Death is one of the only certain things about life. And yet, handling death is also one of the most difficult. Many people don’t know what to do with their grief, much less guide others in the best ways to assist them. The tricky part involves providing help that actually helps.
If you’re at a loss to figure out what you can do, you should know that you have options. Here are nine things you can do to assist a grieving friend or family member.
1. Check In Regularly
When people lose a loved one, they might hear from dozens of well-wishers in the first few days. Family and friends want to share their condolences and offer help. After that time, communication tends to drop off sharply. You might not get a response at all at the beginning, depending on how close you are to the grieving person. Don’t take it personally, especially if you’re not in the habit of texting several times a day already. Instead, keep following up every few days with a brief message of love and care. If you want to stop by for a check-in, plan to make your visit short and helpful.
2. Provide Practical Assistance With Daily Responsibilities
Grief is a heavy load to carry. People often throw off every responsibility they can to cope with the weight. Offer help in doing simple, routine tasks that get ignored at these times. It’s better to list a few things you could do (or simply do them) than to give a generic offer of assistance.
For example, in the middle of summer, you could spend a little time weeding or hire a neighbor kid to mow the lawn. If you’re particularly enterprising, you might set up a chore train to ensure the children get to school on time, buy groceries, cook for them, fold laundry, or take out the garbage. Helping with chores doesn’t have to take a lot of time or effort. A little here and there can help to keep their household running when they can’t take care of it.
3. Let Them Guide the Conversation
When you spend time with a grieving friend or family member, you might feel pressure to control the conversation or figure out the perfect thing to say. Unfortunately, it’s exactly this kind of pressure that leads people to say things they shouldn’t say to a grieving person.
If you want to avoid complicating the conversation or making them, feel worse about the situation, you can let them guide the interaction.
Allow them to bring up things they want to talk about and encourage them to continue the conversation. Validate what they’re saying but try to avoid reframing their expressions of grief in a positive or more comfortable light. Processing grief is hard, and it can get uncomfortable at times. If you’re there for them in the way they need you, you’ll provide better help.
4. Pay Attention While You’re Together
When you get together with a grieving person, you should focus your time and effort on them and what they need. Most interactions with family members and friends involve some give-and-take, but grief creates a moment where this balance isn’t appropriate. Checking in on someone’s welfare isn’t as effective if you’re on your phone the whole time or distracted with your own responsibilities.
Instead, block off some time when you can sit and ignore your text messages. Help to fold laundry or unload the dishwasher while you talk. When you pay closer attention than usual, you might be able to spot signs that they are really struggling and need help that they aren’t willing to ask for.
5. Offer to Assist With Memorial or Funeral Planning
Many people, in the midst of grief, have to suddenly plan a memorial or funeral with time, energy, and money that they just don’t have. Pre-planning for your own last wishes is more common now than it used to be. And yet, plenty of next-of-kin find out that there is no plan, no will, and no obvious way forward. If they haven’t already thought of what they want for their own death, they might not even know what they need, who to call, or where to start.
A grieving relative or friend might not want you to fully plan a funeral or memorial service, but you can certainly do some of the legwork for them. Offer to research online or make phone calls to find out pricing and availability. Pick an aspect of the service and handle it, whether you’re coordinating catering for a reception or ordering keepsake urns to hand out at the memorial. These responsibilities add up, and your help with a few of them can make a big difference.
6. If Possible, Send Money
Losing a loved one costs money. If you can help, you should. Everything from handling the remains to take-out meals people order because they’re too tired to cook adds to the bills. Some people plan ahead, but statistically, those people represent less than half of the population. Everyone else might have to scramble to pay some bills, while they wait on life insurance or death benefits, if they exist.
In addition to the costs of preparing for a loved one’s final rest, losing a spouse, partner, or parent often leads to a serious loss of income. Most Americans don’t have enough money in savings to handle even a $1,000 emergency, much less the loss of half or more of their household income.
Offering to set up a GoFundMe to handle the costs could be a lifeline. Even buying a few gift cards to favorite grocery stores or restaurants can help minimize the damage. For many people who are self-employed or paid by the hour, taking time off or not working at their full capacity can drastically reduce their income after a loved one’s death. In these cases, it’s important to think of ways to help cover these costs.
7. Find Your Own Source of Support
If you’re the main source of emotional support for a grieving person, as a spouse or very close friend, you may need to find your own source of support. As anyone in a caring profession can tell you, caring for people at a high level can exhaust you physically, mentally, and emotionally. It’s common for professional therapists to seek therapy to help them process some of the heavy things they’re helping clients to carry and avoid burnout.
You should consider doing the same. If you’re answering late-night phone calls and then showing up first thing in the morning to help with memorial planning details, you might need someone who can help you out with chores or listen to you as you unpack some of the stress. That way, you can avoid buckling under the strain or emotionally dumping on your grieving friend or family member.
8. Attend the Memorial or Funeral
Unless you absolutely cannot attend for a significant reason, you should plan to be present at the memorial or funeral. A study from the Funeral and Memorial Information Council noted that the vast majority of people consider these services an important part of the grieving process. They get an opportunity to provide a final tribute to a loved one and find community with their family and friends.
Although memorials and funerals focus on the deceased person, it’s important to keep in mind that they are also for the grieving people who need an opportunity to say goodbye. You can help a friend or family member who is grieving by attending, even if you don’t know the person well or you don’t have much to say. Attendance provides physical and emotional support to people at an incredibly difficult time.
9. Keep Reaching Out
When the phone calls, condolence cards, and flower deliveries stop, you still need to be there. Many people, after the loss of a loved one, say that they lose contact even with close friends and relatives. People don’t know what to say, or they’re afraid of saying the wrong thing, so they back off on contact.
For grieving people who lost a spouse, a child, or other members of the household, this can be a devastating loss of social connection. Older people who lose a spouse are statistically much more likely to die within a year, and experts say that losing social support may contribute to it.
Keeping in contact is crucial, especially if you were in regular contact before. Check in on occasion. Over time, you can invite your friend or relative to come to your house or go out with you.
They may look forward to it. Although you might not want to flood them with memories or pictures of their loved ones at first, you should consider reaching out on special days, such as a birthday or anniversary.
When you want to help a friend or relative who is grieving the loss of a loved one, the best thing you can do is to be a consistent source of support. Help them with the things that they can’t find the energy to do and let them decide what they need most. Using this information makes it easier for you to provide support that bolsters them, even in their darkest moments.
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This content is made possible by Larry Alton.
Photo by Mayron Oliveira on Unsplash