Glenn died – I did not ‘lose’ him.
I’ve ranted about this before, but it seems that the further I travel on this journey of mourning, the more intolerant I am of not speaking the truth or hearing it.
Every time I hear, or read posts, or commentaries on grief, regardless of where they are, or who wrote them, stating that the loved one is ‘lost’, I get flippin’ mad. It’s like nails on a chalkboard.
‘Why?’ you might ask. So let me explain. Before I begin, the disclaimer is this – if this offends you, don’t read any further.
To talk about the death of a loved one as something we have ‘lost’ does death a disservice. That’s one. Second, our deceased loved one is not an object that one can ‘lose’, like as library book, or a set of keys.
And third, we are not being honest with our language, nor are we respecting the dignity of death.
Allow me to explain.
When we (that’s all of us) claim that a loved one is lost it implies two things – first, that somehow, we are responsible for the loss. If we lose our keys, it is through our own carelessness. We set them down and didn’t pay attention to where we put them – That’s on us… My bad as we used to say.
So to say that ‘I have lost my husband…’ somehow implies that I was responsible for the loss. And that is absurd. I am not responsible for his death. I did not cause it, it is not my fault. Bad things happen to good people – shit happens.
And second, this terminology objectifies our deceased loved one. He or She becomes an object, a thing. And you and I know that our loved ones are not things, they were people with whom we shared our lives. Our loved ones are not objects. They were living, breathing human beings. And as such deserve our respect.
And third. I feel strongly, that as a society, and even as a church, we do not honor dying and death with the dignity that it deserves. We do not do a good job of talking about it before it happens. We do not, as a whole, plan well. We do not prepare others or ourselves for the inevitability of death. We don’t have the ‘what if’ conversations. ( we did have these conversations, and often). We don’t allow ourselves to recognize our own mortality. We keep a stiff upper lip and pretend that we are strong when we are not. And so when it happens, we use all of the euphemisms that we can conjure up to avoid the pain of talking about it and dealing with it head on. We blindly assume that we are immortal – or 'I’ll get to it later'….'or I don’t want to upset ……………….(fill in the blank) by talking about dying…
We are not honest with our language – we are not honest about expressing our feelings… “ I’m fine , thank you very much…’, even when we are not. Not only is this unhealthy from a psychological perspective, it is also unhealthy from a spiritual perspective.
Have we suffered a loss? Yes – the loss of a relationship that was meaningful and important – but we have not ‘lost’ our loved one. At least in the Christian faith, we should know where they are anyway – with God eternal, however you want to define that.
If we, as Christians, believe that God is with us no matter what our journey, if this God is a comfort and a strength, full of mercy and grace, why are we afraid to talk about dying and death? It is inevitable – no one gets out of this life alive.
And so, to treat our loved ones as inanimate objects, to presume responsibility for their death, to not honor the dignity of death, to not be truthful with our language, is on a fundamental level, disrespecting life as well.
This journey of grief and mourning is the hardest thing I have ever done. But I will not demean or disrespect my husband’s life, or anyone else’s, by disrespecting their death.
And so I will call out (with love, of course!) anyone who uses language that I feel is dishonest. I will do what I can. And yet having said all of this, I know that most people are trying to be a comfort - they are not trying to be disrespectful - they just don't know what else to say. All the more reason to have these conversations.
Glenn’s life – and the lives of your loved ones - deserves no less.
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