BlogHer - death of a mother - Comments

talk about it

mashadutoit — Wed, 14 May 2008 03:42:17 -0500

I lost my mother to cancer just over 2 years ago. We never discussed what her funeral arangements should be. Somehow it never seemed relevant, and when she started going downhil it was so quick...

And yes, we experienced what Kim described - family members having differences of opinion over how things should be done.

I wish I had spoken to my mother about her approaching death, but not because of these reasons. I think we would have had these differences in any case, as they were just ways in which the different people were reacting to grief and stress. It happened to be expressed in arguments about the coffin and the flowers.

And one lesson I should have learnt from this experience is that you simply cannot control things, and when things happen differently from how you hoped, you just have to make peace with it.

Thank you, Kim

Mata H — Tue, 13 May 2008 10:55:25 -0500

I have found it very helpful to have the conversation in advance. Often a clear statement from the person who will be memorialized in advance of their departure is what will ease out any differences among family members and friends. I have been very specific about what I want (a no-frills cremation and a memorial service for which I have selected the music and a gathering at which people could remember me and laugh and cry.) Bright colors OK. Flowers OK. Charitable contributions OK. Gnashing of teeth not OK. I have even written a short note that I'd like read.

My mother and I discussed all this in advance of her passing and it REALLY helped when the time came.

Another two relatives pre-paid their own wakes and funerals and selected and paid for their own flowers and gravestones in advance, so that when they passed it was a turn-key event for their families, as the burden of wondering what to do was gone, and they knew tht what was done was exactly what their mothers wanted.

~~ Contributing Editor, Mata H. also blogs right along at Time's Fool

ahh Maria

Mata H — Tue, 13 May 2008 10:47:33 -0500

Thank you from my heart.

~~ Contributing Editor, Mata H. also blogs right along at Time's Fool

My sympathies

Kim Pearson — Tue, 13 May 2008 07:03:21 -0500

I am also sorry for the loss of your friend, Mata, and appreciative of this tender remembrance.

Your post also prompted some half-formed thoughts. I hope that you don't mind if I share them.

On Mother's Day, I had a conversation with a friend who lost her own mother about two years ago. Part of the conversation centered on this very question of the different ways in which we honor the soul's passing, and the very individual ways in which we grieve in the weeks, months and years that follow.

There is something unsettling about the makeshift rituals that so many of us rely on in families that do not share a common faith. One person identifies with cultures in which the body is photographed; others find that practice shocking. One person believes in wearing bright colors to a funeral; other family members find that irreverent. I've watched families struggle to accommodate the disparate beliefs of their individual members at these times of duress because these are conversations we don't have until we have to.

I don't know what I think about this -- whether I am advocating conversations on this topic along with all of the practical preparatory conversations about death that families so often struggle to have. Perhaps it just makes me appreciate your friend's gift to her family all the more. I pray that the light of her life and the manner of her passing will help all of you go forward in love.

Peace,

Kim
BlogHer Contributing Editor|Professor Kim|

My Condolences

Maria Niles — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:03:47 -0500

to you and MariJo's family - I'm so sorry for your loss.

Thank you for sharing her with us and for this beautiful and poignant post.

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