Be Kind… perspective from a grief worker.

A few months back, I was pulling out of a gas station/convenience store. A large truck was pulled up alongside the store to unload its goods, blocking the view of the exit. As I cautiously pulled around the truck, I found myself nose-to-nose with another vehicle. While it took me by a bit of surprise to suddenly be face-to-face with another driver, I was thankful for he and I’s quick reflexes and attention. But as we pulled around one another to maneuver the tight space, and our driver’s side windows were in close proximity, my positive outlook faded, as he rolled down his window and angrily screamed “Pay Attention!!!”.

Now if you know me, I’ve got a pretty tough skin and it’s not like me to shirk away from confrontation or even to be embarrassed easily. But this one caught me off guard and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t hang with me a bit… not in an all-consuming, pre-occupied way and not in an “I’m gonna cry” way… but it bugged me. Mostly, I think, because it was so uncalled for. I WAS paying attention. If I hadn’t been, our careful navigation would have instead, resulted in a collision. We were simply in each other’s blind spots. And instead of being gracious or understanding, you screamed at me loud enough for the whole gas station to hear… for what?

And that little, insignificant interaction is just what came to my mind when I rode home and wound down after one of my bereavement shifts.

As a perinatal bereavement coordinator, it is my job to assist and support families who have lost a child either in pregnancy or in the first year of life. I work at the bedside as well as conduct telephone/e-mail follow-ups, moderate monthly support groups and organize annual events. Of equal importance, I support and educate staff and the community on caring for these families and themselves, in this most heartbreaking work. With my close interactions and ongoing communication with the many families, staff- doctors, nurses, techs, and various members of our community, I hear and see a lot…and I gain a lot of perspective.

And as the faces of the parents I held that day, replayed in my mind… all I could think about was… in a few days… they are going to bury their child. Somehow in the deepest depths of their sorrows, they are going to crawl off the floor and carry out the impossible task of making funeral arrangements for a child they have been dreaming of for a lifetime. And at some point, in the midst of that horror,… they’re gonna need to put gas in their car, groceries in their cupboards, and pick up sanitary napkins or pumping supplies because they’re probably still bleeding and their breasts are bursting for a baby they can no longer feed. And when they do…

I hope people will be kind.

When I got home and crawled into my bed, I both lamented and mindlessly scrolled social media, my page seemed to be flooded with angry people- people calling other people “Sheeple” and “Idiots”, people angrily protesting masks- swearing that it will damage their children, fighting about a vaccine that was designed to save lives and has somehow become a political war, calling desperate women “murderers”, people on both sides lashing out instead of listening… and it all felt so petty and selfish and narrow-minded, when the parents I saw today, would give up the world just to hold their child alive again.

And all I could think about was… I wish people would be kind.

A few months down the road and these families will once again try to integrate back into society. They’ll sit down to write emails to their employers about when and how they will return to work and they’ll talk to their children’s guidance counselor about a plan for the grieving sibling. Each and every one of them will have to navigate the awkward return when people don’t know what to say and avert their eyes… on top of the ignorant comments and inappropriate questions- “What happened?” “Was it someone’s fault?” “Well at least it happened early”…. “You can have another one.” Because somehow, the idea of replacing an adult is preposterous but replacing a baby is still an idea people like to throw out there. They’ll construct an exit plan for work/school in case they break down. They’ll be tasked with the heart-wrenching decision of what to do with the nursery. And if they try to return anything to the store, an unknowing counter clerk is likely to ask “Why are you returning these?” and they will have to concoct a reply.

And all I can think about is… I hope people will be kind.

I know just how many families at one county hospital are faced with these tasks every week… and that’s just the babies. Then you add in the children, the teens, the young single adults, the parents and grandparents. And it’s not just death… there’s kidnappings and runaways, devastating diagnoses and life altering injuries, there’s trauma and abuse and it spans every population. There are people who are affected first hand and there are people who do hard things for work, in discovering and managing these crises, and everyone suffers. Every one of these things happen far more than anyone realizes… far more than what makes the news. They affect far more people then anyone knows. And not everyone’s support system and resources are equal. Some people don’t even have paid leave… or their household provider is the one being lowered into the ground. And walking down the street, you would have no idea who those people were.

I can still remember the first time I went to the grocery store after my brother’s suicide. I remember thinking “How can the world go on right now… all of these people are just going about their day as if nothing is wrong… but my brother is dead. I’m here, amongst all these people and no one knows what has happened to us.” It felt like my gut had been split open and I was hemorrhaging all over the floor, and no one noticed.

From the hospital room, it’s my job to provide support and resources and ensure that they have a safe ride home. I’ll call or email periodically to check in and intervene if I need to. But by and large, they are out there in the world, at everyone’s mercy…

And all I can think about is… I hope that people are kind.

We are all humans and we must be willing to give both ourselves and others grace. We all make mistakes. We all have bad days. I was known in my youth to flip quite a few people the bird if they pissed me off while I was driving. Patience has not always come to me easily and directness is a communication skill that is both a blessing and a curse of mine. But with every tear that I wipe, every parent that I hold from hitting the floor, every wail that echoes in my mind… I gain more and more perspective.

This work isn’t for everyone… in fact, it’s for very few…. but take this perspective from me….

When you go out again, when you feel a little road rage bubbling up for a fellow driver, when the person standing in front of you forgot their wallet or an item in the store and holds up the line, when you feel the need to communicate your feelings or feel slighted because something isn’t going your way… Remember, that things can be much, much worse… and remember… that the scars people carry are often hidden. It is unlikely that any mother will turn to you in the check out line and tell you that her child just died, but she might be so distracted that she forgets her wallet, pulls out in front of someone, misses her turn and slams on the brakes, is late for an appointment.

And the cops, firefighters, paramedics, doctors, nurses, and all frontline workers who see and manage horrors as part of their line of work, too feel these tragedies and do their best not to take it home… but we’re humans, not robots. And perhaps if we’re grumpy, quiet or stand-offish, it’s not that we have a chip on our shoulder, but are instead shouldering that trauma, so that others don’t have to.

Perhaps, if we all tempered our responses with grace and understanding. If we gave people the benefit of the doubt and considered that some people might be having a reeeaally bad day/week/month/year… it’s possible that we may give a few undeserving people a break… but it’s even more possible that you saved a shattered person from even more pain and difficulty.

I know what it feels like to hurt so badly that you don’t feel like you can breathe. I know what it feels like to be so broken that you don’t know who you are anymore… much less what day/time it is. I know what it feels like to lose friends because you don’t have the energy for anything more than basic life tasks. And I know what it feels like to return to work and school and pretend to be strong and pretend to function when your mind is both empty and maddeningly busy all at once. And still, some people have it so much worse… and I just don’t know how they do it.

And when I think of them, and I remember my own hardest days, and the stupid angry driver , and the faces of those parents that are now seared into my brain…

All I think about… is I hope… I pray… people can just be kind.