasing for a bloke, really embarrassing.
KoB,
Everyone grieves differently. Your grief is YOUR grief, and it would be just as wrong to tell you that you SHOULD cry as it would be to tell someone else to stop crying.
There are many reasons people don't cry at deaths. I did not cry at the death of any of my grandparents, but I did cry at the death of a man who I sat with for two days while he died. I dont know why I cried at his death. I was close to him, but not really close.
When I get really stressed I dont cry. I had to attend the death of a seven year old boy who died in a car accident, and I have a seven year old of my own. I didnt cry at his death (the doctor did) but I ran a red light on the way home, and I had to pull over for a quick moment of meditation before I finished the drive.
Its all different. Your experience is YOUR experience. You dont need to compare it to anyone elses.
Don't worry, KoB. Live long enough and you will experience the loss of people close to you. You are right that it is an experience that cannot be fully understood until we go through it ourselves.
I however cry like a sooky la la over almost anything! embarrasing for a bloke, really embarrassing.
What the heck is a sooky la la?
You're right about how people express their grief differently. When my parents died I didn't really experience much grief at all because I'd been a Buddhist a long time, they were both old and had reached the point in their lives when death was a blessing, and I wasn't with them when they died. I'd left home a long, long time before. The death of a young person would upset me more because they still had a full life in front of them.
Palzang
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federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
I did not cry at the death of any of my grandparents, but I did cry at the death of a man who I sat with for two days while he died.
I did not cry when my cousin died, but I have explained all that in another thread.
Curiously though, I cried when I rescued a frightened, confused and disoriented rabbit from the middle of the road, and coaxed and cajoled him to the pavement (that's a sidewalk for my ATP friends) and he ferlollopped thorugh the hedge and into the field beyond... the queue of halted motorists on the other side of the road, hooted, thumbed-up and applauded, and the guy in the car behind me, smiled patiently and waited for me to carry on.
I wept buckets.
because I knew my saving him had been temporary, and was delaying the inevitable.
I thought he might have actually been hit, and was injured, but he just wouldn't let me pick him up....and then I realised. he was blind. probably from a dose of myxamatosis - a man-made disease contrived and invented to keep their numbers down.
Which is why I think I wept buckets.
Is my perspective wrong? I have no answer. All I know is that that's the way things go, sometimes.
Sadness and grief, are unpredictable
You're right about how people express their grief differently. When my parents died I didn't really experience much grief at all because I'd been a Buddhist a long time, they were both old and had reached the point in their lives when death was a blessing, and I wasn't with them when they died. I'd left home a long, long time before. The death of a young person would upset me more because they still had a full life in front of them.
Palzang
Hi Palzang,
A sooky la la
'Sooky' is a reference to a creature similar to Sooty (our english friends know who that is).
'la la' is like the sound a child makes when they cry kind of like AAAAAHHHHHHH WWWWWAAAAAAHHHH" it's just a nicer (cute perhaps) way of saying "cry baby".
a sooky la la would be the same as a wus or a whiner in your parlance- a sook.
Yes, I know that. One should break one's attachment to being politically correct. It's also a line from a very popular Australian song (at least it used to be).
Comments
Just two years ago, my step-Grandpa died. I didn't cry at that funeral either. I sort of missed his funny stories about the farm life but after a week, he had just become another memory.
On the other side of my family just last year, my Grandma died after years of dementia and being in a nursing home. Try as I could, I couldn't force a tear out of my eyes. To be honest, I thought myself to be quite the uncaring bastard for being the only one NOT crying and actually enjoying myself hanging out with my not oft seen cousins.
But I really wasn't that uncaring. I just wasn't old enough to know my Grandpa. My step-Grandpa I just didn't know long enough. And my Grandma I had never really known because she was in the nursing home for most of the year I knew her.
The closest thing to genuine, close, personal lost was when my friend nearly died of cancer in elementary school. She missed almost a year of school with all the treatments and lost all her hair. It wasn't for another 5 years that I became close friends with her and truly appreciated what a strong individual it must have taken to get through that kind of trauma when she was only 9. When I used to write poetry, she evoked some of the best songs and rhymes I have ever written.
Nothing has come close since then. Of course, I stopped writing poetry after a bad experience in giving some of it to someone.
We handle loss in diferent ways-just because you don't cry etc. means nothing it certainly does not mean you are uncaring, you just don't cry that easily-no worries.
I however cry like a sooky la la over almost anything! embarrasing for a bloke, really embarrassing.
Everyone grieves differently. Your grief is YOUR grief, and it would be just as wrong to tell you that you SHOULD cry as it would be to tell someone else to stop crying.
There are many reasons people don't cry at deaths. I did not cry at the death of any of my grandparents, but I did cry at the death of a man who I sat with for two days while he died. I dont know why I cried at his death. I was close to him, but not really close.
When I get really stressed I dont cry. I had to attend the death of a seven year old boy who died in a car accident, and I have a seven year old of my own. I didnt cry at his death (the doctor did) but I ran a red light on the way home, and I had to pull over for a quick moment of meditation before I finished the drive.
Its all different. Your experience is YOUR experience. You dont need to compare it to anyone elses.
What the heck is a sooky la la?
You're right about how people express their grief differently. When my parents died I didn't really experience much grief at all because I'd been a Buddhist a long time, they were both old and had reached the point in their lives when death was a blessing, and I wasn't with them when they died. I'd left home a long, long time before. The death of a young person would upset me more because they still had a full life in front of them.
Palzang
I did not cry when my cousin died, but I have explained all that in another thread.
Curiously though, I cried when I rescued a frightened, confused and disoriented rabbit from the middle of the road, and coaxed and cajoled him to the pavement (that's a sidewalk for my ATP friends) and he ferlollopped thorugh the hedge and into the field beyond... the queue of halted motorists on the other side of the road, hooted, thumbed-up and applauded, and the guy in the car behind me, smiled patiently and waited for me to carry on.
I wept buckets.
because I knew my saving him had been temporary, and was delaying the inevitable.
I thought he might have actually been hit, and was injured, but he just wouldn't let me pick him up....and then I realised. he was blind. probably from a dose of myxamatosis - a man-made disease contrived and invented to keep their numbers down.
Which is why I think I wept buckets.
Is my perspective wrong? I have no answer. All I know is that that's the way things go, sometimes.
Sadness and grief, are unpredictable
Palzang
Hi Palzang,
A sooky la la
'Sooky' is a reference to a creature similar to Sooty (our english friends know who that is).
'la la' is like the sound a child makes when they cry kind of like AAAAAHHHHHHH WWWWWAAAAAAHHHH" it's just a nicer (cute perhaps) way of saying "cry baby".
a sooky la la would be the same as a wus or a whiner in your parlance- a sook.
Palzang
OOPS! P.-la, perhaps you don't know that the word "abo" is as derogatory and racist as the "N word".
Palzang