Bad Grief! When No Body Comes Home

Missed PersonEach year, more than 1.8 million American men, women and children are reported missing. Although the majority of these people are located, many stay missing, leaving their families to wonder for years and years if the person they love is dead or alive. Sometimes, this situation is the result of a monumental tragedy, like 9/11, that strikes an entire community or nation. Other times, it’s as simple and as devastating as a woman with dementia walking away from her caregiver, never to be seen again. Whatever the circumstances, the uncertainty, pain and isolation felt by the person’s family and friends is the same…and unimaginable to those who haven’t experienced it.

When tragedy strikes and people are presumed dead, but no body is recovered, it changes everything that traditionally surrounds the natural process of grief. Two recent news stories have included just such situations–the missing Malaysian aircraft and the big mud slide in Washington State. Families and friends of those involved in these situations are experiencing this rare types of loss. They yearn for both answers and a starting point from which to confront their loss. However, without a body, the mind still wants to believe anything but the truth. Such deaths, called “ambiguous deaths” by the psychiatric community, require unique handling and sensitivity from family and friends as well as funeral professionals called upon to oversee the final arrangements.

Death in the news

Missing  370 Missing 370 in Sand  On March 8, 2014, Malaysian flight 370 disappeared without a trace. The nightly news has focused regularly on the recovery efforts by crews from more than a dozen different nations. More than one month later, not one fragment of the plane or its occupants has been found. The latest speculation is that the plane is at the bottom of a particularly deep part of the Indian Ocean, more than 2.8 miles from the surface. If this is true, there is little likelihood of the plane and its dead will ever be recovered. The pressure at such depths makes it impossible for any manned craft to navigate the area where the plane likely lies.

The 238 passengers and crew members of MH370 came from 13 different countries, but their families share a common pain, the roller coaster ride of hope and the despair of not knowing what happened to their mother, husband, daughter, father, wife or son.

Washington_Mudslide-088c6Another situation with unrecoverable bodies occurred recently in Washington State last month when a rain-soaked hill collapsed without warning, engulfing more than three dozen homes in a massive mudslide. As I write this, 36 bodies have been found and 10 people are still missing, including two children. Recovery efforts continue more than four weeks after the disaster.

Why are such enormous resources–both in manpower and money–expended trying to recover bodies long after it is reasonable to assume that a person could have survived? After 9/11, the recovery effort continues for more than eight months and ended with a solemn ceremony at the site. Our culture associates death with a body. Not having that body of our loved one disrupts the entire grieving process.

Grieving without a body

Grief On Hold
Grief Stuck In Limbo

In our society, we associate death and grieving with a physical body. Most funeral arrangements involve a viewing, where friends and family can share memories and get a last glimpse of the body that once was their friend or loved one. We usually follow that with a service that culminates in the lowering of the casket in the ground or the handing of the ashes to the survivors. Without a body, all of those traditions are disrupted.

Denial is one of the classic stages of grief. Our mind naturally wants to assume that our dead loved one will walk through the front door any minute. When their is no body, our mind can get stuck in this stage, even when all evidence points to the fact that the person is gone. This is why enormous amounts of time and money are spent on recovery efforts in situations like the mud slide and the disappearance of the Malaysian airliner even when the likelihood of finding a live person has long since passed.

Planning funerals without a body

Deaths where there is no body present challenges for funeral professionals as well as for family and friends. Like loved ones, funeral professionals are used to dealing with a physical body as part of the funeral rites, either as a burial or a cremation. A death without a body throws this traditional system out of alignment, while at the same time offering the challenge of trying to comfort a family during the most terrible time in their lives.

When Hope and Grief CollideDeaths without a body, while rare, are not unique to current events. After 9/11, friends and family of thousands of men and women missing from the Twin Towers had to deal with their grief even though fewer than a quarter of the bodies of those in the buildings had been recovered. Some chose to use an empty casket at the funeral to give the service a sense of normalcy. Others used caskets for whatever part of their loved one had been found, even if it was just a finger.

Often funerals without a body are handled similarly to memorial services, with photos and/or videos of the deceased adorning the service, so that family and friends are able to “see” the person who died one last time. Having the family put together these images, even making a video or a few photo collages can help in the healing process. Take it a step further and have the family create a memorial table filled with items that were important to the life being mourned .

When dealing with deaths where people are presumed dead but there is no body, it is important for funeral professionals as well as friends to be especially empathetic and willing to listen. Any death of a relative or loved one is somewhat isolating, but a death without a body can make the survivors feel that they are the only ones who have ever had to go through this anguish.
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Suicide is Fatal

 L'Wren Scott
L’Wren Scott

Last week, fashion designer and stylist, L’Wren Scott took her own life at her Chelsea apartment in New York City. She hung herself. Ms. Scott’s death made newspapers and website headlines around the globe because she was the long-time girlfriend of veteran rocker, Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones. However, Scott is just one of more than 38,000 people who die of self-inflicted injuries in the United States each year. In fact, suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in America, according to the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta. Although such persons may have felt alone at the end, on average, a person who commits suicide has six survivors.

Why suicides are particularly difficult for survivors

 

Grief Talk
What Would You Want To Hear?

Suicide deaths are particularly difficult to handle for both survivors and funeral directors. Often the person is young. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, suicide is the third most common cause of death in Americans aged 15 to 24. Almost always the death is unexpected. Unlike deaths from illness or those who die at the end of a long and happy life, those who die from suicides are healthy one day and gone the next. Rarely do family and friends have an opportunity to say goodbye. Too often survivors are plagued with guilt, wondering if they had missed the signs and/or if there had been anything they could have done to prevent the suicide.

The truth is that 95 percent of people who take their own lives suffer from a mental illness–either diagnosed or un-diagnosed, according to grief speaks.com. Such people generally aren’t thinking about the pain and the anguish their death will cause their friends and family. At that moment, they can only see their own pain.

Suicide is also often a spur-on-the-moment decision. According to a Harvard University study, more than 70 percent of those who survived a suicide attempt said that they tried to end their life within 30 minutes of making the decision. That short window of time, obviously, doesn’t give the person a change to fully examine all of the ramifications and consequences of their action.

Why Suicide funerals are the hardest funerals to swallow

Funerals for those who have committed suicide can be some of the most difficult funerals for funeral directors to plan as well as for families and friends. For one thing, most suicides are unexpected and family and friends haven’t had time to think about what sort of arrangements the deceased may have wanted. That is especially true when a young person dies.  In addition, family may still be in shock and denial about their loved one’s death. This can hamper decisions like choosing a casket, a service and a burial site.

 

Funeral ProfessionalFuneral planning suicide: how funeral directors can help

Handling the funeral arrangements for a person who has committed suicide can be a challenge for funeral directors, but it can also be an opportunity for your funeral home to help start the healing process for family and friends.

 

Helping survivors cope

Funeral directors are in a unique position to help survivors of suicide fatalities to cope with their loved one being gone. According to the Harvard University study, there are several things that funeral directors (and others) can do to help suicide survivors cope.

  • Normalize the situation. People who have had a family or friend die from a suicide tend to feel isolated and even ostracized from the rest of society. This may come, in part, from traditional church views condemning suicide and the stigma that still remains about suicide. Treating the funeral arrangements and planning as if it were any other funeral can help the family and other survivors cope with the situation. Avoid making the arrangements seem anything but a “typical” funeral.
  • Allow them to talk. Suicide survivors may have no one else with  whom to share their feelings. Allow a little extra time for such consultations so that you have time to listen if necessary.
  • Provide information about support groups. Suicide survivors may not be comfortable talking to their friends and co-workers about the cause of death. In fact, according to the Harvard University study, nearly half of the survivors surveyed explained the death as an accident or other mishap rather than a suicide. Having information on support groups available can help such persons find others who have been through such a situation and help them to realize that they aren’t the only ones.

Planning a funeral for someone who has committed suicide can be a challenging–and a rewarding–experience. Keeping in mind that family and friends of such persons have special needs in the grieving process and doing what you can to keep the funeral planning as “normal” as possible can go a long way to helping start the healing process for those left behind.

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Talking The Grief Talk

Grief Talk
What Would You Want To Hear?

When a person is sad or grieving the loss of a loved one, it can be very hard to know the right words to say to them. It is so very easy to say the wrong thing if you don’t stop first and think about what you are planning to say before you speak. It is very important for the sad and grieving person that they hear words of encouragement about their loss from people.

Many times, even complete strangers will come up to someone who is dealing with a tragic loss and only want graphic details about the accident, etc. Their words do not help the sad person or encourage them in any way. Complete strangers will come up to a person in mourning and say terrible things to them not even realizing they are doing so.

For example, if you lost a child in a car accident and she died instantly the last thing you want to hear is “that must have been horrible for you.” Of course it was horrible for you. You may also hear things like, “Well, at least she died instantly and felt no pain.” Even though this is a blessing these are still not words that will help people but only hurt them or even make them angry.

A Touch of Grief People should think very carefully about the words that they say to their family members, friends, neighbors and co-workers. Once you speak your words to someone that needs to be comforted you cannot take them back, and the pain that you cause them will never be forgotten. This does not mean that you should be fearful in saying something to a mourner. Simply be very careful in the words that you choose to say to them.

People in mourning needs encouragement and support from their friends and family. They need to know that you are person they can trust to be with that will only help them and not hurt them. Always think before you speak to anyone that is in mourning. Below are some factors you may want to consider before speaking to someone that is mourning.

  • Make sure what you say to the person in morning is going to comfort, help or encourage the person. Do not say something just to help yourself feel better about the situation. You are there to help the mourner.

  • Put yourself in their shoes for a minute before you speak to them. Make sure what you say to them would comfort you and make you feel better.

  • Do not simply explain away the person’s grief, but make sure what you say to them will help them deal with it in a healthy way. Don’t simply try to rescue the person in mourning. The grief process is a long one, and they need to know that they can trust you to help them through this horrible time in their life.

  • Make sure what you plan to say to the person in mourning makes the person aware that you understand them and truly care for them. What you say to them should bring you much closer to them. Don’t say something that will only cause them pain and come between your friendship.

Grief and What to SayA person in mourning does not care that you have the best words to say, or the most eloquent words to say to them. They only want to have a friend that will be there to encourage them and help them. You should also be willing to listen if they feel like talking about their loss with you. Mourners only want to know that there is someone there for them in their time of need, and someone that will speak the right words to them or simply sit and listen to them. If you have been through a loss in your life, think about what words helped you the most, and what words that people spoke to you hurt you. This can help you know the right words to say to a sad person.

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