My primer on grief

Today is my sister Margaret’s 51st birthday, the second since she suddenly died in June 2023. This essay, formerly posted on Medium a year ago, touched some people and maybe it still resonates today.

I was approaching the halfway point when the calls started to come in. I was on my bike on the Towpath trail, not even an hour from my home in Cleveland, Ohio. It was a sunny, mid-June day — the kind you don’t take for granted in the Midwest after months of winter grey. I had my phone strapped to my handlebars and remember seeing my mom call. Ah, I thought, I’ll just call her back when I get home. I’m almost at my turnaround point in the 25-mile ride I’d planned that morning. I felt a little bad that I hadn’t partaken in our weekly ritual the day before, where she calls me via WhatsApp on a Sunday afternoon from my home country of Trinidad & Tobago and then hands the phone over to my sister, Margaret, for us to have our weekly catch up. This was a ritual almost 23 years old at this point, since I’d left Trinidad for college here in the United States. But there were times when I’d miss a Sunday while traveling, like I had been that weekend, and figured I could catch up with them on a Monday (Tuesday was pushing it). As those thoughts floated through my mind, with my breath syncing with the whir of my pedal strokes, I saw my brother text me. Strange that he’d do that — he was usually busy, either at work or, on this Juneteenth holiday, entertaining his two little girls. I was at 12, then 12.1, then 12.2 miles. I’d call him when I stopped. When I finally stopped at that halfway point, alone in an industrial estate just outside of Cleveland, the paved trail running alongside a road that ran alongside warehouses and offices, wildflowers and grasses waving in the wind along the trail, I read my brother’s text. Did Mummy call you? he asked. But before I could even respond, my husband called, and that’s when I knew. I stopped at 12.5 miles, got off my bike, and I knew. My sister was gone.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park Towpath Bike Trail. Image from https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/fact-sheets/2017/10/cuyahoga-valley-national-park

The version of grief that I’m most familiar with is when it is unexpected, when it is distant, and when one is trying to make sense of it in the space of a few weeks with family before returning home. It is the grief of the immigrant son, of the child who holds family in their hearts but, with two plane rides between them, is too late to hold loved ones in their arms. When I write this, it’s now almost Margaret’s birthday, almost exactly 5 months since she suddenly went to sleep on a Sunday night (Father’s Day) and was found dead in bed by my mother on Monday morning, lost, after a long battle with depression, to kidney failure, probably due to a seizure in her sleep. I think my mom pointed out the link to Father’s Day in her own retelling, reminding anyone who’d listen over these past few months that Margaret loved her father and missed him dearly. Our father had also suddenly died, his body also an object found, this time in the heights and hollows of Mount Saint Benedict. He, too, suffered from a severe bout of depression prior to wandering in the southern foothills of our Northern Range. He was searching for something out there, maybe himself; the coroner ruled the death an accident, due to a fall. In both instances, the deaths were communicated to me by my husband, Jeff, over the phone. Both deaths involved me quickly and somberly buying flights from Cleveland, Ohio, under the missive of “you need to come home now”, to join my family to be with them in grief.

What I have to offer from these journeys in the valleys of grief is a primer on the return home. I am familiar with the urgent sensemaking your brain cannot help but attempt, while dealing with the mundane drudgery of passport checks and the warm, well-intentioned but, ultimately, uncomfortable presence of family and friends. Who wants anyone around when all you want to do is shut out the world and wish that Margaret was still alive? When the only thing that seems absolutely necessary is to hold the survivors, the ones who found Margaret that morning, in your arms. I’m acquainted with this version of grief, with having to hold it together while quickly re-acclimating to a familiar yet unfamiliar space; this was the house I grew up in, but it was no longer my “home”.

This isn’t Kübler-Ross’ “five stages of grief,” of which much has been written. Instead, this is advice for those who have to make the unexpected journey home, who must quickly descend into situation already made for you, a swirl of people, tasks and intentions not of your own making, with no time to work through denial or acceptance. This is what you might read on that flight or car ride home, and what you re-read as the funky mix of sadness and relief settles on your heart each morning. Sadness for the reason you are home, but relief that you are there.

A primer on grief

1. Be prepared to be angry at everyone and everything. Kübler-Ross never professed that her “five stages” were intended to progress in a fixed sequence for everyone. Denial doesn’t always precede anger. For me, there was no denying that Margaret was gone. Her existence was both persistent — she’d survived decades of depression and, more recently, seizures — and tenuous. How long could she keep this up without some major change? Now she simply was not physically there. I was pissed. Mad at the doctors who said past kidney scans revealed no damage after a seizure. Mad at us, her family, for not figuring out what kind of care she needed; it didn’t matter that we had tried and that mental health care options around the world are limited. I was angry we hadn’t done more. Mad at the neighbors, friends and extended family who were constantly there, checking on Mummy, providing condolences. Why didn’t they just give us space? And why was no one crying? Why were people rehashing memories of times gone by, of things Margaret did or said, making Mummy laugh? Again, why was no one crying? I just want to be sad. The calm and good cheer from loved ones may rattle you because it is not what you want for yourself. Be prepared for the maddening cocktail of confusion and ambivalence…

2. …but then remind yourself that people are trying to show that they care. It is ok to mourn in whatever way you see fit. Which means it’s also ok for others to do the same. The hustle and bustle of food, flowers, laughter, chatter about current events here and abroad and reminiscing over never-before-seen family photos brings an energy into the otherwise low-grade fever dream of grief. People aren’t crying all the time because they are bringing their full lives to your immediate situation. They bring their own laughter, tears, packed school lunches, missed deadlines and losses to your porch and living room, to the seat next to you as they hold your hand. They bring the fullness of life, recalling the past, holding you in the present, and helping you to imagine a future without her or him or them. Let their talk and its normalcy, the mundaneness of life marching on around the bubble of your family’s pain lift you up. They, too, are trying to feel their way to some understanding, right along with you.

3. Use gratitude as a salve. Mustering whatever intention one has at this point, it can help to begin noticing these moments. As you ride the waves of sadness, frustration, anger, confusion and joy, notice that you are still here and still loved. This may be one of the hardest parts of all of this. You still being here means that you are away from her, because she is not here. She is gone. But you still being here means that there is much life for you to embrace in each moment. There is comfort to be had in being with age-old friends and cousins. There is joy in finally figuring out which uncle was that handsome man in the black and white beach photo or stumbling over a shot of us three youngest children, my gap-toothed smile not quite matching the quizzical expression on my sister’s face. There is solace in having time with Mummy while she is still with us, grace in seeing my big brother Michael take the lead — yet again — in coordinating our family around death and its rituals. There is appreciation for my sister Frances’ constant support in executing plans, in just getting things done that needed to be done. Gratitude for my husband, Jeff, for being here with me and mine in a humid, foreign land that he now also claims as home. Seeing, noting, calling to mind, jotting and speaking of these small wonders, holding these tiny miracles is a salve in that moment. Crossing some invisible threshold of pain to feel thankful is a fresh dressing on the wound of grief, a gentle salve on the sore. Over the days, months and years, it is to be applied often and again until the scar that remains only dully aches. Visible, but lightly carried.

4. Choose a story to believe. Four days after her death, two days after my arrival, I realized that Mummy and those around her, her friends of a similar age and core faith, had made a choice. They had collectively and reinforcingly set an intention, choosing to believe that Margaret was at peace. My other sister Frances, for years the caretaker of the caretaker, also chose a story of redemption. Around my second week there, she told me she saw Margaret’s recent progress as a triumph rather than viewing the halting of that progress as a regret. Our belief helps us cope with the strange absence, the Margaret-shaped hole in our lives that we cannot avoid, the empty bedroom with the open door and naked flame that I could not avoid every time I walked through the main hallway of my childhood home. Choosing a story to hold on to gives you a sense of agency, maybe even a little control, in the midst of a world falling apart.

***Thinking about this today, on the first anniversary of her death, has been it’s own balm. I was tired — not fully exhausted, just “low” — last week and frustrated since I couldn’t figure out why. I was worried about how Mummy would feel today, and what I “should” do today. I think the uncertainty was draining; making a choice, any choice — to bike, to be quiet, to make phone calls, to just do nothing, seems to help. It turns out Mummy was not the one to worry about. When I asked her how she felt today, and what she needed, her response was “What month we in again?” Whether it’s the encroaching, greying memory of old age or her psyche protecting itself, I’m not sure it matters. Instead, I’m reminded that there is little I can actually control, so I might as well focus on what I can.***

5. Choose a story to tell. My mother and her friends shared their chosen story with each other over and over again. Figuring out how to express the story, once chosen, is the next step. The tricky part of this is in figuring out at whose feet you will lay bare your soul, and to whom you will say “Everything’s fine.” Which friends, siblings, cousins, or acquaintances will get to see and hear the rawness of your grief? Who has the capacity and willingness to sit with you and hold you, even if it is in silence over the phone? Who might know when to commiserate about past hurts and frustrations and when to gently nudge you to move on and forgive? Or, who are the ones in your life who are well-meaning but not in the right place or time to truly listen? Or don’t have the life experiences — yet — or emotional wherewithal to be fully present? For some time, I assumed that I needed to bare myself to all in order to stay sane. If asked, it was the whole truth and nothing but. But, now I accept that I don’t need to do that to feel comforted, nor is it appropriate for everyone. Maybe it’s a feeling about the place, situation or moment you’re in, or maybe it’s an explicit invitation to share, but you’ll eventually know when and how to share your grief. It’s ok to say, “I’m ok, and how are you?” to one set of people and to fully break down into a weepy puddle with others. It’s not other people’s fault or any weakness or strength on their part. Some people will be able to give you what you need and others won’t during this time. My advice is to have a story, a few sentences perhaps, at the ready for those who may not know what to say, how to say it, or how to listen. A few token words to share your thanks for their concern. But then have your people around you, the sponges who can absorb all that you feel, knowing that you’d do the same for them when the time came.