How To Cope With Death Of A Loved One
What will be your feelings if you have back to back deaths in your family?
I am currently experiencing it, h’mm….
Before telling you how to cope with death of a loved one I would want to tell you, that there has been 2 deaths in my family within a short span of 5 days.
First, it was my grand mother. Then the baton was handed over to my wife, where she too lost her grandmother
Both our mothers have been deeply wounded, as they lost the connection with their umbilical cords..
It was hard, but together we have dealt with it and would want to share our entire experience with you, so that you are prepared to face the eventual reality, at one point or the other in your life.
The biggest mistake in our culture is the lack of preparation to face the death of a loved one.
You should be strong enough and wise enough to make the death as much peaceful as possible.
My grandmother was in intensive care unit for a week and the doctors had almost written her off. But they still wanted to transfer her to the ventilator to make some more money by extending her death.. H’mm, medical world is getting cruel, day by day.
I convinced my mother and other relatives to move my grannie from intensive care unit to a private room. I was in deep grief at the point of time, but pretended to be courageous. These are the situations when you realize that there is an amazing actor lying deep down your heart . And a fake smile can help you at times.
We moved her to the room at 5 pm in the evening. Informed all our relatives, which made it possible for my grandmother to see all her loved ones before her last breath. May her soul rest in peace and I strongly believe this would have given her lot of relief, instead of letting her leave the earth without saying a final goodbye. Some of my grandmother’s relatives had blamed me for not moving her to the ventilator. But I went with my heart and all her children supported it too.
Once again, I realized the power of being and working in the personal development world. You become emotionally tough and you will be trained to dissociate yourself from the scene. This will help you in taking better decisions, I believe.
There are a few feelings which you are bound to have, after the death of a loved one. I am going to tell you about the feelings that I had went through and what did I do to cope with it.
1. Revolt
You will wonder why is God so cruel? I was thinking why there was so much pain given to a person before taking their life. I wanted to revolt against the doctors and the hospital authorities. There were more people whom I was angry at, but I am not able to recollect it now. Eventually, I realized that there is no point in revolting against anybody because death is not in our hands and revolting will not give life to your loved one.
2. Numbness
I spent most of my early childhood with my grandmother. I was feeling numb because she was the connecting link between our relatives and many other. You will feel numb because you know that no one can replace that particular person. It is a reality. Accept it. As they say “Whatever happens, life has to move on”. And it has moved on a long way in the past 10 days . I cried and vented all my emotions. You must definitely express your emotions, which will help you to manage your stress.
3. Sense of guilt
I felt, I could have spent more time with my grandmother during her final days. Since you get too engaged with your life, you miss out on spending quality time with your loved ones.
I realized this and have made it a point to spend quality time with my family members and close ones, ever since my grandmother left us. The time that you spend with them is 100 times more valuable than the material things which you give them.
4. Pain
This is something which can’t be evaded if you are emotionally bonded. Mental pain is more and you feel physical discomfort as well. I told this to my boss and he said “The best thing to come out of pain is to make yourself busy.”
Initially, I didn’t believe him. But you cannot hide reality for a long time. This was a real eye opener for me. I have been on his side when he needed me and he was on my side with a deeply insightful message. If you are having difficulty in handling your boss, then read How to make your boss happy.
The main thing to do is connect with more people and accept the support from your relatives and friends. Never try to venture yourself into alcohol or drugs. This is only going to worsen the situation.
You should take care of your body by having proper food and sleep. I was quite keen not skipping food and depriving my sleep. This will help you in coping at a quicker pace.
5. Confusion
You will get confused, which may force you to take hasty decisions. The best thing is to seek guidance from someone who you trust. Also don’t take too many opinions. This will only enhance your confusion. You are bound to take certain decisions further to the death of your loved one. I told myself that criticisms are bound to happen when you take decisions, but that shouldn’t be a stumbling block from moving forward.
This is stage where you need to take important decisions like time of the funeral, further ceremonies, financial budgeting and many more things. You need to love yourself more than anybody at this stage, because it is inevitable for your mental and physical balance.
At this stage I had to prioritize things, which is why you didn’t see articles from me for more than 15 days. But, I know that my loyal readers like you will come back and support me during my good times as well as bad times.
You should be willing to say “NO” to certain things, if you want to heal yourself at a faster pace.
Please let me know if you have had similar situations in your life and how have you handled it.
Comments
Rafi and Sareena my condolences, I thought you might be busy with your job so you are away from your blog but sad to hear that you bring such bad news. I agree at such times we do question God why he had kept death to human beings at the same time at that moment it would be so sad after loosing people who have been with us for so long and their memories do disturb us a bit and tears simply roll out whenever we think they are not there. Its reminds me of my grand father and grand mother whom I lost few years back. As you said it is better to keep ourselves busy with some work else those memories do hurt us. But as few days pass by we just become normal.
I think everyone need to go through this situation one day or the other.
Vijesh,
We thank you so much for supporting us. Yes, after few days things get normal. Its during the first few days that we need to be on our toes, not to lose track.
Yes, some of our other friends were also asking us why we have not posted any article for a long time. We said, we will do it soon. I feel I cannot write a better article at this time.
I am keeping myself busy and you are experiencing that, I guess .
Thank you Vijesh for your support.
I too miss my Grandmother. She had a very peaceful death. It seemed like she knew her end has arrived. She bid farewell to all her children and went with a smile on her face.
It was from her and my grandfather I learned one of the biggest essence of the life….”To be nice and helpful to human beings”.
You have such an inspiring way of writing! Looking forward to reading more posts from you.
Answering your question, thankfully I have not had to deal with such extreme grief in my life. Grace of God.
Bhavya recently posted…A Fistful of Rose Petals
Hey Bhavya,
Thank you so much for your appreciation. Happy to know that you haven’t had a really painful experience in your life.
Sincerely,
Rafi
Condolences!
I’ve lost my grandfather a year back, cannot describe how much hurt us. Thank you for sharing this event with take part of our lives.
Best regards from I. C. Daniel
I. C. Daniel recently posted…Deutz Farmer v 1.0 – LS 2013 Mods
Daniel,
Yes, losses are always painful and they remain in our heart for a lifetime. Its just that our loved ones operate from a different world.
Rafi and Sareena, first I didn’t want to read this post as I was afraid this would remind me of my grandmother’s death a year ago. But death is a reality: It’s a freedom from life’s hardships and it’s all about resting in peace.
And I was missing you for long time like other readers. This amazingly soothing post is helpful to heal wounds. This is not a sad post as I mistakenly believed, but it’s a truly inspiring and enlightening post! Thank you so much. Keep doing this.
I loved the way you share your real life experience on this blog.
My consolations and prayers for you. God bless you.
Jignesh Rathod recently posted…All-Time Essential, Free Software Downloads For Your Windows PC
Jignesh, You hit the nail on the head, brother.
I totally agree that death is the real freedom. We are really happy to know that you felt a soothing feeling when you read this post.
For you, we will give our best to share the life experiences which will help you in coping up with similar situations in your life.