**This was written about eighteen months after Michael died, so it carries the intense emotional energy of that time. I am not in exactly this same emotional place anymore, but I thought these words might still be important or helpful for others. They are still very true of where I was at that time.**
From that first terrible day, I have tried my hardest to not resent the clumsy, thoughtless things people sometimes say. And God gave me grace for that; filled me with the ability to leave all this room for people to stumble awkwardly around our tragic loss. Still, there were some people who made that very hard to do.
There were things that I was prepared to hear; things I expected people to say, so I was braced for it. "But you still have your other kids." It still stung to hear those words, but I had expected someone to say them so it was not much of a shock. To my surprise though, I only heard them once, from someone I truly care about and who was just trying to find words in the face of my pain.
One of our early conversations as a family, in those first jagged days after we got the news of Michael's death, was about this very thing. We said, "Let's decide now to just have grace for people who will say stupid things that hurt us."
This was important, both for the sake of those around us and for our own well-being. If we responded harshly to people who tried to offer comfort in unfortunate ways, we would have to deal later with the damage to those relationships. That would take even more from our critically overdrawn emotional reserves. To lash out would hurt others and it would also hurt us, and we were already so wounded.
Also, we made a safe space within the close confines of our family, Lee and the kids and I, to vent about those harmful words. This was part of what helped us weather those hard conversations. Knowing that we could go home and blow off the hurt, anger and disbelief by telling our closest people about it was part of what helped us hold that line of determined grace.
Another thing that firmed my resolve to take this road of grace was remembering clearly how many times throughout my life I have been the one trampling tender ground with heavy feet and dumb words. I have blundered all over people's raw hearts, with the best of awkward intentions. I cringe to think of those time. That shamed regret fuels and strengthens my determination to respond gently when the same is done to me.
Still, there are times when it is very, very difficult not to lash out and ricochet hurt back to its source. There are some painful, painful things that have been said to me. Some of them have been said by people who truly love me, as they tried to make sense of this unbearable loss. Those are ridiculously beyond my capacity to handle with compassion, and I have to take them straight to Jesus.
When I talk about the way that I have handled these hard and hurtful things, people sometimes wonder why I do not address this issue directly. Why do I not confront the people who speak these deeply wounding words? It's simple. I can't. For someone like me, for whom confrontation is an intensely vulnerable, threatening idea, going straight to the source is no simple matter. That is me in regular life. Now, there is me in the severely wounded state of bereaved mom of a suicidal child.
My resources on every level have been deeply damaged. Just everyday life takes everything that I have. I have to carefully budget and manage my physical, emotional, mental, spiritual and social resources every single day. I do not have the resources for confrontation. To put myself and another person through even a simple conversation about how, despite how much they care, they have also hurt me deeply, would bankrupt my emotional resources. Because then I would not only be hefting the bulk of my own emotional struggle, I would also have to deal with their wounded sorrow, which only adds to my already heavy burden. I would most likely be thrust (as I have been before) into the position of having to make them feel better for how they hurt me. That is, if they immediately recognized the hurtful wrongness of what they said. If it were to go down the road of their justifying what they said and why it's really fine because they care and their intentions were good, that shoves me into having to defend my having been hurt. This, also, has happened before.
And frankly, I just don't have the energy. Just thinking about the possibilities enough to write it out is draining me, like the light dimming in a room when clouds cover the sun.
There is even a risk in writing about this issue here on my blog. I write about the real things, not only because it helps me, but because a number of people have reached out privately and told me that my sharing helps them, too. Where is the risk in this? The risk lies in the need of others to be reassured. Any time I talk about this kind of thing, people start wondering if they're one of the people who has trod on my toes or stabbed me in the heart. And they want to be reassured that it wasn't them; that they have not caused me more pain on top of all the other pain.
And so they leave a worried comment, "I hope this wasn't me." "I hope I haven't done this."
What am I supposed to say?
The compulsory Nice Girl answer is clear, "No, of course not! You would never do such a thing."
But why must I continue to spend my limited emotional energy comforting other people in the face of my loss?
And what if they are one of those people I'm talking about? What do I say then?
"Yes, actually, you were a huge thoughtless clod and you crushed my already bleeding heart."
No, I am not going to do that, for all of the very good reasons I articulated above.
So here's the thing: if you read my words and you feel a compulsion to ask, whether because you need my reassurance, or even from a sincere desire to know and to learn and to make amends...please, just don't.
If you were one of those people, we are fine.
Whatever hurt has been dealt me, I have taken to my loving heavenly Father and He has given me grace to forgive.
Here is what I would suggest...
If you have any doubts about things you have said to me, or to anyone else who is grieving, then chances are there is a better way you could have handled things. Look at your own words through a lens of truth.
Were your words gentle? Were they steeped in compassion?
Were they... necessary?
I will give you this two-cents worth of advice:
If you feel a need to wrestle with a death and try to make sense of it, please, please, please do not do so by talking about your theories with the person whose loss is maybe the greatest. Please.
Please. Talk about it to other people. Talk about it to God. Or to your dog. Or just...someone else.
Trying to figure out a death by talking to that person's nearest people is just not very kind..
Being willing to let your questions go unasked is one of the most loving and generous things you can do for the bereaved, especially in the case of a suicide.
Part of the reason for my starting this blog was so I would not have to answer those questions over and over.
But really....should they even be asked?
Think about the why. Why do you want to ask this question? Is it because you are struggling to make sense of it all? Trust me, the nearest and dearest of the deceased are wrestling with that in bigger ways than you can probably comprehend.
Is it because you have a theory as to why the death happened? Leave it unsaid.
How could hearing your theories possibly be helpful? Think it through. What are you expecting? Are you imagining that...you expound your theory, and that dead person's loved-one nods, the light dawning, and says, "Oooh, wow. I had not thought of that. Now it all makes sense. Suddenly, now that you have showed me the secrets behind their death, it no longer bothers me. I think I'll be fine now." That is not how that story goes.
Seriously, think! Ask yourself that all-important why. Why do you feel such a need to ask that question or make that comment to that person in the midst of their grief? Why?
Talking to grieving people may not be your best choice, especially if you are just processing at their expense. Why must they be the sounding board for your grief over their loss? Why must they be forced to listen to your theories and field your questions about their shattered hearts? What answers do they owe you? What response are you looking for?
Trust me, it is not comforting to hear our dead child blamed for our complicated relationship.
It is not helpful to hear someone be astonished at our stupidity for not seeing it coming.
(It is not helpful to have such thoughtless comments by others repeated to us- we don't need to know!)
It is not helpful to be advised on how to walk this hellish road by people who are not on it. Not helpful.
Grieving people are rarely looking for advice!! Trust me.
This is not your chance to tell me about everyone else you know of who has killed themselves.
How is this supposed to help me wake up every morning and remember how to breathe?
This is not your chance to tell me what I will feel and how I should handle it.
This is not your chance to process through your feelings about my son's death at my expense.
I fielded so much of this; so many questions and theories and just words in the months following Michael's death. I tried to see this as a gift I could give to people- to help them through this hard thing. I saw that people felt a real need to connect with me, Michael's mom, specifically, and God gave me grace for those needed conversations.
There were also many, many conversations in which I was put in a position to explain and explain and answer and comfort and help other people as they struggled with the suicide of our son.
It became too much.
Frankly, I think this is one of the many reasons God removed us from our beloved small town and thrust us into an RV many miles away.
People, using me, the mother of this broken, dead son, to help them work through their questions and puzzles over his suicide...
God gave me grace...and then he gave me a break.
More than a break; he gave me escape. He gave me rescue. He gave me rest.
I have heard a set of questions that can be wisely applied to any conversation, and they especially apply when talking with the bereaved:
"Is it true? Is it necessary? Is it kind?"
[edit: since I wrote this, I have actually had conversations with some loved ones about things they said that hurt me and it's gone really well. I couldn't do it in those days when my heart was bleeding and I could hardly breathe. It took time, and healing, and had to come in a safe moment, at a time when I could handle the conversation. I am grateful to have been able to have those conversations and to have had them go lovingly and well.]
