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Coping with Death Sooner or later everybody must learn how to cope with death. Since childhood up, our parents explain to us that dead people actually go to better places, where they feel safer and happier, that is why our grief and sorrow from losing grandparents or relatives in early ages is filled with innocent hopes and humble submission. But when we grow older and discover this world better, when we establish strong and very important relations with other people around us, we begin understanding, how enormous misery and grief can be experienced, when we lose somebody we truly love. Everybody accepts death and reacts on decease of close people different ways, but for everybody death is one of the worst trials of life.
After bereavement of close people everybody feels hard pain, sorrow, or confusing mixture of distressing thoughts and feelings, and later this can be followed by long periods of depression and endless speculations, what this life is all about and what is our purpose in this world. Losses of close people may become a reason of serous stresses and psychological traumas, sometimes even lethal for excessively sensitive and emotional people. I decided to ask my mother, what were her feelings and perception of death. I know that being a devoted Catholic and very religious person, she sincerely believed in existence of better places for those, who died, and completely relied on Gods mercy and bliss for them. From her words, she never used to grieve very much and could manage to pull herself together after losing parents and some friends, finding her relief and consolation in visiting church, praying and talking to people there. But she underlined, that the important thing she had learnt from her own life was: how different deaths of people can be, and how hard it was sometimes to accept and to reconcile oneself to the absence of somebody loved and treasured.
Some deaths are natural and expected, like it is happened, for example, with her parents, who died peacefully in their beds because of oldness. Mother said that it has been exceptionally hard to recognize that they had passed away, but she has been prepared for such ending and ready to be strong and as much as possible positive in coping with the loss of parents, one after another. But sometimes, as she has learnt, death may occur very suddenly and unexpectedly, so there is no time to get ready and at least realize the possibility of ending closing up. Young and healthy people may die in accidents or be murdered, and, usually accompanied with horrifying deformation of corpses, such deaths may become incredible mental catastrophe for family members and friends.
Mother told me that the most impressive and tragic bereavement she had ever overcome was the loss of her younger brother, my uncle Anthony, who died eleven years ago when he was hardly thirty five. I can recall some moments from his funeral, though I was a little child. Everybody was very shocked and upset, because uncle had never displayed any problems with health and used to be very strong and energetic. Besides, he died in terrible suffering, caused by rare and hard bacterial disease called tetanus. Tony was mothers younger and only brother; he lived with his family in Florida. One day his wife Emily called my mother in tears and panic, and she informed that uncle had been taken to the hospital with very horrible symptoms.
Mother and her sister, my aunt Virginia, immediately took the plane and went to Florida to see last minutes of his life. On the way to hospital from the airport Emily described the events of the last days. He started feeling headaches and pains in neck, accompanied with high fever and muscle discomfort. After spending all day in bed, he began suffering unbearable spasms in all the body, so Emily called 911.
Doctors took him to hospital and after some tests they discovered infection of tetanus in uncles blood, which probably got in through a scratch on his hand, when he was dealing with soil in the backyard. The disease has been progressing incredibly fast, and in the end of the third day after sudden attacks and spasms, uncle could not chew and open his mouth properly. He has never been vaccinated for tetanus. With the tears in her eyes, mother continued the story.
When they entered the hospital room, the picture was really very scary and terrible. Uncle Tony was in permanent convulsions, shivering, and seemed to be unconscious. Mum said that he has not probably notice their first appearance, and, being rather sensitive, both she and Aunt Virginia stepped out from the room in tears and panic. Doctors and nurses helped them to sit in the hall and provided aunt with sedative drugs. I asked mother, what exactly she felt in those first moments, when they realized the bitter reality. She said that it has been refusal, rejection, and then huge anxiety and panic.
She could not believe her eyes and accept that her brother was hopelessly sick. Within some hours as they stayed in the hall of the hospital, initial shock started calming down and desire of doing something to save Tony's life began dominating their minds. They went to see their brother, whose attacks decreased, but he was exceptionally weak and was almost fainted away. Mother said that she has been trying to control her mind, and she has spoken to the doctors in order to encourage them to find the solution.
But the time was not enough, and soon Uncle Tony passed away after suffering some more terrible muscle spasms. It was difficult for me to insist on her continuing the story. She said that right after uncles death, all the three women in his room have demonstrated different reactions. Emily started crying and screaming in grief for her husband; and at the same time aunt became very aggressive: she slammed the door of the room and tried to release her emotions on doctors and medical personnel. Mum says that she herself has got paralyzed and could not see and feel anything properly. She felt very petrified, empty, and only later on, when they all arrived to Tony's house, she could burst in tears and free her emotions.
Then, as she continued, after first shock and anxiety, she had found herself in condition of deep autopilot. Even now mother can not remember details of the events before and after uncles funeral; she said that she could not get properly concentrated on anything and could hardly control the situation. Her days and nights got mixed to each other, she could not sleep well, and all the time sweet memories from their childhood days were in her mind. She remembered Anthony as a child, playing and laughing, then saw him in his adolescence times, recalled his first achievements and successes, his hopes and plans, his brothers care and concern about herself, and such retrospectives made her cry again and again. Soon she realized that she needed some considerable help and support, and her thoughts about finding peace in religion were back to her mind. She began realizing that it was Gods will to take Tony, thats why it was probably the best way for uncle.
A day before the funeral mum decided to visit a church and pray, but the cathedral in Florida was very crowded and noisy, so she could not find much peace of mind and relief in praying. But, in anyway, after pulling herself together and starting directing her thoughts on positive channels, she began feeling little bit better. Funeral was very crowded, many friends came to see uncle for the last time, and during the procedures, as mother said, everything still looked very unreal for her. It was the last good-bye to their beloved Anthony, thats why the relatives felt pain and deep misery. There were a lot of tears and cry at the funeral, because uncle had left his women: wife, daughter and two sisters, so very early and suddenly. She added that she has felt incredible concern about Emily and her little niece, who had to go on their life without father.
Mum wanted to stay longer with them in Florida, but she had to continue her work and to be back home. Therefore, feeling of guilt together with inability to protect her close people from misery of loneliness and to share their pain seriously added to mums emotional burden. From her words, for rather long time she suffered failures to restore her normal mood and usual behavior. She felt very lonely and devastated after the bereavement, and she could not find salvation in daily routine. She did not want to see her friends and talk much about her misery; she felt loneliness as a state of mind, even though we and her colleagues were always around and tried to support her. She says that she has been visiting church three or four times a day: she had been feeling need of religion and faith more than ever.
At the beginning she only prayed and cried in church, asking for forgiveness and peace for Uncle Tony and also for strength and patience for his wife and daughter. But one day she happened to talk to the Reverend Father, who made her open herself and speak to him about her feelings and emotions. It was incredibly relaxing and effective talk, as mother said. The Reverend Father told her that she has been wrong in grieving alone: she had to share not only facts about her loss, but also her emotions and inner feelings with somebody else.
He said that she had to find courage to let emotions go, and then try to move on with her life, keeping only good memories about deceased brother and looking forward for new relations, new events and new opportunities. I could notice, how much emotional was my mother when speaking about that talk in church. Obviously, it initiated a brand new beginning for her and stimulated a huge wave of inner strength and power for fighting with own emotional stress. She said that she was enormously thankful to the Reverent Father, and every time she visited the church, she used to express her gratitude to him and learn more and more from his sermons. I asked her, what else did she do to help herself managing with her grief? She said that she has tried to keep herself always busy and to vary her daily activities.
Routine can be very hard and killing in such moments, because those are the things, which we usually do automatically, so our mind is free to grieve and to fantasize. And, as she has learnt, in such cases it was necessary and very important to remain active, to be opened for positive influences of social surrounding and not to get concentrated on own sadness. She said that very soon after the talk in church she has started forcing herself to redirect her attention from negative thoughts, so she started communicating and spending time with her friends and maintaining interest in other activities. As me and my sister were already teenagers and busy with our schools, she used to have some free time for herself, so she began improving her health and got involved into some related social programs. She started gathering and learning information about additives and dietary supplements, used to visit some meetings and lectures on relevant subjects, or to write little articles about healthy life for different local periodicals. She thinks that it has taken quite a good time for her to recover and to adjust her life after the loss of brother.
Now everything is fine: she feels pretty happy and content with her life and enjoys her emotional peace. In the end of our talk she noticed that she treasured very much her experience in grief management. Overcoming this tragedy changed her view on many aspects of life: it made her take pleasure from every single day, be much more tolerant and patient, take peace and comfort from her faith and care about close people much more than she used to do before. My mother is a very sensitive and a very strong woman, and I love her endlessly. She bravely went through all the stages of her grief almost alone, without involving people around in her misery.
I have learnt a lot about her personality and inner world just from this simple talk, and now I feel deep respect to her tenacious courage, invincible will, faith and devotion. I feel really proud and glad to serve her with my best activities and dedicate my life achievements to her.
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Research essay sample on Close People One Day
