Bereavement
the action or condition of being bereaved. "there is no right way to experience bereavement"
I had to Google how to spell “bereavement” after I wrote the title (note: I was correct). Under the word, was listed the definition- “the action or condition of being bereaved.” Use it in a sentence: “There is no right way to experience bereavement.” I could have Googled “bereaved.” I didn’t. I left it at that.
Yesterday I took a bereavement day from work. Do I capitalize that? Bereavement Day? Seems wrong. But maybe that’s my minimization speaking. I didn’t know that b(B)ereavement d(D)ays were even a thing. I mean, I did in theory. But I assumed they were for like- tragedies. Last December I covered for a co-worker who’s mother was terminally ill. That sounds like the correct use of allotted Bereavement Days.
91 year old grandmothers dying? Maybe not so much.
I feel like I did my b(B)ereavement d(D)ay wrong. My idea was to purposefully mourn. Light a candle in front of a photograph. Sit in silence in the dark, contemplating memories, crying to purge the pain, until I finally fell asleep and awakened to feel refreshed and light.
None of those things happened.
I slept until 10. I laid in bed until 1PM, where I dragged myself up to eat a piece of toast. I listened to Music Heals day on KEXP, songs about depression, loss. Theme: You Are Not Alone. I was trying to hard to heal. But honestly, it kind of made me feel worse- like watching sad videos when you are already sad. Just deeper down the hole. A friend texted and said she couldn’t come to my birthday party, and I almost lost my shit. “No one loves me…” I whined from under the covers to Andy, who had to quickly replace his laugh with a look of forced sympathy. I got stressed out from the music, and then Googled COVID rates in my school district, thinking maybe I had an excuse to cancel all future plans. Then that stressed me out so much that I re-downloaded Instagram (something I do about three times a day), and scrolled through about a hundred @iamthirtyaf memes to giggle nervously in the warm humor of existential dread. The only real crying I did that day was to the Blue’s Clue’s video. (Didn’t we all…)
I finally put on pants around 4:30 PM. Then we went and got pizza.
“There is no one right way to experience bereavement.”
My grandmother died on August 26. She was 91 years old. She had been in hospice for weeks. It wasn’t a surprise. I didn’t end up going to see her the last time I was home in Rochester, NY, as she had fallen the night before we were supposed to visit her nursing home, and was sleeping most of the day. The guilt of that kills me.
Her burial service was this morning. Her memorial is tomorrow. I am not flying home from Seattle. The guilt of that kills me even more. I wrote a poem, which one of my cousins will read aloud in my stead. There is an emotion there, and I don’t even know its name, but it feels closest to like when we went to the bakery last week, and the fresh loaf of bread was so warm that I held it to my chest as we walked to the car. When we got home and opened the bag, the soft loaf was slightly crushed, I had been holding it so tight.
Wednesday night I had texted a friend; “Did you attend your grandmother’s memorial service?”
She said she had not, because it was December. She attended it on Zoom. I asked how she handled that. She said she had taken a bereavement day and shared memories with her partner, gotten a jelly donut, as her grandmother had loved.
Me: “Mmmm i like the term bereavement day- even if it’s not actually a day off of work- I like the intentionality.”
Her: “Wellll it was absolutely for me a day off of work as well.”
"But yes.”
”I mean the Jews have it right. Shiva is the best practice.”
Immediately after that conversation, I opened my work laptop. I logged into the Frontline employee page to log an absence. I checked the drop down options. Listed: bereavement. I can’t remember if it was capitalized.
I clicked it. I felt like I was faking something. When you submit a bereavement absence, a little box pops up that asks you to write a *reason for bereavement*. It is starred. As in, you can not click ‘submit’ without a reason.
“Taking the day to mourn my grandmother’s recent passing.” I wrote. It felt cliche.
I clicked ‘submit.’
Last Sunday, I attended YouTube Church for the first time. My friend, a hospital chaplain, was preaching at her home church in Chicago. I had plans to watch the video live at 9Am on Sunday morning, but they did not live up to reality. So instead, I lay in bed on Sunday night, watching the service from my iPad.
The next day I texted her: "YouTube church gets an A+ in my book- I was lying in bed watching it on my iPad eating cheesy rice crackers and drinking a day old can of tonic water for communion while Andy was lying next to chanting ‘transubstantiation!’”
Her response: “I am clergy and I officially call that experience Holy.”
There is no one right way to experience bereavement.
Today, the day after my b(B)ereavement d(D)ay, I worked from home. Instead of answering emails, I FaceTime’d with my mother, my aunts. My mother was at the funeral home. She didn’t know where to put the flowers. My aunts were making molasses cookies. My grandmother’s favorite. The screen was blurry, their laughter choppy.
Before I started work this morning, I drank tea and wrote in my journal. Here is what I wrote:
“Oof. I feel like I got hit by a bus- but not in a bad way, I don’t think. Just- the snow globe had to settle, and it wasn’t exactly pretty. It’s still settling, in fact. Taking a while. But I feel slower, less closed up- more wide open. It’s painful. It hurts. I did heart opener yoga this morning- my natural state right now it seems is to close up, hunch over. Protect my chest, as it feels raw and new. Its a conscious practice to straighten my back, keep my shoulders back, heart open. It’s okay there are cracks- that’s how the light gets in.”
I noticed, as I stopped writing, that I was close to finishing my journal. Just a couple of pages left. I flipped to the beginning, to see where I had started. Two Kodak photos fell out. I had forgotten they were there. Probably tucked into some care package by my mom, years ago, which I had then slid into my journal upon opening. One photo was of me, a toddler sitting in a stroller with my mom in the background. We are camping somewhere. The second, me also a toddler, the same camping trip. I am smiling. There is drool on my face. I am wearing a bib. And holding me, head cocked to the side to get in the frame, also smiling, is my grandmother.