Op de Utrechtse Heuvelrug, elke eerste zondag van de maand Heb je op jonge leeftijd je partner verl

Op de Utrechtse Heuvelrug, elke eerste zondag van de maand Heb je op jonge leeftijd je partner verl
Heb je op jonge leeftijd je partner verloren en ben je -als één van de weinigen in je omgeving-
bezig met rouw, verlies en herinneringen?
Zou je graag lotgenoten willen ontmoeten en
ervaringen
delen in een kleine, informele groep? 'Jonge Weduwen Wandelen' organiseert
elke eerste zondag van de maand een wandeling ergens op een mooie plek in Nederland.

Blog: Standing next to a young widow

As a young widow I am surrounded by people who, like me, are inexperienced in matters of mourning. That makes it extra difficult: for me, for them. The people around me aren’t yet experienced when it comes to talking about sadness, about grieving, about death and dying. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing; many good intentions, much frustration and many good conversations later, we are learning together.

The hardest part for me is still the fact that people want to relieve my pain or take away my sorrow. It’s unavoidably human. If you love someone, you don’t want that person to be sad. And so you will try to lighten it, to bring calm, to offer hope. Except. That’s not possible when someone has passed away.

When I’m feeling his death very acutely. Don’t try to soften his passing. Don’t say that ‘he had made peace with it’. Don’t say that ‘he’s always near’ me. Don’t say that ‘time heals all wounds ... ’.

When I feel so full of pain, don’t try to take it away. Stay with it. Try to stand next to my brokenness without being able to console me. Without making it worse. Without making it better. Don’t try to manoeuver me away as quickly as possible, back out of that pit. Instead, stay with me, right there — briefly — at that deepest point. Acknowledge that it’s black there and that there is no solution or salvation for it. Acknowledge the reality just how I experience it at that moment. He is no longer here, and nothing about that will change.

If you can do that, you’ll be my hero. You’ll be showing me that my sadness isn’t scary, isn’t unbearable for you. And better yet, if you dare to stand there, you’ll give me the confidence that I can also be and stay there.

And when I am deeply sad and — while the months tick by — I sometimes cry because he’s slipping away from me; the sharp focus of my memories, the sound of his voice, my image of him, how he continues to disappear from my day. Don’t try to soften it. Don’t say, ‘but the connection will always remain’. I would much rather that you acknowledge that this letting go is also terrible. Don’t grasp, in your powerlessness, at rays of hope, like ‘but there are so many things you’ll never forget’ or ‘but your love for each other will always be in your heart’. I know. I know. And you’re right. But at this moment I just don’t feel that. Dare to stay with the pain of letting go, because that is the task I face.

When I’m feeling sad and I’m grieving, don’t hope for me that it will be over as soon as possible. Don’t hope for me that the old Me will show up again soon. Because, though it might seem that way to an outsider, I can no longer see sadness as exclusively heavy. I feel some lightness in it, and — just like at beautiful moments — I feel so connected to him. Instead, give me space to grieve long and well. Because I think that’s where the secret really lies — what happened when I stood long enough in that black pit; so much of value lay in its depths.

In my grieving, I ask something of my friends and family that goes deeply against the grain of their first human reaction: wanting to take away pain. Only now that I have so often stood knee-deep in the sadness myself do I really feel how well-intentioned soothing words, loving advice, and that oft-spoken optimistic closing remark are no help at all. On the contrary: at times it makes me furious, or desperate. It’s incredible now that I understand how much people just plain want to be heard, and how often I myself have talked right on through it, and I inadvertently still do.

Only now am I learning that the only thing you can do is stand in another’s shoes.

Listen. Stand in another’s shoes, and then feel. Acknowledge and affirm their emotions. Silence. You’re my hero not only when any sadness is completely okay, but also when you dare, for a moment, to allow the sadness to be in you. Such a small moment from another person, briefly standing in my shoes, gives me such relief. Understanding.

And you know — strangely enough — when I then don’t have to struggle with feeling alone and not being understood, when that tension falls away, then I have noticed that rays of hope naturally present themselves on my horizon.

A friend said it beautifully: it feels so awful that I can’t console you. She was both right and wrong — there is indeed no consolation, not in the sense of being able to alleviate my sorrow. But for me, there is no better consolation than you staying with me while I grieve. Gently waiting and listening until the sadness passes. That takes an awful lot of patience and trust, and flies in the face of everything you, as my friend, would want. But if you can help me this way to believe that I can bear my grief and that my love and gratefulness for this life will naturally reappear... then we will surely find our way.

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