bereavement support

Love endures.

Posted by

0

As you walk through the intense fire that follows the death of your child, your heart burns for those walking behind you. You turn around and look at their tear-drenched faces – parents whose child just died . Despite the unbearable heat of your own loss, you can’t help but reach out to them. Their predicament as unbearable to you as your own. In trying to ease their pain, you believe you diminish your own.

This poem is offered by one of the CORe members for those carrying the heavy load of love and loss. It deeply respects the brokenness while also tracing the quiet light that remains, reminding us that even in grief’s shadow, love whispers through.

I feel your grieving, heart laid bare,
pieces scattered, our lot unfair.
Yet each fragment, though fragile, shines,
resilience stitched by love’s designs.

Your angel child, though gone from sight,
does dwell in memory, a quiet light.
In laughter caught, in whispers faint,
in all the love your heart can paint.

Each tear a bridge, each sigh a thread,
connecting worlds where you are led.
The joins of grief, so tender, true,
are etched with courage in all you do.

Though nights are long and shadows deep,
their presence lingers—it does not sleep.
In dreams, in stars, in softest air,
your dearest whispers: “I am there.”

Your love endures beyond the pain,
a sacred flame that shall remain.
Though broken, your heart bears a light,
turning grief’s darkness into sight.

So let each memory softly bloom,
a garden bright within the gloom.
Even in sorrow, love will find
its way to warm the grieving mind.

Now fragments found, arranged anew,

Love, hope, and courage form the glue.

Your heart, though changed, beats strong and true,

A living flame that carries you.

Whispered Reflection:

Each fracture, each delicate seam, carries a quiet, hidden light. Through love, courage, and the passing of time, these pieces are held together, forming a heart that is not the same as before—but more radiant for all it has endured. The very places of repair shine with their own gentle beauty, a reminder that even in loss, love endures and is able to recreate beauty.

People

Posted by

1

So many disappeared.
I saw them on Day 1 and 2 and then nothing. Not even a text or a call.
Luckily, the early days were a fog, a maze. Luckily, I have forgotten so much.

Some people, who were nothing more than work colleagues showed up big time. They could sit with my despair. They sent me little books of poems for difficult times in the post. They met with me for coffee in town. They called up and chatted on the phone. They made a note of Saagar’s birthday and death anniversary and sent me cards, saying, thinking of you today. Simple, small things that meant the world.

Some people spoke very little but their body language boomed loud and clear. They mirrored the contraction inside me. Their empathy shone through that. On the second day, Rajeev, an old friend sat with us for two hours in silence. Before leaving, he said, “If there is anything I can do, please let me know.” Over the next months and years, he followed my blog, commented on posts and casually dropped by when he could. He let me know he was there.

Some people possibly saw in me, the worst possible lashing of fate as a parent. Maybe they got frightened. The speed of their exit indicated their fear of catching it. Some people who were previously in the ‘life-long friends’ category, vanished. One of them was a Psychiatrist, a mother of two. One of her children, Rajat, was a close friend of Saagar when we were neighbours in Belfast. The two boys spent every evening together cycling, playing and talking. They often had their dinner and their bath in each other’s houses. I still have a picture of them at six-year-olds, with the alien they constructed together from their toys and balloons. We were the closest of friends for four years and then they moved to Birmingham and we, to London. We stayed in touch and visited each other but the boys grew apart as boys of that age do. After their visit on Day 2, our next contact was a wedding invitation to Rajat’s wedding by a WhatsApp message, eight years on.

Of course, people don’t understand. They can’t. It’s not their fault. I wouldn’t want them to because they would have to experience this. If this had happened to a friend of mine, I would like to think that I would’ve been there for her but I don’t know that for sure. The woman I was in the ‘Before’ might have been too busy or too afraid or too awkward. I don’t know.

Some of Saagar’s friends have been with us all along. We’ve attended every concert we could as Hugo and Azin have risen in their musical careers. We have met up for meals and walks as often as possible. We’ve met their partners, watched them buy houses and change jobs. Our connection with them seems to be made of the same silk as our love for Saagar, and his memory. We feel blessed to have these young people in our lives.

Yes. My address book has radically changed. Like me.

Resource: How to be with someone who is grieving:

https://outlive.in/suicide-loss

Your suffering is a bridge.

Posted by

3

He described himself not as a revolutionary writer but one born into a revolutionary situation. He was born out of wedlock in the USA a hundred years ago – black, poor, despised by his adoptive father, the eldest of nine siblings and to top it all, a homosexual. His name was James Baldwin. He knew the meaning of suffering and could talk and write about it with striking beauty.

“I can only tell you about yourself, as much as I can face about myself.

As it happens to everybody who’s tried to live. You go through your life for a long time and you think that no one has ever suffered the way I’ve suffered. My God! My God!  Then you read something, you hear something and you realise that your suffering does not isolate you.

Your suffering is your bridge. It tells you that many people have suffered before you, that many people are suffering around you and always will.

All you can do is hopefully bring a little light into that suffering. Enough light so the person who is suffering can begin to comprehend his suffering. Begin to live with it and begin to change it.

We don’t change anything. All we can do is invest people with the morale to change it for themselves.”

Indeed. We can and we do. Thank you for your light, James Baldwin. Happy centenary.

[ CORe: Bringing light to those who have been unfortunate enough to lose a child.]

Early autumn

Posted by

2

How can people not know that their coat buttons are misaligned and one side is hanging lower than the other? One buttonhole is so very obviously exposed at the top, middle or at the bottom. And one button hanging loose somewhere along that vertical line. How can they not notice before they leave their front door? I used to be baffled when I saw patients like this in the hospital or random people on the streets, oblivious of this blatant asymmetry.

This afternoon, I went walking around my neighbourhood, taking delight in the profusion of red oval rosehips on roadside bushes and the yellowish-brown tinge starting to appear at the edges of leaves. Dense clouds were threatening to break open and fall on my head while my head was in the past. A few years ago, this date would have been a busy one for me.

10th of September – World Suicide Prevention Day

Not today. After years of searching for answers, raising awareness and trying to change the narrative, I have stepped back from it all. I accept the mystery that is life and death. I have slowed right down and found this to be the right way to live, for me.

Death is not a defeat or a failure. It’s not caused by a weakness or a flaw. It simply is. Its timing is its own. It has a wide range of imaginative excuses to visit. We like to impose a timing on it but it is a free agent.

Yesterday, a friend asked “I would love to show you my boy’s wedding album but it must be hard for you to see things like that because your son … Do you ever wonder how things might have been if he was alive?” After a brief silence, I replied “Every time my mind wants to go there I point out the one big assumption it’s making – if he was alive he would be in good health. I don’t know that. In fact, I don’t know much about anything at all. That allows me to live in awe, in wonder. I would love to see your boy’s wedding album.”

As I ambled along the empty streets this afternoon, I felt we are all dying a little bit every moment of every day, amidst celebrations and conversations, hopes and aspirations. Just then I noticed that the right side of my shirt-dress was hanging three inches lower than the left. The top button on the left side of my neck was hanging loose.

Resource: Online support for bereaved parents: Circle of Remembrance: http://www.core-community.com

The Wednesday Group.

Posted by

4

Dear Saagar,

Ten is a strange one. Who knew an innocent, round, even number like this could inflict such pain on one. The last note I had from you was ten years ago. It turned each moment of each day into an unwanted debt, heavily owed to God-knows-who. Potential decades stretched out before me like a horizon-less dark desert. I wished they would disappear. Time became the enemy, unfolding in fits and starts in wiggly circular patterns, etching lines of blood and tears on the surface of mighty oceans.  

Now, this gone decade demands recognition. It wants to be acknowledged in some way, however small. It deserves a pat on the back for braving through such turmoil and finally becoming a friend.

Hugo, Azin, Phoebe and some other friends, yours and ours came over for a Sunday lunch in early August and brought their friends along. Many of them, musicians. Remember Corinne Bailey Rae? You bought me her CD, Girl put your records on one Christmas? Remember how I sang along to it in the kitchen while cooking? On Sunday, we sang that song together. The Dock of the Bay and Ain’t no sunshine and Stand by me too.

We cut a chocolate cake for everyone who turned thirty this year. We were together for five glorious hours. Tens of sun-flowers smiled in vases dotted around the room and the sun shone on us as we talked and laughed and sang, just like the old times.

You won’t believe this but I resigned from my job recently. I know. I was so proud of it. I got so much from it. It meant so much to me but I feel liberated. Now someone else can do that lovely job while I work with my unique gift. In a world increasingly obsessed with labels, I am happy to lighten myself and shed a few.  

Last weekend, Si and I hosted a retreat for eleven bereaved parents. It was The Wednesday Group of the Circle of Remembrance that had started meeting online in May 2022. For more than two years we met for an hour and a half online every fortnight, sharing the most personal of things. This was the first occasion for us to meet in person as a group. It was divine.

One brown butterfly alighted on the left side of Si’s chest and rested on his white shirt peacefully for quite a while as we all talked and laughed and sipped our teas and coffees.

After returning home, one mum wrote to say,

“…this weekend has reminded me of who I am and what I am capable of as I continue to navigate this life I never expected or wanted to have.” 

What could be better?

I am blessed. Thank you for being my son.

Your essence remains here, with us.

Love you my darling.

Mamma. xxx

(Please visit http://www.core-community.com and contact us to join our loving and understanding community or recommend it to anyone who might find peer support after child loss helpful.)

(A handmade patchwork wall-piece for the home of CORe)