What Grieving Friends Wish You Would Say. 10 Things To Say To A Friend Who Has Lost A Spouse

by Monica Bobbitt

It can be hard to support a friend who has experienced the death of their spouse. You want to help your grieving friend. But you are unsure of what to say. What can you do to help?

When my husband was killed in a military training exercise, our friends and military community rallied around me to provide support. For many, it was their first experience losing a close friend. They had no idea what they were doing, and honestly neither did I.

A few days after my husband’s funeral, an acquaintance called to check on me. My mouth dropped as I heard her say,

“I know what you are going through. My dog died last month. I’m still heartbroken.”

I was stunned. How could she be so insensitive? How could she know what I was feeling? She’d never buried her husband. Losing your dog is not the same as losing your husband.

Another friend informed me that I would be miserable and lonely for the rest of my life.

“You’re going to be so miserable. You’ll never ever be as happy again as you were when Dan was alive.”

I knew my friends didn’t mean to be insensitive (really). They were actually trying to be supportive. They just had no idea what to say.

It’s a problem many of us struggle with when someone we know loses a spouse (or anyone else).

When someone is grieving, words can seem so inadequate. We often struggle to find the right words. And sometimes we end up saying completely the wrong ones.

Some people are so scared they will say or do the wrong thing they purposefully avoid the bereaved person, thinking that’s better than saying the wrong thing. It’s actually not better; it’s one of the worst things you can do. Avoidance is hurtful and confusing to someone who is already dealing with so much.

The truth is there is nothing you can say that will take away your friend’s pain. There are no magic words you can say that will fix it, you can’t fix the unfixable.

But there are some things you can say (or do) to provide much-needed comfort to a bereaved friend during a terribly difficult time.

1. I don't know how you feel.

No one can ever truly understand what another person is feeling. Even if we have suffered a similar loss, our pain and grief are as unique to each of us as our fingerprint is. No two people will grieve and mourn in the same way.

Don’t compare your friend’s loss to a loss you have experienced, especially to the loss of a pet. Losing a pet is definitely not the same as losing your husband.

2. I'm sorry for your loss.

They may not seem like enough, but these simple words convey so much meaning and show you truly care.

3. I'm not sure what to say. 

Be honest with your friend and tell them you are at a loss for words, trust me, they will understand.

Before my husband died, I’m not sure I would have known what to say to a friend who’d lost a spouse either. Though, I’d like to hope I wouldn’t have compared it to losing my dog. 

4. I'm here for you.

Everyone needs to know they are not alone. Knowing there is someone you can reach out to when you need them, whether its 2 p.m. or 2 a.m., is vital and so reassuring.

I had friends I knew I could message in the middle of the night when I had nightmares or couldn’t sleep. And ones I knew would drop everything in an instant to be there for me. 

5. Say nothing.

This is not the same as avoiding your friend.

Sometimes you do say it best when you say nothing at all. There will be times your friend doesn’t need you to say anything.

They just need you to sit with them in silence. Hold their hand, pass them a tissue, or make them a coffee. Let them cry.

Listen. Let them talk about their sorrows, no matter how personal or messy it gets.

Listening, without judgment, is one of the most important things you can do for a grieving friend.

6. I'm thinking of you.
Grief lasts long after everyone has gone home and all the funeral flowers have wilted. Knowing someone has taken the time out of their day to think of you is very comforting, especially if it’s been several months (or even years) since your loss.

A message that only takes a few seconds to send can make all the difference in the world to someone who is feeling lost and alone.

It’s been three and a half years since my husband was killed, and I still have people reach out to me on a regular basis.

“I just wanted to let you know I’m thinking of you today.”

Those messages truly warm my heart.  It’s so nice to know people still care.

7. Ask them what they'd like to talk about.

They might want to discuss their loss or their circumstances. Or they might just want to talk about something ordinary, like the weather.

For weeks after my husband died, it seemed like all anyone wanted to talk to me about was his death and my grief. It was so heavy to think about all the time.

I had one friend who didn’t talk to me about my loss at all. Instead, he would talk to me about the weather or wind turbines or bats (all conversations we actually had) and for those brief few minutes each day, I didn't have to think about my grief or my broken heart or how awful my life was going to be.

8. I'm coming to take the garbage out.
Even the simplest of tasks can be overwhelming to someone who is grieving. Avoid the tendency to ask the bereaved what they need you to do because, in all honesty, they likely don’t even know what they need you to do.

Take out the garbage, mow the lawn, or shovel the driveway. Make a list of household chores that need to be done and divide them between those who have offered to help.

After my husband died, so many people stepped up to help. One sorted all of his military kit; others took care of my lawn, a group of them pitched in to hire a house-cleaning service.

There was no way I could have managed all of it on my own, especially in those early weeks. They eased some of the load on my already overburdened shoulders.

9. Talk about their loved one.

When someone dies, we often worry if we talk about them it will make the griever more upset. In fact, the opposite is true. When someone loses a loved one, they want to talk about them. And they want to hear their name.

Say their name; share your own stories and memories of them. It’s comforting to know how much you loved them and will miss them too.

After Dan died, I heard so many wonderful (and funny) stories about him from his friends and soldiers. They made me feel closer to him and made me laugh. Not surprisingly, many of them involved Dan spilling coffee on someone or something. He really could be such a klutz sometimes. 

10. Would you like a hug?
Not everyone is touchy-feely, but physical contact can be meaningful and comforting to someone who is grieving. A hug won’t take away their pain, but it will make them feel loved and a little more secure.

I was always a hugger, but I find I’m even more so now. I hug a little tighter, and a little longer. Just in case. Because you never know what tomorrow is going to bring.

Supporting someone who is grieving can be challenging and difficult. It is gut-wrenching watching someone you love suffer. You aren’t going to have all of the answers, and you won’t get everything right. And that’s okay.

The most important thing you can do is show up. Be there for them in the days and weeks (and months and years) after their loss.

Show up. Say or do something. Listen when they need you to.

Be there. Be a friend who cares.

“The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.” ~Henri Nouwen

Chat soon,
Monica

Click here to learn  What Grieving Friends Wish You Wouldn't Say

To learn more about grief, resiliency, and life after loss, follow Monica Bobbitt on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/agoatrodeo/ 

His Last Breath: My Father's Battle With Lung Cancer

It rained the night before my father died. One of those warm summer rains that leaves the air more sticky and humid than it was before it started. 

It was still raining as I rushed to the hospital the next morning. I remember thinking my hair would be a disaster all day. A riot of big, frizzy curls.  

In hindsight, it seems such a bizarre, unimportant thing to be concerned about when you know your father is about to die. 

  

But already my brain was switching to self-defense mood. It needed to be elsewhere. 

Anywhere but signing his death paperwork and planning his funeral. Anywhere but saying goodbye. 

My father took his last raspy breaths just before I entered his hospital room. 

  

I paused briefly at the door. My brother Shawn, the first one to arrive, looked up at me, his grief-stricken face streaked with tears.

He didn't have to say a word.

I'd seen that same anguished look on the faces of my children three years earlier when I told them their father had been killed.

I was too late. My father was gone. 

  

I quickly crossed the room and placed my hand on his still warm cheek. With my other hand, I stroked his hair as his lungs exhaled their final breaths of air. 

  

I barely recognized the shell of the man left in the bed, his face sunken and hollow and contorted in death. 

  

The night before I had kissed him goodnight before I left. 

  

I love you, Daddy. 

  

He was so heavily medicated, I wasn't sure he'd heard me. 

  

"I love you too." 

Are you sure? I'd asked. 

  

"Yep, pretty sure. Night dear."  

My father's death was neither sudden nor unexpected. We had been anticipating it for several days beforehand.  

In truth, I'd been expecting it for months.  

And yet, that made it no less painful. 

My dad died of metastatic lung cancer. Seven months after he was diagnosed, he was gone. 

Last year, I knew nothing about lung cancer.  And now I know more about it than I ever wanted to know. Cancer has a sharp learning curve. Biopsies, thoracentesis, pleural effusion—it was so hard for me to keep all of the terms and procedures straight. The amount of information overwhelmed me. And I wasn't the one living with cancer; I can’t even begin to imagine how he felt.  

Late last fall he'd developed a cough he couldn't shake. He never told any of us about it though. It was no big deal. Just a cough.  

A retired industrial electrician and former smoker, my father had been cigarette free for almost a decade. It never occurred to him he had cancer. 

  

It never occurred to any of us he had cancer. 

  

In hindsight, we should have known something was wrong, long before he developed the cough. He hadn't been himself for months. He was always slightly grumpy (my kids even called him Grumpy), but over the previous year, he'd become withdrawn and irritable. It seemed like he was always complaining about something. 

"Your mother never listens to me."  

"Your mother can't remember a thing I tell her."  

Your mother this, your mother that. My poor mother couldn't seem to do anything right.  

We chalked it up to old age.  He’d turned seventy-five on his last birthday, and had definitely slowed down over the last couple of years. He didn’t seem to have the same energy he used too. But it wasn’t just old age, it was cancer. His fifty year, two-packs a day smoking habit finally caught up to him ten months ago when the cough first started. 

But really, it caught up to him long before that. He’d had a ticking time bomb in his lung for years and had no idea. 

  

My dad was dying long before we even knew he was ill. 

  

Last January, I'd sat beside him as the doctor gave him the results of his first biopsy. Non-small cell carcinoma; squamous cell carcinoma to be exact, the type of lung cancer most strongly linked with smoking. He had a tumour the size of an orange nestled against the membrane of his heart. Surgery was impossible; his only options were radiation, to shrink the tumour, and ease his symptoms, and chemotherapy to try to stop the cancer from spreading. 

  

And then the news went from bad to grim. Two more biopsies subsequently revealed he had a different type of cancer, adenocarcinoma, in his right lung. 

  

Concurrent primary malignancy.  

My Dad was living on borrowed time.  

His mood didn't improve after his diagnosis. He was angry—angry at the world, angry at cancer, angry at the health care system that was letting him down, angry at himself for ever having smoked in the first place.  

“Everyone else is making the decisions. It doesn’t matter what I say,” he’d grumbled to me after his last visit from the palliative care nurse.  

“I’m just a passenger along for the ride.”  

Yes, Dad and cancer was driving the car.  

He had every right to be angry.  

Cancer is such a cruel, merciless disease. My once strong father, who could haul lumber and logs effortlessly, was bedridden for the last six weeks of his life.  

Cancer robbed him of his breath and his strength, it took his dignity and then it took his life.  

He never made peace with his death. He clung to hope for a miracle cure, until the bitter end.  

For months, I silently watched my father die. I didn’t have the heart to tell him there would be no miracle, at least not for him. Hope was all he had left. And I couldn’t take that away from him.  

I knew he would never have chemo. His cancer was far too advanced, and he was far too weak. Chemotherapy would shorten his life, not lengthen it. 

  

At his last appointment, his oncologist explained to him why he couldn't have chemotherapy. She outlined the side effects of chemo as she told him how ill it would make him and then asked him what he thought.  

 “It sounds to me like I don’t want to have chemo." 

  

His shoulders slumped as he said it, his voice barely a whisper. He was exhausted. I knew he was nearing the end. I wondered if he knew it too.  

If he did, he never said it out loud. 

"We don't have to worry about that for quite a while yet," he told me, two weeks before he died.

  

He adamantly refused to speak of his death. 

  

The week before he died, my mother had to call the EMT's three times. The palliative care nurse called me the morning after the third visit and told me it was time, we had to move him to the hospital. At that point, my father was refusing to go. As his medical guardian, it was up to me to sign the papers. 

  

It was a position I'd never wanted to be in. I knew my father wanted to die at home, but I had to do what was best for him, and for my mother. 

Fortunately, I never had to sign those papers. By the time, I arrived, he had relented and agreed to go. On his terms, of course.  

"I'll go, but just for a week until I feel better. Remember what the doc said, I can come home whenever I feel up to it. A deal’s a deal. Right, Lib?" (Lib was his childhood nickname for me.)  

Right, Daddy.

He would never get to make that trip home.

He died the next day.

  

I started composing his eulogy in my head months before he died. 

"My father died of lung cancer. I would like to say he died after a courageous battle, but the truth is he never had a chance to fight. The war was over before the battle even started. Lung cancer was the victor, as it all too often tragically is.” 

The other day, as I was stopped at a stop sign, a man with his little girl crossed the crosswalk in front of me. She had dark curly hair and was talking a mile a minute. He held her little hand in his. With his other hand, he took a drag off of a cigarette. 

I could feel the tears welling in my eyes. She reminded me so much of a little girl I used to know. 

As I wiped away a tear, I couldn't help but wonder if she would be holding her father's hand in his doctor's office one day.  

Lung cancer is the leading cause of death from cancer for both men and women in Canada. Lung cancer kills more Canadians then breast cancer, colorectal cancer, and prostate cancer combined. Despite the large numbers of Canadians dying from lung cancer, lung cancer research is the least funded in the country. There are no national or provincial screening programs for high-risk populations. Partially because of this lack of screening, most lung cancer patients are diagnosed in late stages.

  

The five-year survival rate for lung cancer is a dismal 17%.

  

More than 85% of lung cancer cases in Canada are related to smoking tobacco. The risk of developing lung cancer increases with how lung you have smoked, how old you were when you started smoking and the number of cigarettes you smoke each day. The risk is also higher if you smoke tobacco and have other risk factors such as exposure to asbestos, radon, certain chemicals, and air pollution.

  

For more information on lung cancer and lung cancer prevention please see the Canadian Cancer Society

To learn more about grief, resiliency, and life after loss, follow Monica Bobbitt on Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/agoatrodeo/