For a grieving person, the holiday season can be a painful reminder of loss while the whole world celebrates. Linda Findlay shares how she helps people in their own bereavement world to get through the holidays without sacrificing their peace of mind. She explains the importance of proactive communication with your loved ones about grief and the simple yet profound comfort of creating new traditions to remember those who have passed. Linda also explains how to take advantage of bereavement services through local hospices and getting grief care from funeral homes.

I am sharing my experience of loving the same man for 32 years, a mother to two adult children, a retired military officer, a breast cancer survivor, and my connections with others.  

Anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts should reach out to a suicide hotline or local emergency number in their country: Psychology Today Suicide Hotlines and Prevention Resources Around the World.

—

Watch the episode here

Listen to the podcast here

Providing Support In The Bereavement World With Linda Findlay

This conversation with Linda has some real tips. You would want each and every one of them. She shared with me the most amazing tip on what to do during the holiday season. She has tips on what you can do as far as following up on the usefulness of your hospice team, hospital, and funeral home. Let’s get into this conversation now.

Hello, Linda. Welcome to the Widowhood.

How are you?

I am well. When you hear “Welcome to the Widowhood,” what comes to mind for you?

What comes to mind is probably a community of women who are widowed. I think of that encompassing support, guidance, and help for people who are going through that experience, a community for widows. It’s wonderful to have that available for families, for people going through that. It’s tough, no matter how you look at it.

It’s also a community for men because men are widowers, and there are men and women in our community. This conversation is for both of them to hear. I want to say thank you for being part of this mini-series, Voices of Widowhood: Healing Through the Holidays, because grief during the holidays has a different spin to it. What would you say to that?

Grief during the holidays is a tough time of year for people who are grieving. When the rest of the world is celebrating right from all the decorations, the Walmarts, the stores, streetlights, and all of that, it’s sharp early in grief for that time of the year to come around. People are not in a place where they’re feeling like they need to celebrate. They’re feeling so sad. They don’t know. They see all of this around them. It’s like a stark reminder of, “Here I am. I’ve lost my loved one, and the world is going on.”

I would think it made me feel like here I am in my grief, yet the world is flying by me. It’s a bad time of year for people, and not even the first year of grief. Our holidays will never be the same after we’ve lost our loved one. We’ve lost our spouse. It’s never going to be the same. It’s not even that first holiday season. It could be the next. It could be something that touches us every year because that loved one isn’t there. That is empty.

How Linda Turned Personal Loss Into A Mission

Thank you for sharing that. You’re speaking from a personal experience of your daughter’s loss and also how you show up and support people. I want to explain the reason why we chose Widowhood. It did start with the passing of my husband, but my children lost their dad. To my husband’s brother, that means their brother died. There was a nephew. There was a son. That name was intentional to encompass everyone’s loss. It may be the person who had the prime connection, but there are always other people on the outskirts of that. Their grief is as relevant. If you would share how you serve people now, and your motivation for that.

I do have my own personal story of loss. Many years ago, in 1988, I lost my mom before Christmas that year. She died on Christmas Eve. Within ten months, I had my first daughter. She died shortly after she was born. All losses are painful. My mom was as painful as my daughter was, but I found that there wasn’t any help or support for that. I got from everybody around me that I need to move on, and all those sayings that people say don’t help.

I did go to a support room. I found that to be helpful. I eventually got interested. They had asked me if I wanted to continue. This lady, who was running it, had been doing it for a year. She’s burnt out. I took it over. In hindsight, it was probably too soon after my own personal loss, but it’s what it is. I made it my mission to create what I call, at that point, a resource and referral service for anybody who has had a loss. I tried to accumulate all the resources that I could find.

Back then, we didn’t have the internet as we have it now. That’s a whole other topic. Even with the internet, it’s not easy for people grieving to find the resources that they need because they don’t have the bandwidth to do that. That’s a whole other conversation. I made it my mission to bring together whatever I could find. During that process, I had asked our local hospice if they would sponsor the support group that I was going to facilitate.

It wasn’t showing up once a month. There was a lot involved with that. For them to allow me to host the group at their hospice, I had to go through their training. I went to all the bereavement care training. I went through the patient care training. I had to do all that. Back then, it was weeks of training, which is fine. I started from there, running groups for them and doing a lot of outreach in our community. I started to meet funeral directors. I started to ask them, “What do you do for your families after you’ve served them for those few days?” All of them said, “Nothing, but I should.”

I took that “I should.” I started talking to funeral homes and developing my grief care programs. To this day, I still work for most of the same funeral homes that I had so many years ago. It has been almost 35 years. I went down a lot of different paths working with hospice, funerals, and faith-based organizations. That’s my background. I’ve trained people and certified people in grief care education, doing a lot of work in this space.

I’ve learned so much. I had my own personal loss, but I believe I learned so much from the families that I’ve worked with. I worked with a lot of widows and widowers, parents who lost children, and any kind of loss you can think of. I have learned from everybody else, if that makes any sense. Their sharing their experience with me helps me to share that with other people. No names or anything disclosed, but it gives me a window into all of the personal loss. What I did was I always documented my phone calls with families. From there, I’ve written a series of books that I send out to my families throughout the year.

Those books were written from the stories that were shared with me. It was obviously my own personal loss and what bolted me into this room, into this world. It’s all the families to this day that I talk to that have given me the wisdom to know how people need to be supported, the wisdom to know how I can meet them where they’re at. In the work that we both are doing, we’re meeting our families and our people where they’re at. That’s what they need. That’s my life. My daughter’s legacy is my life’s work. I am turning pain into purpose. It is a perfect example. I took pain from loss and turned it into purpose. Here I am, connecting with people like yourself and being able to share and talk about loss.

There’s a huge gap in grief care in our culture. For those of us who are doing this kind of work, it is so valuable and so helpful for families. Let’s face it, there’s nothing for them. Most times, they’re just left. One thing that is profound is that I have the same conversations today that I had with families years ago. What that tells me is that all grief transcends through generations. It transcends male, female, and different relationships with people whom we lose. Even with all of the resources out there now, there are still the same conversations. Nobody cares. Nobody is calling on me. Everybody was there when my loved one died. Here I am, 6, 7, 18 months down the road. Nobody is even thinking about me.

It’s the same as it was years ago. That’s sad to me that people aren’t finding the resources. Doing what you’re doing and providing a resource for families and someplace to tap into, to learn, and to be able to share is what’s most important in the work that we’re doing. No entity is taking this on and doing this for our culture. They’re just not. It’s a problem around the world. There’s no infrastructure for grief care in any place if you think about that. There’s no continuation of care anywhere. I do work for funeral homes that provide that continuation of care, but it’s a very small percentage of the number of funeral homes that are in our country, in our different states.

That’s my mission in life. To me, it’s not work. As I said, my calling, my life mission, is to meet people where they’re at and support them. I had to learn early on that I can’t take somebody else’s grief away from them. People ask me, “How do you do this work?” I learned early on that there was nothing that I was going to say or do that was going to take it away, but I knew I could be there. I knew I could listen. I knew I could provide resources. There you have it.

Understanding How Hospice Care Works

Thank you for all of that. You mentioned the word hospice. I don’t want to make an assumption that someone knows what that word represents. Would you mind explaining hospice and the services under that, and why someone would go under hospice?

Hospice is an organization that supports the dying patient. They have to have a terminal diagnosis. Typically, when somebody is going to die within six months, they can get into hospice. It is a wonderful organization that supports not only the dying patient, but more so, they support the family during that process. They provide equipment at home. They have both care teams, nurses, and volunteers coming in to help the family and give them some respite. It’s very difficult to take care of a loved one when they’re going through the end of their life.

Typically, somebody would get into hospice. Their life would end during that time. What most people aren’t aware of is that most hospices, if not all of them, are required to provide grief support after the patient dies to the beneficiaries. It’s mandated throughout Medicaid and Medicare that they provide bereavement support. In all of the programs that I’ve ever been aware of or ever been involved in, you don’t have to use hospice services to access the bereavement support. I always recommend giving resources to families, calling your local hospice, and checking their websites.

A lot of times, I’ll do that for them. There are support groups available for them for any of the activities that they do. They do a lot of things that help families stay connected to their loved ones. They do a lot of remembrance ceremonies. They do their butterfly releases. There are lanterns. There are a lot of things that they do that are not only available to the families that they’ve served. They’re available to their communities, which is important.

Another thing, to this day, I tell people, “Did you go through a hospice?” If they say no, I’ll ask what county they’re in. We’ll look up information. Typically, people are like, “I didn’t know that I could access this because we didn’t use hospice.” That’s a good thing to talk about. Hospice is there for the bereavement community. Most communities don’t know about it, but it is a good resource for support groups, individual counseling, and community events that help families to memorialize their loved ones opportunities to remember their loved ones and honor them.

Why Staying Connected With Your Loved One Is Not A Problem

Thank you for explaining that. You made a statement about staying connected to your loved one. Someone may be reading and go, “They died. Why would I want to stay connected? I thought I was supposed to move on.” Can you explain further the importance of those rituals, keeping those memories, and how that helps with someone’s grief, especially during the holidays that they’re going to be experiencing that? It seems that the gap is even more apparent.

That is another thing unique about that time of your family because that loved one is not there. The question becomes, what can I do to help me feel connected to my loved one when the rest of the world is indicating that I should be over this? Ultimately, that’s what we do when we’re grieving. We get to a point where we find ways that we can help to feel like they’re part of our day. I don’t know why I think my daughter’s favorite color was red, because she was a baby and she wouldn’t know otherwise.

There have been times when I either felt sad or during the holidays, I’ll wear red. I know in my head that I wasn’t wearing red because it was the holiday time. I was wearing it to honor her. There are simple things that we can do because they do help us. Your heart has to catch up to your mind. It’s almost like your mind knows that your loved one has died. You know that intellectually, but your heart is still broken. It takes a while for that to come together, your heart and your mind.

I say that we never get over our grief. I don’t say that to mean that people are not going to be able to function in life. That’s not what happens. What happens is they become more familiar with the grief. They find these ways to honor their loved ones. Part of my work always is telling families, “What can we do to help you on that day that’s coming, whether it’s a birthday, an anniversary, or a holiday? What can you do that’s going to help you feel connected?”

It can be your loved one’s clothing, a t-shirt, a sweatshirt, whatever it is, cooking their favorite meal, or wearing their favorite color. There are loved ones who are sad that their birthdays are coming up. It’s like, “Their birthday is coming up.” A lot of times, the anticipation of those special days or the holiday can be worse than the actual holiday itself. People will say that. I always tell people to try and plan something so that you know that you’re doing something in honor of your loved one, even if it’s just burning a candle. I have to add a disclosure. Do not leave the room when there is a candle burning.

There are things that we can do that come from the outside world. Nobody can even notice it or recognize it, but we feel it inside that we’re feeling connected to them. That is so very important. Hospice, with the programs that they provide, and a lot of funeral homes will do programs and outreach into their communities that help people to feel that connection. It’s so important. We can do that privately in simple ways. We can do it in a grander way, whatever that means to us.

I’ll never forget a lunch one time at this local restaurant. When our check came, the waitress said, “Nobody’s paying this morning because Mr. Jones passed away and his family is here. For everybody who comes in today, they want to give them a free meal.” I’m like, “I’m praying for the guy.” I wrote a note on a napkin, “Dear family, thank you so much. It’s so wonderful.” That was a grander thing. This family came together to watch patrons come into this restaurant and for the waitress to say, “You’re not paying for this.”

They’re doing it in memory and as an offer. I think that’s so cool. We don’t have to do things in a grand way, but the little things, a piece of jewelry, something that reminds you of your loved one, their jewelry, or something special to them. I am always telling families to talk about their loved ones. Share those stories. Share those mementos. Share those things because that keeps them alive and keeps us feeling connected to them in a different way than what we’ve been used to.

We’re used to them being there right before us, and our lives are so intertwined. That’s what I say, too. It’s not just that we lost our loved one before us. It’s all the ways that they were a part of our lives. That’s a lot. I don’t know who said this, but I have read different studies. They say for each person who dies, there are at least five people who are going to deeply grieve that loss. That depends on the number of siblings and children in the family and how big the family is, but there are at least five people who are grieving that loss. That is low, but it does give you an idea. It’s got the closest people to that loved one.

Teaching Grieving People How To Turn Pain Into Purpose

When you mentioned turning your pain into purpose, and you also mentioned about training that you do, if someone is reading this conversation and goes, “I’m at a place that I want to turn purpose out of my pain,” how can they connect with you? What would that training look like? What are the options for that? How is it conducted?

I have a couple of trainings that I’ve done in the past that work with this other lady. She is in this grief care world. She has been in this world for many years. It was a twenty-hour training that we started with. It went down to ten hours because people don’t have all that time. I have different programs that I have provided to people who want to provide grief care. It’s not like some of these big organizations that charge thousands of dollars and all this kind of stuff. We’re going to teach you what you need to know so you can be a good support person for the person who has experienced the grief.

Oftentimes, it is somebody who has had their own. The training also helps to support them in their own grief. We like to make sure that they’re a little bit further away. I would like to say at least two years from their own personal lives before they embark upon wanting to work with other families. There are a lot of other good programs out there. I usually post on my website. I don’t have anything in the near future that has been booked. I’m going to have to coordinate with my colleague. I’ve got so much information.

If somebody wants to look at a training, they can access ours. We’ll schedule them. I’m talking to a funeral director, giving her resources, and helping her to know what would be helpful to give to our families and stuff. Another thing is to talk to me. I love doing that, sharing information and resources. That’s so important. We do have the formal aftercare training. We do have that and have done it for many years. It does help people to be more organized and have the resources and the structure enough to create anything. Everything is created for them already. We just teach them how to use the tools.

Thank you. I know you said the funeral director spoke with you. What type of services do you offer through funeral homes? What type of services should people ask their funeral home about that they overlook?

I work with funeral homes. I provide a follow-up of care throughout at least that first year after the loss. What that typically includes is I wrote them the five books that are sent to the families throughout the year. Each book was written to be received at a specific time based on things that are commonly going on for people. We mail them out at 1, 3, 6, and 11 months. During the holiday time, we have a holiday book. I might also call families.

I have some funerals that want me to call them throughout the year. I have some who want me to call a month after the loss, whatever the funeral home wants me to do. Included in all of that are any additional resources that they want for their families. They’re provided to the funeral home to put in their funeral homes, to put in their family packets, or to use if they are hosting a support group. As far as the second question, repeat that question, because I don’t know if you’re asking if families are asking about grief care. Ask that again, so I can understand.

How To Take Advantage Of Grief Care From Funeral Homes

Someone goes to the funeral home. They know that there are services to help with the homegoing, the burial of their loved one. What are some things that you found people don’t tap into the resources of their funeral home? You explained things that people don’t tap into with hospice, which was available. Trigger warning for anyone who is reading. My husband was cremated. He told me that he wanted some of his ashes to go to his brothers and to go to the hunting grounds.

I found out later, I could have taken the urn back to the funeral home. They could have separated the ashes. I did not know that. I did that through tears and trying to fulfill my husband’s desire. I would not recommend that to anyone. I didn’t know that I could take the urn back and give them the containers, and they would have split that up and done that. I like to make sure that people know whatever different things that you find people didn’t know about that they could utilize, because that could have saved me something.

It’s funny you ask that question, because the average person has no idea that the funeral home is capable of giving you that extension of service if that’s what you need. In an ideal world, the funerals that I work for provide what I call proactive grief care. We’re providing the grief care. The family doesn’t have to ask for it. It’s part of the services. They’re never charged for it. I’ve never had a funeral home that went back and charged their families for my services. They get the services I provide them. They take great care of me. Families automatically get it. They’re told they’re going to get it.

Nobody else has any idea how to do what you said, go back to the funeral home, specifically, with the ashes to do that. People don’t know. That’s the truth of it. They have no idea. My soapbox with funeral directors all these years has always been that you need to proactively provide grief care for families because they’re not going to think of you. You’re not even going to be on the list of being thought of for grief care. They’ll say, “I have a lending library. I have resources.” Your families don’t know that you have that.

No matter all these years, I’m still on that same soapbox. We have to be proactive. I would tell anybody who’s reading, don’t hesitate to call your funeral director and ask, “What are you doing in grief care?” In saying that, I know that probably most, if not all, funeral home websites have a section that says either resources or grief support. Always check into that.

It’s usually a listing of some local groups, maybe some content as far as specific to loss of a spouse or loss of a child. I would first always check their website to see what they have. Do not hesitate to call the funeral home and ask for what you need if it has anything to do with grief and grief care. If they don’t have anything, they can put you in the right direction, at least. They’re not doing anything themselves. They’ll be able to refer you to something else. That’s important for people to be proactive themselves, if they have to be, because there is so much out there now for grieving families.

They’re just not finding it. They don’t have the bandwidth to search. They don’t even know that they can search. As you said about hospice, people don’t know that hospice provides grief care to communities. I don’t know what is ever going to change that. We have to speak for ourselves. We have to ask. If we feel that we need help, we need support, we need resources, or we need to talk to somebody, we have to reach out. Tap into your local hospice because that’s where you’re going to find those resources.

How Grief Adversely Affects The Physical Body

Thank you. You mentioned not having the bandwidth. Sometimes, people think grief is, “The person died, I miss them, and I go back to work.” What are some things that people don’t know about their own body and their own experience of grief that they may be dealing with and not realize it’s grief-centric?

They don’t realize it. I tell people that when they lose a loved one, for the most part, their brain is hijacked. You lose your loved one. You’re dealing with that. You’re dealing with all the things that you need to do to take care of your loved one. Again, that’s your interaction with the funeral homes. After that, your brain is still hijacked. You could have been the most organized person. You could have been whatever it is. Once you experience that loss, there’s the day before the loss, and there are the days after the loss. What are you going to do those days after the loss? There’s so much that families have to churn through. Grief can affect us emotionally, physically, spiritually, and cognitively. It affects all of who we are.

It affects our senses. People don’t even hear right when they’re grieving. Things taste different to them. They may have liked a certain dish, and all of a sudden, they don’t like it. Music taps into the grief and the experience of it. There are so many ways that grief affects us that it affects us physically. I always had, say, a pissy stomach. If you’re grieving, your stomach is probably going to be a little bit off. If you suffer from headaches, you might have more headaches. As a caregiver, I always tell people that it is recommended that, within the first six months after your loved one dies, you should have a physical with your primary care physician. You should go do that to make sure that everything is okay with you physically, because there are some real things that happen.

As more time churns on, the more people stuff in grief. They start feeling all these different responses to it. They don’t understand it because they’ve gotten away from the actual death. Eighteen months down the road, somebody can be like, “I’m so fatigued. I’m so tired. I can’t get myself organized. I feel like I’m stuck.” They’re not relating it to the death because society is telling us, “Three days, you’re done. You’ve got to go back to work. You’ve got to go back to life.” That does not happen for most people. They do go back to work, but their whole being of who they were before the death, they are not that same person. You spend that whole first year trying to churn through all of the ways that your loved ones died.

It seems like during that second year, you change somehow. You don’t even know what day it happens. It happens that all of a sudden, you’re reestablishing your life. You start reestablishing who you are, what your routines are, and things that you’re going to surround yourself with. Hopefully, that’s what people do. Some people get stuck in their grief. They stay there for the rest of their lives. That’s a sad story. As people churn on, typically, we move on. We don’t ever forget our grief is right here. I can ask any person who’s experienced a major loss in their life. They can say this to me. “I can sit here today right now, and I can put myself right back to that day that I found out that he or she died.”

It’s there. Those emotions are there. They can be brought up. They’re just not as strong. They’re not as frequent. It’s not as scary. People are scared of what they’re experiencing because they don’t realize it. I always recommend reading whatever you can about grief. Read whatever you can about taking care of yourself while you’re grieving. That’s another thing that I’m a big advocate for. We have to make sure that people give themselves permission to take care of themselves, particularly when they’re grieving, because if they’re not taking care of themselves, they’re not taking care of anybody else.

I try and help people identify some things that you could do to help take care of yourself. We have care plans they can fill out and reminders, even, to write down to drink your water today. People can’t even think of that while they’re grieving. Get enough nutrition. What does that mean to somebody who is grieving? They’re like, “I don’t care about food.” We have these tools that we can give them that keep track of how much water you’re drinking. What are you actually eating? Did you have something nutritious? Did you walk a little bit today? Did you get your feet out into the grass today? We need to do things that are going to soothe our senses and soothe us. That starts with taking care of you. I have to take care of myself before anything else.

Communicate Your Grief With People Around You

When you look at the holidays in grief specifically, what are some recommendations that you can give to the people who are reading?

The first, most important recommendation that I can give is that people need to communicate with those around them. It sounds very simple, but it’s not because each person in the family has an idea of what they think they need or want in regard to the holidays, whether we’re going to cook at Mom’s house or we’re going to do something different. Are we going to stick with tradition? Are we not? It’s important that families sit down and communicate with each other with words. I’m not talking to text message or email. I’m talking with words.

Again, we have tools. I have a whole sheet that I can give to families that they can fill out. What are my expectations for that day? What are some old traditions I would like to honor? What are some new traditions that I would like to implement? Who do I want to be around? I am always saying that if you change anything, you’re allowed to do that. You can decide as a family, you’re going to do X, Y, Z. For some reason, you don’t owe anybody an explanation if you decide you can’t do that at the time, because you want to leave yourself an out.

That Thanksgiving may be different than the next Thanksgiving. This is just this year. Thank you.

It would be the upcoming year, because we can’t go too far. Sometimes, when you’re grieving, you don’t know what you’re going to be doing tomorrow. How are you going to be able to do that? We’ve got this first holiday season coming for people who are bereaved within the last year since the last holiday season. The most helpful thing is to communicate with your family. Do not be afraid because what happens is that when words aren’t spoken, and communication is not happening, we have expectations.

We start feeling the pressure of what I should be doing, what I could be doing, or all those things. Each of those people is dealing with the same thing. That communication is important. I tell people, you can come up with a new tradition. I got a lot of feedback from this. I said, “Have a tablecloth where you all write down your loved one’s name and a memory of them. Every year, you take that out.” You know how many families have come back?

I can’t even tell you how many families have come back from this simple suggestion and tell me about their precious tablecloth. The next year, they pull it out. They do some more memories on there. It becomes a family treasure. It’s so simple that you wouldn’t think that that would be so healing and so helpful. Doing and feeling connected, that’s what it’s about. It is doing things during that holiday to help you feel connected.

You might not feel like cooking anything, but let’s say that your husband loves your stuffing. Make your stuffing. You don’t have to give it to anybody to eat it. You can eat it yourself. These are things that people can’t think of themselves because they can’t. They’re so tied up in the grief, life, and everything else going on. Do something that’s going to help you feel connected to your loved one, whether it’s an old tradition or a new one that you can come up with.

I have a lot of people who leave that plate setting there for the loved one at the table with a picture. There are families where some family members are like, “I keep doing this.” It’s fine. If it’s your home and this is what you decide you’re going to do, you go ahead and you do that. You put that picture there every once in a while. It’s okay. I have families that’ll have the candle going all day so that even if they see it out of the corner of their eye, they know that they have that candle lit for their loved one.

We always watch those candles because I sometimes worry about that suggestion. What is that called? The ones with the little batteries. I have them. I’ve used them. It is whatever it is that you feel that you need to do. Sometimes, people don’t have to do anything. They can decide to stay home. Maybe some people want to be alone. That’s okay, too, as long as we make sure they have what they need and we offer them your presence and your time.

Some people are like, “No, I need to be home.” Another consideration, which is important as well. Sometimes, people think, “If I go away for the holidays, I’m better. I’m going to be able to deal with this if I go away.” What most people find out is that no matter where you go, you’re packing your grief with you. It’s going with you. What ends up happening is that you’re not doing the thing that you usually would be doing.

It’s new to you. That’s another challenge. You’re not familiar with it. That’s not a comfort. You’re doing something new that you’re not used to. That sometimes causes people some challenges that they thought, “I’m going to get away. I’m going to go to a sunny place. I’m going to sit on a beach.” That grief is going to come sit on the beach with you. As you’re taking it with you, it is what it is. Planning is important.

Leave yourself the out that if you decide to change your mind, you can do that even at the last minute. I offered to make a salad, let’s say. You’re not going to show up because you’re not going to drop off a salad. Be okay with that because nobody else is going to worry about that. We can’t put pressure on ourselves. We have to be kind and gentle with ourselves. That’s an important piece of all of this as well. Don’t put too many expectations on yourself because you already have enough to deal with, with all of the ways that this grief is affecting you for so much longer than anybody would ever imagine.

That’s another thing that can be talked about in life. Grief lasts so much longer than the average person would even consider. Look at our employers. They’re still giving three days off for bereavement leave. When are we going to get two months off for that? There are people who need to stay home. They can’t function. They can’t think straight. They can’t be as productive as they might have been. I have found through the years that employers have been a lot better with families by allowing them the flexibility of staying home a little bit longer, maybe transitioning to working from home.

I’ve actually written letters for people’s employers telling them that this is what is needed. If somebody is having a difficult time with their loss and they make the suggestion that they can work from home for a little longer, that might be better for them. I’ve never gotten called back and said, “My employer denied me that.” Another communication that we have to have is with our employers. If you’re in that stage of life where you have to work and all those things for a living, you have to communicate with your employer what is going on.

Getting Support From Others (Even At Least One Person)

That is an excellent suggestion to reach out to your mental health professional, your general practitioner, to ask for that note if you’re needing that. I appreciate you taking the time to have this conversation. You have provided some helpful tips that I know people have never heard of before. I have asked you a lot of questions. I want to know if you have any questions for me.

How long ago did you lose your husband?

It was March 11th, 2017.

That’s not a lot of time that has gone by. What did you find was the most difficult thing for you? I know there might be a lot, but what stands out to you in this time now?

It is the reality that I would never talk to him again. It is the reality that he is off the planet. As our children have milestones, and our daughter got married, he was not there. It is the reality that there is not one more phone call, one more conversation, and that he is gone.

It is the permanency of that.

I still am very fortunate. My family and friends have been my rock. My faith has been valuable. I know a lot of people no longer have their same community. I do. They have been so supportive. I’m grateful for them in that. It is the finality of his being gone and then talking to other people. It is hearing how unsupported they are to talk to people and hear the most bizarre things that people would think to open their mouths and say. It’s like, “You obviously have never experienced something harsh for you to open your mouth and say that.” That has been amazing in supporting people and hearing the things that they’ve been told. Those have been the two for me.

Most people do not have what I would think would be adequate support. That’s an individual interpretation. Somebody can have so many people around them. You look at the family like, “They got so many people around them,” but that individual could be standing there feeling so alone. You can’t assume because somebody has family and a lot of friends. It happens to a lot of people that the person they expected to be supportive of them, oftentimes, is not.

Those friendships change if not done with. There always seems to be that one person who steps up. I tell people, if you have at least one person, you are blessed. You do rely on faith because I also say that you’re never alone. God is with you all the time. When you’re grieving, these are things that you’re not focusing on here. Your brain has been hijacked. Think a bit of that. I tell my funeral directors, “Just think of this one. Your families come into your funeral home and sit down at that conference table. Think of their brains being hijacked out of their head. The information you’re giving them, they’re probably looking at you and are like, Okay.”

They don’t know what’s going on. We can’t assume, “They have family. They have whoever is around.” Never make that assumption. I tell people you have to find that one person. Sometimes, it could be a stranger from a support group. It can be somebody that they resonate with, like yourself, doing the show. They’ll turn to you and want to listen to you or what you have to say. It is hard. I’m so happy to hear that you do feel that you were supported, because that is one of the most important things.

The work of grief is done by you and only you. If you have those people around you that can hold you up in the times that you couldn’t hold yourself up, or there are people who are giving you the time and space to say and be who you are, what you need to say, and what you need to be, that’s important that you get that attention from the people around you, even if it’s one person. I’m happy for you that you feel that you have that, because the majority of the people that I talk to down the road are telling me I’m the only person who is checking in with them.

Their closest family and friends are not checking in with them 10, 11, 12, 18 months down the road. This thing is important to add here, too. I tell people that those around you aren’t bringing it up or saying something because they don’t care. They don’t know. They don’t understand. Guess what the second reason is? The second reason is that it’s easier not to say anything.

We’re saying, “I’m fine.” If you said you’re fine, then I’m going to believe that. We don’t have to deal with this.

We’re going to act normally like nothing has changed. That’s the thing. I tell people, say, “I’m taking it day by day,” because they can’t even figure out what to say. Tell somebody newly bereaved, it’s okay to say to people, “I have my bad days.”If you keep saying you’re okay, and they’re looking at you, and you look the same as you did before your husband died, they’re going to say, “Nothing has changed. She’s going to work. She looks good. She’s taking care of herself. She says she’s fine. That’s the end of that.” That goes around.

I can’t think of any other questions. It’s amazing. You are another example of turning your pain into purpose by doing this show and doing the work that you do. That’s the most that you can do. The most that any of us can do is to be a little bit more sensitive to others when they’re grieving, because we know, and we don’t want anybody to join our club. Nobody wants to join our club. It’s hysterical. I told you we do The Grief Cruise. We’ll be in the restaurant at night, eating, dancing, and laughing. People will come up and say, “We want to be part of your group.”

We don’t even want to tell them what our grief is because we don’t want to make them feel bad. We all get a chuckle out of that. There’s a lot to be said about surrounding yourself with people who do understand because they have had a similar loss, and finding that one person who can be supportive of you. That is important. That person has to feel like they’re being supportive. That’s most important. Anybody can say, “I’m supporting my sister.” If I don’t feel my sister supporting me, I’m not being supported.

That’s a perversion. I am going to say something to our readers, and then I want you to have the final say, maybe another thought. Share your website or email address, and anything else that you would like to say to wrap up this conversation. I am grateful that you found value in your time spent with us. Linda’s concept of the tablecloth, you should check that out. That is amazing. Also, reach out to your funeral home, hospice, whoever helped you, and the hospital.

If you are looking for resources in your area, she has given you that tidbit to check in with them to ask for the resources that they have. When you were there, and your loved one was passing, your mind was focused on that. Now, your mind is focusing on what tools you need to continue living and keeping their memory alive. Thank you. I am sorry for your loved one who is no longer here that drove you to this conversation, but I’m glad that you found us.

That’s so beautifully said. I don’t know how I can say even more beautiful than that. It feels alone, but there’s a lot that can fill some of that time to help you with your grief. There are resources out there. I have my website under MourningDiscoveries.com. I am happy to talk to anybody. I do have a monthly support group that I run every second Wednesday of the month at 4:00 PM Eastern Standard Time. If anybody’s interested in that, you can let me know. I can send you a link. You register for it. You can join us every month in that.

I don’t use anybody’s addresses or information for any other reason but to contact you. There are resources. I encourage you to continue to try and tap into those. I wish you well on your journey because grief is a journey. Remember this. It’s not so much the time that goes by. It’s what you do with that time that matters. Think of the things that you can do with your time that can help you, because that will help all those around you as well. That’s the best that I can say.

Thank you.

You’re so welcome.

Important Links

• Linda Findlay
• Linda Findlay on LinkedIn
• Mourning Discoveries
• The Grief Cruises
• The Grief Cruise on Facebook

About Linda Findlay

Linda Findlay has dedicated more than 40 years to supporting grieving families across the country. Her work began after the heartbreaking loss of her firstborn daughter, Aubrie, in 1989—a loss that shaped her lifelong mission of helping others through grief. In 1994, she founded Mourning Discoveries, Grief Support Services, and soon began serving funeral homes as an Aftercare Coordinator.

Since then, Linda has worked with thousands of families through funeral homes, hospices, and faith-based organizations. She has developed and led countless workshops, remembrance services, and support groups, always with compassion at the core of her work. Today, she also serves as a lay counselor for a Christian Care Ministry in Greenville, SC. Linda considers her greatest honor the opportunity to walk alongside others during their most difficult times.