Why do we cry even when a loved one’s death is not unexpected? This last week, my 91-year-old grandmother passed away. We have witnessed her gradual decline for the past few years. In the last few months, she seemed to be become more and more frail. Thankfully, she was still in her right mind and she passed away peacefully in her sleep. She lived a very blessed and full life and she was ready to meet Jesus. Even with the absence of drama surrounding her passing, we all still cried.
This experience has made me realize a few things about pain, death, loss and grief. It has been a very long time since I have lost a grandparent or anyone close to me to death. I have not had to personally go through a grieving process for about fifteen or more years. Since I am an adoptive parent this time around, I am seeing this experience through a completely different lens. I am really trying to allow myself to fully examine and experience my feelings of loss and grief.
What about her death makes me sad? Will I miss her stories about our family history and heritage? Will I miss her laugh, her cooking, her sewing, her creative frugality, her hands…just what is it? Or is it that I realize that since she is now gone that this is the end of an era? A huge piece to our family history is now gone. The truth is that it is all of these things and more.
As an adoptive parent, this has given me a unique opportunity to tap into these emotions and try to relate to my adoptive children on a much deeper level. I won’t even pretend that I will ever experience the level of deep grief and loss that they feel or will feel in the future. However, how can I harness the timing and emotions of this event to draw closer to them and show them that grieving is OK? A few thoughts came to mind as I was pondering this very thing. Maybe some of these will help you also.
ACKNOWLEDGE IT – Do not try to hide the fact that you are sad and that you are hurting. Sometimes we don’t want to cry in front of our children because we do not want to upset them. The fact is that they are probably upset already and seeing a parent cry, may actually be a relief. They won’t feel like they are all alone or feel wrong for crying.
EMBRACE IT – Actually embrace the loss and grief and allow yourself the chance to go to the painful places and even stay there awhile. Allow yourself and your children time to honestly explore why there is pain and the things that you will all miss. Pain is not always bad. In fact, it is such an important part of life that I am sometimes puzzled why we run from it and avoid it like the plague. It is OK to be sad, cry, grieve, and miss someone that you’ve loved.
LEARN FROM IT – Please try to see this as an amazing opportunity to draw closer to your family and particularly your adopted children during this time. It is also time to help you develop a little perspective on why their experience of grief and loss can be so intense. I had a revelation that hit me like a ton of bricks. While I will miss the things I know about my grandma, my adoptive children will not only miss their great-grandma, but they could also possibly experience a ‘double grief’ if you will.
There are a lot of things that I will miss about Grandma like her laugh, the color and look of her eyes, her cooking, her personality, her creativity, her amazing stories and so on. I will miss these things because I knew and experienced them. What about my adoptive children? They may miss some of these things about Great-grandma, but will they also grieve what they may never know about their birth family? “Do I have Grandpa’s laugh? Do I have eyes like my birth mother or birth father? Do I have a personality like my grandma?”
Do you see what I mean? I wonder which is worse….the pain of knowing, loving and then loosing or never knowing and experiencing at all? I am not looking for anyone to give me an answer here, but I wonder about it. What do you think?
We took our children to the pumpkin patch the same day that we received the news of Grandma’s passing. You may think that it was pretty ‘cold’ or disrespectful for us to go out and have some family fun shortly after hearing such sad news. We did it for a couple of reasons. First, we had promised the kids over a week before that we would go on this day. Second, Grandma would have wanted us to. She would have been pretty upset with us if we did not keep our promise to the kids. We had a wonderful day of family fun and the kids picked out a pumpkin for Grandma. Our kids said, “We want to get this pumpkin in honor of Grandma P.” It was pretty sweet to watch them try to find one that they thought ‘looked’ like her. So that is why we now have a memorial pumpkin!
So what about you? Will you optimize times of grief and loss to grow emotionally closer with your adoptive children? Are you willing to allow them to have a ‘memorial pumpkin’ so to speak…something tangible to honor what they have lost, no matter how ‘silly’ it may seem to you?
Cherri
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