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25 Jun Grief Tending as a Practice When Feeling Emotionally Numb

Grief Tending as a Practice

For some people, a Grief Tending ritual is a one-off event. They may come for a specific reason, have an experience and leave complete. For others, Grief Tending becomes a practice. People often return, once they have tasted it. They may come regularly, while they are working something through, they may want to work with feeling emotionally numb, or come occasionally as a refresher.

In her recent book, ‘How Not to Save the World: Doing Good Without Annoying Everybody’, Anthea Lawson quotes an interview with me about Grief Tending workshops in which I say:

“About half, come full of grief; others find it harder to access their feelings.”

Both these groups of people – those who have easy access to tears, and those who struggle to find their emotions, or feeling numb, might return to Grief Tending as a regular practice.

Pilates as an analogy for working with feelings

I have had a cranky shoulder this week, and tended to it in different ways through doing different classes with Victoria Park Pilates. It made me think about the different ways I use Pilates as a physical practice according to my needs. I notice some similarities with Grief Tending as an emotional practice.

My shoulder was really tense, and Ellen’s approach in her ‘Flexible Strength’ class was useful. I breathed into the tension, mobilised the joint with gentle exercises and letting gravity to do its work, I allowed the area to soften. This helped me to stretch and improve mobility.

Grief Tending provides a slow, permissive space to allow feelings to arise if they are present. This can be a way to access feelings if you are feeling numb, and may allow them to move through the body. Some people long for a space where feelings are welcome, where they can be supported by others to explore the terrain.

My shoulder continued to bother me. I used Duncan’s ‘Functional Movement’ class to do some more structured exercises with spring resistance to build strength.

In a similar way, with Grief Tending, we recommend explicitly building support in order to strengthen our capacity before moving towards grief. Like Duncan’s method, this provides a more stable base to explore from.

Feeling emotionally numb

When feelings are hard to access, we may need stirring exercises, some practical grief tools, as well as time to connect with emotions. We may not have the language to be able to label or identify what we do or don’t feel. Feelings may be hard to find or name. People may feel numb or disconnected. These are still feeling states. There are usually really good reasons to feel numb. In the presence of something that is too shocking or overwhelming to feel, our system has a really cool adaptation that allows it not to feel until it is safe to do so. This may take hours, days, months or years, if at all.

Feeling nothing is an important absence to notice. It is often an important indicator that feelings are not available, or not recognisable at this time; but we may have disconnected from the sensations to maintain our safety, sanity or ability to function. Sometimes we needed to choose not to feel in order to belong to a group – such as a family, a school, a cohort of friends, or a professional group. Sometimes being comfortably numb was the best option we had. Recognising and valuing the ways our defences have kept us safe can be a really important first step to acknowledging feeling emotionally numb.

Finding our authentic way to express feelings

It is very common to imagine that there is something wrong with us. We don’t seem to feel or emote feelings in the same way as others in dramatic depictions of loss. We can put ourselves under pressure to feel or express emotions in what we imagine is the ‘right’ way, rather than find our own authentic way.

It is possible that you have ‘Alexithymia’ – an inability to identify and describe your own emotions. More usually, we might not have found helpful role models for grieving. Ken Doka describes ‘Intuitive Grievers’ who have more easy emotional access, and ‘Instrumental Grievers’ who may express their pain in practical or useful ways. Often we are a mix of both and have access to different modes at different times.

Our personal neuro-biologies play a part in what and how we feel. It is easy when Hollywood portrays sadness or rage in archetypal ways to assume that the way we feel something is wrong. Our own wiring, personality, socialisation and history all contribute to a unique picture of sensations (or their absence), that make up our unique felt-experience.

We may need active engagement to find our own way into expression. In addition, we also have our own preferred ways to express feelings. Our mode may be through movement, stillness, verbal, sounding, or silence. It may be through other bodily sensations. We may need to tell a story, dance, cry, wail or sing. This is where having a Grief Tending practice can be a helpful way to give regular time and space to feelings. Simple ritual can be a helpful tool of symbolic tears, remembrance and mourning too.

There isn’t a particular goal or desired outcome in Grief Tending. Although some people may have been socialised, or made the decision at some point not to cry; tears may be both longed for and elusive. The same may also be true for someone who has been socialised not to express anger. In Grief Tending, there may be a possibility of experimenting with rage and screaming. We recommend allowing it to come up and risking expression, which can be very different to a kind of effortful, generated catharsis.

One to one support to complement Grief Tending

This week I also took a 1:1 Pilates class with Sam to help me devise a long-term strategy for improving the strength in my back and arms to give my shoulders more stability.

We recommend that people have enough support in place before tending grief, so that they can be part of a group, able to hold and witness others. Support may include a trusted close friend, a community that encourages our self-development (such as a 12 step programme, Co-Counselling, a choir or a spiritual community), or a therapist amongst other things. As with my Pilates lesson this week, sometimes we need some personal, targeted help.

In Embracing Grief workshops, we recognise that no space is inherently ‘safe’. We aim to create the conditions that allow people to lean towards being brave, if it feels okay for them. A gentle progression towards expression alongside somatic practices and an invitational approach can allow people to experience enough holding to risk expressing sadness, fear, anger, shame, relief, numbness, or in fact joy.

Being emotionally numb may serve us, as a way to function, a helpful strategy in the face of collective or personal trauma. And we may have come to a time in life where we want to uncover more flow with feelings. Our physical health is optimum when we have strength, mobility and aerobic fitness all available to us, and as needed in different situations. So too, in peak emotional capacity we will have flexible access to feelings, to be able to be both strong when needed, and soften when it is appropriate. Grief Tending is a practice that aims to balance access to grief and praise, or loss and love. Some people have more of a tendency to one, so we invite them to stretch into both ends of the emotional spectrum in order to feel more, and feel more alive.

Sarah Pletts is a Grief Tender and Artist who offers workshops in London and online, sharing rituals where grief on all themes is welcome.  For more information about Grief Tending events see here. 

07 May Involuntary Childlessness

Socialised to be a parent

I remember my life-size doll with her short scratchy blonde hair, painted eye lashes, plastic hands and feet, and soft fabric-cushion belly. She was known as ‘the baby-doll’, and I dressed her in a pink terry-towelling baby-grow, and carried her around, imagining her my real baby. My female socialisation came with many unconscious messages, including the expectation of motherhood. It never occurred to me that I would be involuntarily childless.

Longing to have a baby

My assumption was that I would parent at least two children. This prompted an unrealistic search for male partners, keeping the alternative drivers of my sexuality out of my awareness. Despite my unconventional family and creative education, I saw myself as maternal and I didn’t question this narrative. I longed for a child.

What I assumed was a biological urge, a human imperative to breed, did not match with my ability to conceive and physical capacity, despite eventually being in a relationship where it might be possible. I longed to become pregnant and become a parent. I dreamed about this fantasy altered state, and frequently found my dream-self forgetting I was a parent, and misplacing my child. My internal alarm clock rang for years. I was unaware of the condition that meant I was probably unable to conceive. I had hormone checks, tracked my cycle, stimulated my ovaries with acupuncture and herbs, and made love diligently during ovulation, but conception didn’t happen.

The quiet despair of involuntary childlessness

‘Babies’ is a six-part BBC drama series which explores the subject of longing to have a baby through the eyes of Lisa and Stephen, played by Siobhán Cullen and Paapa Essiedu. Their journey unfolds with complex relationship dynamics between the couple, and parallel relationships with their friends. The desperate longing of the couple to conceive is layered with disappointment when it doesn’t happen. The different oblique communication styles of everyone involved compound the only-too-common tragedy that puts them through the mangle of grief.

This may be an especially intense watch if baby loss is a hot topic for you. And I suspect that watching the struggles of the couple may be a powerful mirror if it resonates with your experience. This is a warm, deeply human, sometimes funny portrayal of loss, hope and vulnerability. In the programme, family and friends of the couple reinforce the tendency to avoid, stay silent, deflect and hide their feelings from others. ‘Babies’ is a brilliant portrayal of a descent into the quiet despair of involuntary childlessness.

Toxic positivity to avoid grief

The social impulses of the protagonists reflect the shocking contemporary British tendency to avoid the subjects of miscarriage and childlessness and carry on. There is plenty of toxic positivity as the characters succumb to the temptation to button down feelings and hide genuine expressions of distress. The mismatch of these communication norms versus the felt experience of heart-shattering grief made me remonstrate out loud as I watched, (although me shouting at the television is not unusual). The template of mainstream contemporary culture as it is shown here meeting grief, is a believable portrayal of how we try to defend ourselves unsuccessfully against pain.

Coming to terms with involuntary childlessness

I was sad but sanguine, when I came to understand that I was not going to be a biological parent. My longing concluded with a period of grieving. I re-oriented my life, choosing to see conception as a gift rather than a right. I was also lucky to be an engaged step-parent, and felt able to accept this role with grace. I love being a step-parent, and am proud that my step-child now has step-children, and I am diving into the role of step-grand-parent.

If I’m honest, part of me was also relieved that I wouldn’t have to endure the challenges of the initiation of birth, and the sleepless nights, relentless care and unanticipated circumstances that often follows the birth of a child. I wasn’t entirely sure that I was strong enough to cope with all that biological parenting might deliver.

Subconscious desires to parent

Longing can be a deep desire to fill an unmet need. It felt important that I examine my subconscious motivations, as well as the more relational and practical aspects of the desire to parent. I longed to love and be loved, and I began to recognise that I couldn’t control how this might or might not happen. Was I hoping to offer to a baby what I hadn’t received enough of myself? As a child I longed for the siblings that never came. I learned of my two still-born ‘ghost’ siblings. My father’s baby brother died five days after birth. Was my own longing part of an intergenerational pattern of wishing for a missing child?

Different routes to parenting

As I explore with the guest interviewees on the ‘Rainbow Mums’ podcast, parenting can happen in many different ways. Blended families and chosen families are normal, and may include different kinds of parents, different modes of arrival, and different kinds of sibling relationships. Some of the interviews feature people who have used donor insemination, or have adopted a child as well as step-parenting. However, it is often the underlying impulse to parent that leads to intense longing, which may end with child-rearing, or may lead to deep disappointment, shame, or a sense of hopelessness.

Increased visibility of involuntary childlessness

For me, the series ‘Babies’ flags just how common issues around involuntary childlessness and fertility are, and how rarely they are shown on television. ‘Babies’ stands out as a realistic and warm-hearted examination of miscarriage and envy. It is just one story in a huge sea of possible human stories that might provoke grief around the theme of conception, birth, infertility and childlessness – whether voluntary or not.

Some reasons to grieve

Traumatic experiences around birth and conception are very common among the people who come to our workshops. People – and I mean people of any gender – may be suffering from direct or indirect experiences around the subject. We believe that every experience of loss, absence, longing or change is worthy of grieving. Some of the experiences that may bring people of any gender to seek a Grief Tending workshop include:

Involuntary childlessness

People may have gone through gruelling struggles to conceive, sustain a pregnancy or be an active parent.

• Miscarriages
• Still births
• Baby loss
• Unsuccessful rounds of infertility treatment
• Early menopause
• Biological infertility
• My partner doesn’t want to have kids
• ‘Social infertility’ (lack of resources or the right partner)
• Exclusion from the life of your child

Voluntary childlessness

Sometimes people make reluctant or pragmatic choices not to parent. They may be choosing not to have a child as a result of concern for their current situation or for the future. Or people may have made choices that they later regret. (When people are happy with the choices they make, they are less likely to want to grieve the outcome).

• Termination
• Social factors (lack of resources or the right partner)
• For environmental or ethical reasons
• I am not stable enough to be a parent
• I don’t want to pass on a heritable disease to my children

Re-parenting our inner children

People may be processing an early experience of their own. Many come to tend their inner child. Sometimes people are born into grief in some way.

• My own traumatic birth
• I was born to a grieving parent
• I was a replacement child after the death of an older sibling
• ‘Ghost’ children in my family who died and weren’t spoken of
• My parent was not available to parent me
• I was abandoned or adopted as a baby
• I was born into an abusive situation
• I was born into intergenerational trauma

Sharing the experience of loss and longing

Breaking the taboo to speak about our experiences of loss, love and longing opens doors to meaningful connections with others. As ‘Babies’ shows all too clearly, superficial banter and keeping positive at all costs imprisons us and fails to let others in. Our natural emotions including shame, self-judgement, envy and longing may feel bewildering. Emotional intelligence grows as we find others whom we can share our stories with, and express ourselves in ways that feel more authentic.

Finding avenues of support

Developing practices that support wellbeing also help us find the way back from heart-break or dysfunctional relating. To grieve well, we need ways to find relief, and people who understand and are able to witness our pain without minimising it. A gratitude practice can also be one way to shift focus back to the things that support us. Finding support in multiple ways is an important step. This may include friends, professionals, and a sense of being held by something greater than us.

Tending Grief is a way to be with our sorrows, while also growing capacity to be with our strength, becoming more resilient. We may do this in groups with others who are able to recognise what we have been through. Grieving in community is one way to connect with others in a supportive group. You can find our Grief Tending workshops here.

Creating meaningful rituals

Rituals can also help us to navigate loss and longing. We can create our own meaningful rituals. There are many different ways to honour or commemorate what has happened or what we longed for. We may have places we can visit to remember a particular loss. We may create a meaningful moment to acknowledge our hopes and dreams too. It can feel profoundly hard when there is no grave to mark the place, or when a being grows but dies un-named. We can create our own designated place of memorial, or action of remembrance. Lighting a candle, pouring water, making a symbol, giving an offering, singing or speaking at an appointed time or day can all provide a threshold to move towards grief and step back from again.

At the end of my attempts to become pregnant, I decided to close the door and stop trying. My partner and I held a small private ritual in which we both spoke the appreciation of our efforts in acknowledgement, and named our sadness. It was a simple but deliberate threshold moment that allowed us to grieve and step forward into the life that we had not imagined.

A symbolic tattoo

The commemorative tattoo in the image above was chosen by a friend. For her, it is a symbolic reminder of her three children who are alive, and their three spirit siblings who didn’t live long enough to join them. “I wanted it to be a talking point and a physical representation of the memories of them”, she says.

Re-imagining the future without children

Through grieving, we make space inside ourselves. After the loss of hopes and dreams, and their mourning, we may need to find deliberate steps to change focus. A personal ritual to honour what has been longed for but not received may be a way to acknowledge what hasn’t happened and let go in order to shift focus and move towards a different creative opportunity. My own switch from longing to creativity has allowed me to re-frame the projects that I continue to birth into the world. As Mary Oliver provocatively asks, “Tell me, what will you do with your one wild and precious life?” I invite gentle encouragement to re-imagine a future with self-kindness and flow into the mystery of what it is to be human.

For more sources of support including Sands who support bereaved families after baby loss, see our links page.

Sarah Pletts is a Grief Tender and Artist who offers workshops in London and online, sharing rituals where grief on all themes is welcome.  For more information about Grief Tending events see here. 

25 Mar Seeing the Invisible

When Grief is Invisible

Sometimes grief wears an ‘invisibility cloak’, like Harry Potter, and people don’t recognise it. We may need to look closely and ask the right questions in order to find out what is present but appears invisible.

My father had a talent for seeing negative-space. I remember a family holiday in Scotland with my cousins. On arriving at the rambling rented farmhouse, my Dad deduced an absence of internal space. By moving wardrobes unobserved, he found a hidden room. Then he designed a treasure hunt, which revealed the discovery of the secret room as its triumphant end point.

Noticing Absence

This noticing, of what is present but appears absent is particularly helpful when exploring emotional landscapes. I imagine putting on my ‘grief spectacles’ to help me see what might not be apparent to the casual observer.

Absences can be obvious if we pay attention to what or who is not in the room. We might ask, “Which feelings are welcome here?” or “Which demographics aren’t here?” Absences can also be hard to detect. It’s not easy to see what has been persistently absent, or what has never been invited in at all. My sense is that the narrower our experience of difference, the harder it may be to detect what has been normalised and what is not visible.

In the terrain of grief, absence can be a provocation for grief as the source of unmet needs. I am an attention seeker. I am usually happy to perform, to speak in public, to dress up. This comes in part from my own unmet childhood development needs. I was an only child with a bipolar mother. I experienced her lack of attention – as a result of her depression – as neglect. I longed for attention. Instead, we often shared ‘proximal separation’ as Gabor Maté describes a care-giver who is nearby but not able to give attuned presence.

Now I see this as grief, or longing for what wasn’t available. In Francis Weller’s framework, this touches both on ‘The places that did not receive love’, and ‘What I expected but did not receive’, (his second and fourth Gates of Grief).

When Grief Is Unwelcome

For those who are processing the death of a loved one, there is often a pervasive sense that talking about the experience of grief is not welcome – or only in limited ways for a limited time period. In this way, speaking about death is often relegated to private spaces with a caring professional. In addition, there is often an assumption that we can only express grief in ways that are deemed acceptable (rather than the wild waves that unpredictably surge with rage, loud sounds, responses like unexpected changes in sexual desire, and other intense emotions). The reality is that grief may feel unwelcome at best or totally taboo at worst. In this way, grief may become ‘disenfranchised’. As a result, your grief may be at least removed from others’ direct gaze, if not invisible.

Invisible Sources of Grief

So, imagine if the source of your emotional turbulence is not the most recognised and acceptable reason to grieve – the death of a loved one. If bereavement is not the source of your emotional roller-coaster, how does it feel if the very real and natural symptoms of grief that you are experiencing, don’t fit neatly into the ‘recently bereaved’ category? What does it feel like, for example, if you have had a miscarriage, and you didn’t announce your pregnancy, so no-one sees your loss?

Disenfranchised Grief

There are infinite reasons to grieve. Many do not include bereavement, (and if someone you love has died that is an excellent reason to grieve). Ken Doka helpfully coined the term ‘disenfranchised grief’ to describe an unrecognised or hidden source of heart-break or grief. Examples include:

• The loss of someone you love, when their next of kin do not recognise the role you played in their life.
• Separation from a lover where your relationship was not public.
• Loss of your home and established life, when you are choosing new circumstances.
• Grief as a result of involuntary childlessness.
• The life choices you regret.
• The life unlived when ageing or facing chronic ill health.
• The loss of a meaningful attachment figure that is not externally recognised, (such as your therapist, favourite pop icon, pet hamster or the tree you loved watching through your window being cut down to make room for the neighbour’s extension).

Ambiguous Loss

‘Ambiguous Loss’ is another term which I find helpful, to describe the particular shape of unexplained absence. Pauline Boss first used this term to describe the grief felt when someone is missing either physically or emotionally. Examples include:

• Someone is presumed dead but there is no body to mourn or explanation to give closure.
• Someone has disappeared without giving notice or being in contact.
• Not knowing why you were given up for adoption.
• Being ghosted at the end of a relationship for unknown reasons.
• A ‘misadventure’ that may or may not have been an accident.
• Waiting for the outcome of a court trial.
• Someone you love remains unresponsive but is still physically present.

Unacknowledged Grief

While every loss is worthy of grieving, it is not always possible to do so at the time of impact or injury. The processing of grief may need to wait until there is adequate space and holding to do so. Grief may be present but delayed thanks to our helpful defensive accommodations, which enable us to wait until it is safe enough to feel. Feelings may be exiled, completely out of awareness, or dissociated from until they are ‘touched and awakened’ (as Bonnie Badenoch says).

Sometimes the grieving parts of us, that are out of our awareness, are apparently invisible, but sensed through the symptoms or situations in which they are triggered. We may gradually become aware of the shape of absent parts of us. In extreme cases, this may be portrayed through Dissociative Identity Disorder, (described in Carolyn Spring’s book ‘Recovery is My Best Revenge’) where traumatised parts split off and become invisible until activated.

Including the Whole System

When thinking systemically, it is important to include all the parts of the whole system. There may be parts that are invisible or less easy to recognise. There may be parts within us that are concealed for self-protection, or to avoid risking more vulnerability than feels comfortable. We may judge ourselves, allowing our critical inner voices to keep us small and boxed in.

In families, communities and organisations, grief itself may be split off or excluded. Often there may be one or more family members who are carrying the unacknowledged grief unconsciously on behalf of others in the system. Working with a Family Constellations practitioner can be a really useful way to map a system in order to reveal dynamics which have been carried by people in the system without their knowing. Rose Jiggens describes this modality:

“Working this way opens up insights which could not be gained through talking alone. We get to sense, feel, see and know things that are otherwise unavailable.”

By teasing out what is in the energy field in a Constellation, it is possible to surface what has been hidden, return unwanted energetic gifts, resolve unconscious wounds and clear invisible dynamics. The ties that bind us frequently entangle us in systemic bonds as a consequence of grief and trauma. Constellations can be particularly helpful when we remain caught in repeating patterns and invisible directives that are organising the system but out of our awareness.

Seeing the Invisible

If I widen the frame to include all causes of grief – including bereavement and everything beyond that causes emotional suffering, and then put on my grief spectacles, what becomes visible? This lens makes it more likely to see individual pain, collective losses and cumulative hurts, and the intersecting relationships between them. Add in the lens of past impacts and future fears, to see a complex matrix of stimuli that cause grief.

To make the invisible visible requires listening to all of our feelings, the voices of others, seeking out the absent narratives and being curious about the experience of people who are different to ourselves, and may hold different perspectives.

Tending Grief

‘Grief becomes grievance’ when untended. When sorrow, or distress is left without adequate containment, or holding, so that it can be digested, a residue of the hurt remains. It is this legacy that may go on to cause further distress, whether to self or others. The old adage is activated, ‘hurt people hurt people.’

Grief Tending is a practice in which we welcome all kinds of grief, whether known or unknown. In order to include what is both visible and invisible in Grief Tending, we often pour water to acknowledge ‘what has been said’, and also include ‘what has been left unsaid’. When people express grief, there are often cumulative layers of undigested experience. It may only be possible to begin to move towards feelings or access the surface layer.

It requires work to see the invisible. Putting a wide frame in place, like the edge of a jigsaw puzzle, and filling in the things that we know allows the gaps, the unfamiliar, the unacknowledged and the untended pieces to reveal their shape. Each of these invisible places may need to be attended to. They may also help us to make sense of the whole picture.

Sarah Pletts is a Grief Tender and Artist who offers workshops in London and online, sharing rituals where grief on all themes is welcome.  For more information about Grief Tending events see here.

31 Jan What to Say to a Grieving Person?

Being With Someone Who’s Grieving

I am a Grief Tender, and was recently asked “How do you learn to hold grief?” The practice of Grief Tending is all about becoming more comfortable with our own feelings, and also with others’ emotions. Although the question “What should I say to someone who’s grieving?” can be useful to explore, for me, it is more important to learn how to be with someone who’s grieving. This might include the pace and tone of voice, and body language, as well as words in order to offer supportive presence.

Learning How to Be With Someone Who’s Grieving

I am deliberately using the verb ‘to learn’. For many of us, we haven’t grown up with enough wise elders who could show us how to be with someone who’s grieving. The kind of relational intelligence it takes to know what to say to someone who’s in distress is not taught in schools. This is often now a skills gap in families and communities. It can be particularly difficult for young people to navigate talking to someone who is mourning if they have little or no experience of being around death or dying.

A Quiet Revolution in Grieving

There is something going on that is counter-cultural to the dominant norms of privacy around grieving. There is a quiet revolution that is happening in the culture of death and dying. People are discovering their agency around the theme. We are consuming books and films that illuminate the infinite ways to approach endings. We are talking about mortality at Death Cafés, that welcome conversations on the subject of death with tea and cake. People are engaging Death Doulas to support their choices at end of life. Groups like Companion Voices are singing with those who are approaching their end of life. People are choosing to design their own funerals – often with the support of an independent celebrant. The Dead Good Guide is a great place to look for inspiration for creative endings. And many are finding ways to process it all in community through grief rituals.

The Practice of Contemplating Change

It is essential if we are to support others who are grieving that we explore our own relationship with endings of all kinds. In Buddhism, there are explicit meditation practices to recognise that everything changes, and to contemplate ‘impermanence’ and suffering. In many indigenous and spiritual traditions, there are customs for ancestor veneration. Bringing those who came before us to mind, and perhaps giving thanks, or making an offering can develop a connection with someone who has died that we love. The Continuing Bonds theory of grieving (Dennis Klass, Phyllis Silverman, and Steven Nickman) emphasises how helpful and comforting it can be to evolve a continuing relationship with a loved one who has died in their new and unfamiliar form, rather than detaching from someone who has died. Some of the simple rituals we use in Grief Tending can be a helpful way to do this, such as lighting a candle and pouring water.

Other People’s Grief

Other people’s grief may remind us of our own. What has not been processed or tended in our own lives may be a wound that another’s grief touches. For many, there is an impulse to avoid, deny or minimise our own troubles. When someone else in our life grieves, our own feelings may be activated. Sometimes it was necessary to put our grief out of our awareness in the past as an act of self-preservation. When this has happened, it often re-surfaces later, if circumstances change and it feels safe enough to process. In order to support others, it is important that we are willing to recognise our own grief and allow it space and attention.

What Not to Do

Grievers often express dismay at the absence of acknowledgement from other people. There is often already a feeling of lack of belonging to normal life, and avoiding them amplifies this. Grief is not infectious, but people sometimes behave as if it is. Saying nothing at all is the most unpopular, unsupportive strategy with someone who is grieving. “I don’t have the words,” is better than no words. Saying something formulaic and garbled is little better than saying nothing. The traditional, “I’m sorry for your loss” generally seems impersonal and inadequate.

Avoiding eye contact during the delivery of mumbled or hurried words can feel like another way to defend against any genuine connection with the griever. I have an aversion to the use of euphemisms like “passed away,” in place of “died”. But it is kind to listen to the griever and mirror their language rather than deliver words that they would find too direct. In the same way, it is helpful to take cues from the griever as we try to bring words of comfort. They may not be ready to talk. They may not want to divulge traumatic details or precise circumstances of a death, despite our curiosity, so wait for an invitation before asking direct and detailed questions.

The Words We Choose to Offer to A Grieving Person

In choosing words of comfort, I favour simple statements, offered with congruent hand and facial expressions. Something along these lines and said with authenticity might land gently.

“I’m so sorry.” Or, “I was really sad to hear of…” If I write a card, I try to remember a personal memory or appreciation of the person who has died. Avoid making yourself the centre of attention, but small details of remembrance can be received well.

Grievers often experience a profound sense of exclusion from normal everyday life. They may simply long to be asked, “How are you?” And when your world has just turned upside down, this can be too big a question. “How are you today?” can feel a more manageable enquiry.

An Invitation to Spaciousness

More than anything, grievers often need space to find their voice, their response. They may long for genuine invitations to say how they are, or to tell some of their story, or share the experience of their losses. For me, a slow, gentle invitation to speak or creating a receptive moment for a response, and just listening feels helpful. Avoid offering platitudes that are intended to minimise or console someone’s pain. Grief is better received without offering unasked for suggestions or solutions.

Ritual Ways to Welcome Grief

In Grief Tending events, we welcome many different experiences and emotions. We use simple rituals to encourage people to feel seen and heard. We use simple sentences to acknowledge someone’s grief, like:

“Thank you,” “I see you,” or “I hear you”. We may pour water as a symbolic gesture. Most importantly, we aim to bring our attention to the person who is sharing their experience. It can feel profoundly supportive for someone who is grieving to be listened to by others, who recognise the territory of grief, if not the same experience.

Holding Grief With Presence

If the situation allows it, I try to respond to someone’s grief with attuned presence rather than lots of words. I breathe, and if there is space and time, I often observe their breathing too. Holding space for people requires that my own nervous system is regulated and calm enough to be available to someone else. Listening to the suffering of another can feel overwhelming. In order to develop a sense of equanimity, I often call to mind what supports me, which I draw on in order to support others. Through regular contact with people who are grieving, and by exploring my own emotions, I am growing and expanding my capacity to be with grief.

Empathy not Sympathy

In the rack of greetings cards of condolence for someone who is grieving, there are cards that say “With deepest sympathy”, “sorry for your loss”, and “thinking of you”. The tones are muted, they are adorned with flowers, sunsets and stars. While for some, these will comfort, it can be helpful to choose an image and words that ring true for this particular person, in this particular situation. As you look for ways to acknowledge someone’s pain, I invite you instead to come alongside, to find your empathy, in order to ‘feel with’ rather than ‘feel for’ someone else’s sorrow.

Coming Together in Community

What is often missing in grief is a supportive community. How can we offer our presence in a way that brings people together, that provides food, human warmth, and connection? Notice whether we are bringing those who grieve into relationship or are separating them. Are we able to offer supportive presence and empathy to someone who is grieving in a way that meets where they are at, and welcomes them? As we become familiar with the landscape of grief, it is possible to move beyond words to offer some holding to someone who is grieving as they navigate emotional turmoil.

Sarah Pletts is a Grief Tender and Artist who offers workshops in London and online, sharing rituals where grief on all themes is welcome.  For more information about Grief Tending events see here.