Ideas to Help You Comfort a Grieving Friend

My brother died on June 28, 1992. Though he was terminally ill, the timing of his death was unexpected and put our entire family into shock. My sorrow was not for my brother, for he was no longer suffering. Nor was it only for myself. The hardest part was seeing my parents go through the pain of loosing their only son. My experience of the death of a loved one showed me that many of us don’t know how to help a friend who is dealing with death and grief. I’d like to share some ideas with you that might help you to comfort a grieving friend.

Let them talk, especially about their loved one. Talking helped me work through my pain and somehow, it was lightened by sharing it. Share your personal memories of their loved one. It is nice to hear how your loved one touched others lives. Or don’t be afraid to just sit quietly and hold them.

Share short scriptures if you like, but forget platitudes like “I’m sure it was for the best” or “They are in a better place.” These just don’t help at this time. And unless you really know, have lost a loved one yourself, don’t say “I know how you feel” because you don’t, you can only guess.

Don’t just say “If there’s anything I can do, let me know.” A grieving person often can’t think of what needs to be done, let alone feel comfortable asking for help. Find something that needs to be done and do it. Run errands, wash their car, care for their children while they are busy making arrangements, start a load of laundry or take their laundry home and do it for them, polish dress shoes or take clothes to the cleaners that they may need for the funeral. Pick up relatives at the airport, house out of town relatives. Offer to do something specific.

It’s traditional to bring food to the family and this is greatly appreciated. I mean really, really appreciated, unless you get five dinners in one day and then six the next. For about three days we were deluged with food, and then nothing.  Usually grieving people aren’t exceptionally hungry. Coordinate the meals/menus with others so that they are spread out over a period of time. Plan a meal for all the relatives after the services, at the church. Grieving people don’t need a bunch of hungry relatives in their home after the services. If possible continue the meals after the services also; in fact they are more appreciated after the confusion of services is over, than immediately after the death.

Send a card and be sure to write something personal inside. The cards I received were of great comfort to me. I could read them over and over again in private without having to think of a reply right then.

Don’t recite your own stories of death and present problems. A grieving person isn’t a good listener and just sinks further into despair when listening to a story that has nothing to do with them at the time.

If at all possible, go to the funeral or memorial. It really meant a lot when one friend took the time to come to the funeral. She didn’t know my brother, she came for me and I’ll never forget that. She was the only one of my friends who came.

Of course one of the most important parts of helping is prayer. Uplift your friend and their family in prayer during this time of grief.

Don’t forget them two weeks, a month or more later. Often times this is when it all sinks in and the struggle to continue on is difficult. Everyone around you is living their life and you want to scream out at the world, “Don’t you know what has happened?” Take them out to lunch, sit and talk, go for a walk, just spend time together. Encourage them to take care of themselves. I was the sickest I’d ever been in my entire life the year after my brother died. I didn’t understand how grief and lack of sleep stress the immune system.

For the most part, people really do love and care, they just don’t know how to deal with death and grief, what to do, or how to help someone who is grieving. So next time, don’t be uncomfortable or ignore someone who is grieving, just pick one of the simple things I’ve mentioned and show how much you really do care.

~Judy

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