It's Complicated

2/13/2009

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc133/moonchld999/WeepingAngel2.jpg

Life can be messy, and death can strike when our relationships are in flux.  Many families have to deal with unresolved relationship issues on top of the grief they are feeling.  How we feel about a person's right to make decisions, or even be present at funeral services often depends on which party we are closest to, and not necessarily what might be legal or fair for everyone.  In addition, the complicated and volatile feelings of grief and loss can further polarize and dramatize  the situation.

When someone we love dies, we can react by becoming very possessive.  In our loss, we grasp on to our memories, even complicated ones, and feel that we own all the grief.  Sometimes we get to the point where we resent the grief of those those we see as competitors.  Though the situation demands generosity and understanding, we have a very difficult time giving up more because we've already lost so much.

Most often, the situation is something like this:

A couple has split up, but the deceased has not married their current companion.  Therefore, the adult children and/or the former spouse hold the cards.  The current companion of the deceased feels that they should have the right to make decisions, but legally they have no rights.  Their presence would make the legal spouse and children very uncomfortable, but they have a need to grieve and participate as well.

or,

A couple is divorced, and the deceased has remarried.  In this case, the new spouse holds the power and the children and former spouse of the deceased may be denied their opportunity to grieve and participate. 

It's easy to see how many of us could end up on either side of this situation, depending on just when death strikes.  I advise families in this situation to be as generous as they can be to those who have no decision making power, because the shoe could easily be on the other foot. 

As an undertaker, I am bound to follow the wishes of my client.  Most often this is the legal next of kin, or if there is more than one at the same level of kinship, the person who has engaged my services and has agreed to pay for them.   I am also bound to obey the law, which means that at a public funeral, I can request that people stay away in respect for the family, but I cannot keep them from attending.  In any case, it is a heart wrenching task to even ask a grieving person to leave a funeral.  I have seen too many partners without the title of 'widow', or other 'left-out' relatives come up to the grave to weep after the 'real' family has left, and I know that many relatives and loved ones have had to deal with their grief privately when services have not included them.

https://eee.uci.edu/clients/sbklein/images/NOH/nohmasks/pages/fukai.htm

Japanese  Noh mask of a grieving woman

When I was a child, my parents separated for a couple of years and then reunited.  Soon afterward, my father died.  I distinctly remember that at his memorial service, there was a woman that no one seemed to know, who sat in the back of the funeral parlor.  She may have just been a former student of his, but if she had been closer to my father, I'm glad she was at least able to attend.  Certainly, she didn't call attention to herself or do any 'showboating'.  Sometimes, as my mother has often said, discretion is the better part of valor.  Many families are mature enough to call temporary truce, and allow everyone at least a limited role in the funeral.  

In the past, I have posted advice given by Award-winning Vanity Fair writer and hospice volunteer, Judy Bachrach.  Judy's advice can also be seen on her web site, theCheckoutline.org, and on Wednesdays on Obit magazine  .  Here is her advice on a difficult situation.

http://media.knoxnews.com/

Dear Judy,

Please don’t use my real name or anything similar to my name. I live in a medium-sized town in the South and everyone here gossips. My problem is the man I’ve been quietly seeing for 2 years died suddenly (thrombosis). It was a big shock, not just to me, but to everyone here.  His funeral is in a few days, and it will be a big event because he was so prominent and he comes from a prominent family too.

He was married and he has 3 kids, all in high school or middle school, and I don’t want to cause a fuss at the funeral. But I do want to go. My best friend says I shouldn’t because the wife might know all about us (gossipy town, as I mentioned) and she might throw a fit. She’s that kind of person.

But I think after a 2-year relationship with a man I loved,  I’ve got as much a right to mourn him as she does. Don’t you?

 Theresa

Dear Theresa,

You of course have a right to mourn a close friend. What you don’t have the right to do — given the nature of the town you live in — is come to his funeral and provoke even more gossip.  I’m guessing you’re probably right: the widow knows all about you and your relationship with her late husband – or at least as much as she cares to know. Your feelings toward her are your own business.  But they are not her kids’ business. Whatever these bereaved teenagers  may or may not suspect about their father, a funeral is not the time or occasion to clarify details.

Stay at home. Since your relationship was private, you’re grieving has to be done exactly the same way.

 Thank you for writing

Judy

 http://www.thecheckoutline.org/advice/hes-dead-and-i-cant-go-to-the-funeral/

Ask Judy

Advice for the dying, and for those who care about them.

http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/bios/judy_bachrach/search?contributorName=Judy%20Bachrach

Judy Bachrach

Award-winning Vanity Fair writer and hospice volunteer, Judy Bachrach, answers readers' questions and offers advice for anyone needing help on the most critical part of life -- a last act that, because of medical advances and early diagnoses, many of us are consciously living out for months and even years.

It is her years of work as a hospice volunteer that compelled her to start an advice column on dying for people facing critical issues dealing with death and dying, often with little support.

"The most common and hardest part of life -- facing and dealing with death and dying -- happens to be the very area where almost no help is offered. Hospitals ignore the problem, friends and relatives often don't know what to do, and doctors seem embarrassed by their inability to keep everyone alive forever," Ms Bachrach stated.

As a funeral director and an etiquette buff, I find Judy's advice to be well researched, thoughtful, and helpful. Her site is a great resource for those of us who realize the need to face up to complicated issues surrounding dying and death.

http://www.thecheckoutline.org/

Here are two of the many compelling questions Judy answers every week.

Dear Judy,
I’ll make this short. My breast cancer has recurred, third time; I am 37. We thought we had it beat the first time around. My oncologist has told me to “get my affairs in order.”
One of my “affairs”: My kids, 10 and 9. What do I tell them? Can I not tell them? What do I tell my mother, who has breast cancer herself, but not as bad as me. The prognosis for me is 100 percent bleak.
Sharon in Illinois

Dear Sharon,
I am so sorry about your recurrence, and sorry as well for your children — and your mother. Obviously, you must tell your mother the bad news at once: she will want to know, and she may be a help both to you and the children now, as well as much later when she can talk to the children about you, and probably (if she is well enough, despite her condition) help care for them as well.
Your children also must hear the truth, and I think they must hear it soon. Euphemisms are not a good idea. Phrases like, “Mommy is going away for a long time,” makes them think, in this day and age, that you are getting a divorce. A friend’s young children — when she told them much the same thing — asked why she couldn’t visit them on weekends.
So tell them you love them and that you are very likely dying. Tell them you have tried everything and nothing has worked. There is nothing else to do. I would also, of course, recommend a kind and thoughtful therapist for the children to see, both now and for later. That’s important. And as many relations as you can muster to be with them.
You haven’t mentioned a spouse, either present or former. If you are — or were — married, or have a steady man in your life, he should be by your side. And he should, once you are finished speaking, be there for them.
Thank you for writing
Judy

Dear Judy,
I have a dear friend with a virus in his heart — cardiac myopathy, I’m told, something I’d never heard of before. For some reason he just hasn’t been selected for a transplant. He’s dying. He lives in New York. I live on the other Coast. He says he’s too tired for visitors, and I think he’s also too depressed and plain sad.
I really do want to see him. I can fly out any time. When I phone, I just don’t know what to say except that — that I want to see him. But I also don’t want to put him out, or act like he has to see me when he’s weak and tired and sad. I don’t know what to say or do when we speak. I can hardly bring myself to call, I feel like crying all the time.
Do you have any advice?
Lucy in Orange County

Dear Lucy,
I am so very sorry about your friend. I know you want to see him once more. But he has made this much clear: he is not ready at this time for visits, even from those he loves. To be honest, he may not ever change his mind.
What you must understand is that his reluctance has nothing to do with his feelings towards you. The dying very often are weak and depressed — and patients with very severe cardiac myopathy (about 20 percent of those who get it) suffer especially overwhelming fatigue, in addition to fever, weakened left ventricular functions and bad chest pains.
In other words, visits, even from those closest to them, are tremendously taxing. Also, and I suspect this is the case with your friend, many are worried they might not be able to welcome guests as they deserve. Sometimes the disease progresses even after the virus is long gone. The immune system keeps on damaging the heart.
So for now, I’d suggest offering other forms of love and consolation. Continue phoning, no matter how difficult the conversations. But when you call, be practical. If he loves movies, maybe you might offer to rent some for him from an online video site. If you know his taste in books, you might buy and send a few. If there are prepared foods he enjoys, these too can be delivered.
In other words help out without making it seem a huge effort. He will know by these gestures how much he is loved and valued. And you will feel useful and appreciated.
Thank you for writing
Judy

for more great questions and spot-on answers, visit The Checkout Line at http://www.thecheckoutline.org/wordpress/category/advice/