What Dies When Someone Dies
Death is messy.
No kidding, I can almost hear you say. Of course it is.
Yes, I hear you. Those parts are obvious.
I'm talking about the mess after.
What you don’t know is coming.
The grief that comes for you when you don’t expect it. The shock of realizing the death happens once, but the losses keep coming.
So many other things died when that person died.
When my dad died, it wasn't only my dad who died.
My hope died too.
Hope that we could have an open conversation, father and daughter.
Hope for accountability.
Hope for answers.
Hope for gratitude for all I had done for him.
Hope for an I love you.
When Grandma died, it wasn't only her who died either.
There would be no more phone calls. No more sparkle in her eyes when she saw me. No more hearing my name in that tone.
No more late-night conversations about politics or the state of the world, what was going on in my life, or what we were reading. I promise you, we solved the world's problems some nights.
No more birthday calls. No more singing Happy Birthday off-key to me.
Some losses are the loss of what was.
Others are the loss of what could have been.
And when someone dies, we lose both.
But I don't think we know everything we've lost when they die. Some of it, we know immediately.
The phone won't ring.
The chair will be empty.
The conversation is over.
Others wait for us.
Grief has a way of introducing us to our losses one at a time.
We have been taught to treat the funeral as closure. As though we gather, say goodbye, bury or scatter our dead, and somehow that closes something.
But the funeral doesn't tell us everything we've lost.
In many ways, we're only beginning to find out.
We find out months later when something happens and we reach for the phone.
When our birthday comes.
When we finish a book.
When we do something new and challenging and we know exactly who we want to talk to about it. Grandma would love this. I have to call h- …
Oh, wait.
Sometimes you know they're gone, but your body still reaches for them anyway.
Only to find an empty space instead.
The people who knew us when
An entire world exists around another person. There are conversations you have only with them. Rituals that belong to the two of you. Stories they remember. Versions of you they know.
It is a precious thing to have people in your life who knew you when.
When you were younger.
When you were coming of age.
When you were struggling.
When things finally started going your way.
They hold pieces of your history simply because they were there.
And then one day they aren't.
What do you mean I have to learn to do this without knowing they are in the world still?
Isn’t it weird to think no one will ever know you the way someone else did, simply because they didn’t exist in that part of your timeline? I can’t just call Grandma and say, “Do you remember that time...?” Sometimes she was the only other person who remembered.
With my grandmother, I'm learning there is also grief for a future she would have participated in.
She would have wanted to know about me exploring the pursuit of a doctorate. She would have wanted to hear about the building and rebuilding of a business. Selling my house. Moving across the country. Traveling to places she never got to see.
She would have wanted to see the ordinary unfolding of my life.
Someday, I'll turn 50.
She won't see it.
Maybe I will meet someone.
And she will never meet them.
There will be milestones I don't even know are coming yet, and when I arrive at them, she won't be there.
She would have been proud.
And every new thing carries this little absence:
I don't get to tell her.
But it isn't only that she doesn't get to know the next version of me.
I don't get more of her either.
I don't get to hear what she's making for dinner.
I don't get to hear about whatever knitting project she has decided on next.
I don't get another story about the people who made my existence possible.
I was still becoming. She was one of the people I expected to keep telling about who I became.
With my uncle, it's different.
I miss his counsel, yes. But I miss his presence more.
He was fun. He and my aunt were fun together. Loud, generous, always ready with good food and good drinks. They welcomed people into their lives and somehow made everyone feel like family. I felt most loved when I was with them.
I admired their marriage. They showed me something about what it could look like to build a life with someone.
I miss who they were together.
Life keeps presenting me with decisions, and one of the people who helped me think through those decisions is no longer available.
There are career decisions. Business decisions. Big life decisions.
And sometimes I want his guidance.
I want to sit across from him and tell him what I'm considering. I want to know what questions he would ask. What I haven't thought of. What he would challenge.
I don't just miss him.
I miss what happened between us when I needed him.
He and my aunt built a business together. He would understand something about what I'm trying to build now. He would have offered kind words and sound advice when I had to quickly pivot and tear down one business and then replace it with another.
I know he would be proud.
But knowing someone would be proud isn't quite the same as getting to see their face or hear the excitement in their voice when you tell them.
There are people whose presence in our lives becomes part of how we understand ourselves.
They remember us.
They advise us.
They witness us becoming.
And when they die, part of our history loses its witness.
Maybe someday
And then there is Dad.
Something much more complicated is present with this one.
When I tell someone my dad died last year and they reply with a heartfelt, "Oh, I'm so sorry," suddenly this whole complex story flashes through my being.
Sometimes a wave of panic comes with it because I don’t know what to say without making things weird and awkward.
They hear my dad died.
They don't hear everything contained inside those three words.
Yes, I am grieving.
And yes, there is relief.
And yes, I loved him, which I hate.
And yes, the relationship was hurtful.
And yes, dementia made things more complicated. It became difficult to know what was him and what was his illness.
And yes, we didn't speak for the last three years of his life.
And yes, his death made something final that some part of me hadn't completely surrendered.
Maybe someday.
Maybe that's what died with my dad.
Maybe someday.
Maybe someday we'll talk.
Maybe someday I'll understand.
Maybe someday he'll understand.
Maybe someday he'll tell me he's proud of me.
Maybe someday he'll say he loves me.
Death takes maybe someday and turns it into never.
And that's brutal because you can grieve something you never actually had. You can feel relief that a painful relationship is over while grieving that it can now never become something else.
There's a culturally acceptable grief script.
Someone dies.
You are devastated.
People say they're sorry.
You tell beautiful stories about them.
I can't give you a beautiful, uncomplicated portrait of my father that fits that script.
Death doesn't retroactively simplify a relationship.
Even my grandmothers were complicated women. Not all the stories are beautiful.
Some are small and simple.
Some are funny.
Some are hurtful.
Because most people are complicated.
We disappoint each other. We misunderstand each other. We hold grudges. We forgive things and don't forgive others.
We love people who have hurt us.
We are hurt by people who have loved us.
Sometimes we love people despite everything we know about them.
And then they die.
Whatever was unresolved doesn't magically resolve itself because someone is gone.
Complicated relationships don't cooperate with the grief script.
Sometimes someone dies and you grieve.
And breathe easier.
And feel guilty that you're breathing easier.
And grieve the relationship you actually had.
And grieve the relationship you didn't have.
And grieve the relationship you now know you will never have.
That's a lot of deaths contained in one death.
And the world keeps going
So how do we possibly live with all these other, quiet deaths?
I don't know.
We just do.
We go to the store.
We do laundry.
We answer emails and take out the trash.
Someone wants to know what you're doing next Tuesday.
The cat still meows at you when you forget to open the front door for their morning nap in the sun.
People still go to work. They go to church. Cars move through intersections. People make dinner and complain about their day and laugh with their friends.
And sometimes you want to scream: Don't you know what just happened?
Because your world stopped.
Or maybe it didn't stop.
Maybe that would have been easier.
Instead, you feel separate from it. Like in the movies when the main character stands still while the whole world moves in fast forward around her.
You desperately need everything to stop. Just for a moment.
Long enough to catch your breath.
To orient yourself to this new reality.
To feel grounded again.
But the world keeps moving.
And somehow, you move with it.
When you reach for the phone to call them, you sit in the silence.
Or you cry.
Or you laugh and shake your head.
Or you sigh and close your eyes, searching for some memory of them.
You let people talk about how great their dads are. You hold space for them to have that, even when some part of you aches for what they had.
You celebrate the milestone and notice the empty space in the room.
You make the decision without the person you want to talk it through with.
You become someone new without the people who knew you when.
I don't think you ever get used to them not being here.
I think you learn where some of the empty spaces are.
You remember Grandma isn't on the other end of the phone.
You discover how to make the decision without your uncle.
You face the fact that maybe someday has become never.
You learn to live in a world that contains their absence.
And then, just when you think you know the shape of it, something happens.
You reach for what used to be there.
And find another empty space.
Another quiet death you didn't know was coming.
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