The Cruelty of Kind Words

There are words you might have heard before, but you don’t fully understand their meaning until they become an undeniable part of your life. Platitudes was one of those words for me. I would never have imagined that hearing a well-meaning sentence could make me furious, but that’s what grief does.

“He has gone to a better place.” How do you know that? He loved life. He loved moving around all the time, fixing things around the house. He loved going shopping, even when the shopping list had only one item on it. He loved the changing seasons and the fruits and vegetables that came with them. He loved us. Nothing made him happier than seeing us. What better place could there be when he is no longer here to do any of this?

“He is relieved now. He is not in pain.” Well, he wasn’t in pain when he was here. You know why? Because we made sure of that. We did everything we could, and I mean everything, to make sure he was comfortable. What do you know about pain? Pain is not always physical. Pain was seeing him wither away before your eyes. Pain was watching him realize he couldn’t drive anymore, he couldn’t walk without a cane anymore, he couldn’t go to the washroom alone anymore. Pain was losing him in small pieces every single day. He wanted to get better. He is not relieved that he is dead.

“Death is inevitable. It will happen to all of us.” Well, thank you for the insight, Mr./Mrs. Obvious.

“You did everything you could.” I did. But what good came of it? He is gone anyway. I saw a sentence on a tombstone that sums up how I feel about this: “We suffered so much to keep you here, but it couldn't be done.” You know how finishing a race works? I feel like I am still running.

“It’s like losing a vertebra. You will never walk upright.” Thank you for the encouragement.

“I know exactly how you feel. I have been through this.” And then starts the tale of how they lost someone they loved under completely different circumstances. Before you know it, they’re crying on your shoulder. Am I supposed to comfort you now? I am sorry you went through this, but do you want to maybe not hijack my grief for a moment?

“It was bound to happen, sooner or later. Now you get to go back to your life.” Which life do you think I get to go back to? The one in which he is not here? Is that the same life I wanted to have? How am I supposed to live with this bottomless pit in my heart? You seem to know everything. Do you have a solution for this?

“This family had a record of neglecting their health. They were all gluttons.” Oh, fuck all the way off is what I should have said to this. But I just pretended I wasn’t listening. I was scared to let the anger out. She wouldn’t have survived it.

I have a rare collection of these sentences to go through. Some of them are so bad I don’t have the bandwidth to talk about them right now. Someday I might. What makes all of this worse is that the majority of these people thought they were helping. That was their intention. If I think hard about it, I might have said something similar to someone grieving in the past, but never again.

When you lose someone you love, nothing is going to make that better. Better loses its meaning in this scenario. Nothing will ever be better when it comes to this.

New seasons, with their fruits and vegetables, will come and go, and he will not be here to see them.

Your life will move on. New things will happen, good and bad, and he will not be here to see any of them.

The shows he was watching will go on for a couple more seasons, and they will end, and he will not be here to watch them.

The calendar on his wall, the one that froze on the month he left, will always stay the same.

Nothing can make any of this better.