At this time of year many of us spend time with family and friends to give thanks for our many blessings. I don’t want to bore you with a diatribe of the gifts in my life. At this point I am well aware of how lucky I am for the life that I have. The gift of the work that I do is that I am also painfully aware of how fragile that sense of peaceful contentment can be.
Holidays such as Thanksgiving can shake the emotional foundation of anyone who has suffered a loss. It can cause grievers to re-experience the hole that a loved one left, or cause an addict to come publicly face-to-face with their addiction. It can highlight the complications a divorce can have on children and it can force people to grit and bare another meal with their toxic family. So while there are many things to be thankful for in my life, these times of year also remind me that holidays are not always the easiest time for many of us.
I am reminded of a story told to me many years ago from a survivor that lost her daughter to suicide. Years after her daughter’s death she told me of one of her family’s holiday traditions. Her family would sit around the table and reminisce about silly things that their children did when they were little. Most years it was the same stories recycled from year to year. Everyone knew what Grandpa would say and some would even join in on some of the punch lines which would only escalate the hilarity that ensued. She told me about how after her daughter died this stopped for a while. She thinks that it was awkward and painful for all at the table.
So for years she missed the stories and the embarrassed faces of the grown children. You can imagine her joy when the tradition started up again. She loved hearing the family fables. She felt that her family was once again grounded in the present rather than grieving the past. That is until she felt it was her turn to share a story about one of her daughter’s misadventures.
As she spoke of the silly story, instead of the regular laughter the room fell silent. Even though she was ready to reintroduce her daughter’s life back into the room, others were still struggling with her daughter’s death. She was proud of many of the things her daughter accomplished in her short life and didn’t want to lose those things when she lost her daughter’s life. She described to me how important it was for her to share not just the sadness of her grief but to also share the memories of her daughter’s life. She wanted to stay connected to her daughter by sharing a bit of her with others that also loved them both.
So this Thanksgiving I hope that you can be thankful for what you have, honour what you may have lost and make room for all of it around your dining room table. Laugh, love, cry and be gentle with each other.