Compassionate Friends, counselor help mourners cope with holidays

FLORENCE — The holidays in November and December are joyful for most, but for those who are grieving the death of a loved one, this time of year can be painful and full of sadness.

Coping with death isn’t easy at any point in the year, but it can be especially trying during the holiday season, said Debbie Lowder, whose only son, Gary Lowder Jr., died seven years ago.

“He was my baby. Every single day, I struggle and it is the hardest work I’ve ever done,” she said. “The holidays, at first, were more difficult because you see all the pretty lights and the children in the stores and everybody smiling and joy. And there you are, with tears in your eyes, and you’re wishing that you had them there with you.”

The holidays tend to remind the bereaved of the loss of their loved one, Lowder said.

Dianne Mayne’s 18-year-old daughter, Leslie Mayne, died in 2004 after a car crash, just 10 days after her high school graduation.

“It was actually hard for me to talk, it took my breath away,” Mayne said. “I just wanted to lay in her bed and think about her and just have her in my mind. I always say I had the perfect life with Leslie, I just didn’t have the perfect ending.”

There can be tremendous pressure on a grieving person to enjoy the holidays, said Dr. A. Joseph Baroody Jr., a licensed pastoral counselor in Florence.

“That person can feel the pressure to try to be happy, to join in,” he said. “.... they feel like they are supposed to be happy when we sing Christmas carols or hymns that have to do with the birth of the Savior coming to bring blessings to the world and they don’t feel blessed at all. They feel confused, hurt, angry.”

Mourners shouldn’t feel obligated to go out and enjoy holiday parties and events, Baroody said. Rather, he said, they should do what makes them feel is best.

“People need to do what they feel comfortable doing during the holidays, not what everybody expects them to be doing,” Lowder said. “They need to take care of themselves. They need to be patient with themselves.”

Many find remembering their late loved ones is helpful. Some set a place at the dinner table or light a candle for that person during the holidays, Baroody said.

“Everybody grieves differently. There’s no wrong way. there’s no right way,” Lowder said.

Grief is condition or a state of being, Baroody said.

“Dealing with grief is mourning. Mourning is a verb, grief is a noun,” he said.

Grief is often thought of in stages or steps, but Baroody said he doesn’t think of that as being effective.

Mourners can revisit certain “stages” and when you think of grief as being linear, a person can feel as if he or she isn’t progressing, he said.

“There is no resolving grief. A better term is reconciling,” he said. “When grief is intense, it’s like the person is around your neck and every breath you take, you feel that person. Everything is about that person.”

But as you experience certain feelings you learn to “take the person from around your neck and put them somewhere in your life,” he said.

“It just takes time, I think you have to have an enormous amount of patience. You get so frustrated,” Mayne said. “I know you feel bad, but you just have to let yourself feel bad for a while. Slowly, time helps and you start to enjoy happy memories.”

Many find help through their faith or through counseling.

Mayne said it helped when her neighbors saw her withdrawing into a shell and made a point to visit her.

“They really didn’t have to say anything. They just let me talk,” she said.

Lowder said she also found it helpful to speak about her late son.

“I needed to talk to someone,” she said. “I approached two different people and begged them to talk to me ... they did not want to talk about their grief. They both had lost a child.”

She turned to counseling and then to Compassionate Friends, a worldwide organization that offers friendship, understanding and hope to bereaved families following the death of a child.

She went on to help establish the local chapter of Compassionate Friends, where Mayne is also a member.

Lowder said ut just helped her to be around other mothers who had lost their children.

People who are further along in their grief can help the newly bereaved which is, in essence, helping themselves, Lowder said.

“It was hard those first two years, probably for four years I cried every single day,” she said. “Now I’m at the point that I don’t cry every day, but I say his name every day. I tell somebody about him every day. He’s still with me because he lives forever in my heart.”

Many mourners feel comfort when others mention their late loved one.

“(My family) always remembers my child,” Lowder said. “We’re all so afraid our child is going to be forgotten. That is the biggest thing. We want them to live on.”

Others may not be ready talk about their loved one right away, but it may help to listen to others talk about their losses, Lowder said.

It can also be helpful to make a donation, plant a garden or do other activities in memory of a deceased loved one, she said.

The local chapter of the Compassionate Friends will have a local candle lighting ceremony at 7 p.m. Dec. 13 on Darlington Public Square. The event coincides with a worldwide candle lighting. All are welcome to attend.

Compassionate Friends meetings are conducted the second Tuesday of every month at 6:30 p.m. at St. Matthews Episcopal Church, 210 S. Main St., Darlington. An alternate meeting site is at First Reliance Learning Center at 2148 W. Palmetto St., Florence, the fourth Tuesday of every month at 6:30 p.m. For more information, call Lowder at (843) 676-0066 or (843) 615-8485.