Sitting with Grief

Lessons in Loss, Love and Resilience

Alaina had a friend that she had a pretty cool bond with, they were very similar in many ways. Kayley reached out to me after reading one of my posts. She is a nurse and I loved what she wrote and asked if she would allow me to post it as it is a beautiful perspective. The following is Kayley’s perspective, as you will be aware, she’s much more eloquent.

I saw you’ve been posting about wanting to hear stories of other people’s losses and grief. I wanted to reach out and share some thoughts and experiences as someone who spends a majority of my days surrounded by intense loss, grief, and suffering.

As a nurse on a children’s cancer unit, I find myself facing grief filled moments multiple times a day, every day.

If I’ve learned anything, it’s that there isn’t a “right” thing to say to a parent mourning or preparing to mourn their child. Rather, it’s the simple act of being there, seeing them, and loving them (however that may look in their specific situation) that makes the world of a difference. In the end, I feel like there’s so much power and impact in simply not being afraid to sit with a hurting person in the darkest dark. It’s about not turning away from the hard things. Pain and suffering and loss are inevitable, but it’s our response to it all that we can control.

I have watched kids take their last breath and I have held their sobbing parents in my arms moments later. I have attended funerals of kids that I loved like family. I have sat in on countless conversations where I listen to a doctor tell a family that there’s nothing more we can do to treat their child’s cancer. I’ve seen first hand that every person responds to loss in a different way. With some families I simply give them space while reminding them I’m here if they need me. With other families I sit with them as they cry, I hug them, and I just listen. Some people get angry. Some people deny reality. Some simply need distraction. But each response is rooted in grief.

I carry this grief with me constantly. I grieve every kid I have lost with such depth. Honestly I feel like grief might be one of my main emotions at this point… but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It has changed how I view the world in every possible way. Even though it hurts, grief has changed me for the better. My understanding of life is richer because I know loss. I find myself appreciating the little things and not stressing over day to day inconveniences. I find myself loving more deeply because of the kids I’ve loved and lost, and man do I love all those kids a lot.

I guess my point of this email is that there’s no right answer to how to handle grief. There’s no right thing to say to someone experiencing it. But there is something so beautiful about not carrying and facing grief alone. There really is beauty to be found in the love that surrounds loss. There’s a reason I go back to work every day, even when my heart is heavy with grief. We don’t get to choose whether or not to experience loss, but we do get to choose how we face it. We get to choose to love people through grief and I think that’s pretty cool.

I love the way she has embraced these difficult moments and how she has found the beauty to live and give empathy over sympathy, to sit with them, whether by their side or just outside the door.