~
By Therese Rando, Ph.D. ~ Continued from Part 2 on Wednesday, June 6, 2012
If you have lost a
loved one from sudden death, you know that you had no chance to say good-bye
and no opportunity to finish unfinished business with your loved one. Most
probably these are major issues for you. The lack of time to bring this
important relationship to a positive close causes much anguish to those of us
whose loved ones die without warning. We wish that we could have known in order
to say and do what we wanted to; we wish we could have just one more brief
moment with our loved one to tell him we loved him, apologize for ways we might
have hurt him, explain why we treated him the way we did, or let him know what
he meant to us.
You may feel a
profound loss of security and confidence in the world. After all, you have been
taught a dramatic lesson: Loved ones can be snatched away without warning. You
may always await another loss to befall. Research has shown that widows whose
husbands died suddenly are slower to move toward remarriage, since they are
unwilling to risk future unanticipated loss again for themselves and their
children. Avoidance and anxiety eventually can lead to states of anxious
withdrawal since the world has become such a frightening, unpredictable place.
In some ways. the
consequences of losing a loved one to sudden death can last a lifetime. While
for some mourners this can be evidenced in chronic grief or persistent anxiety
in which security and confidence never totally return, for others the
consequences ate less dramatic, though no less powerful. The best example I can
give of this is a personal one. All of the deaths in my husband’s life have
been anticipated deaths. When I am a little late returning from work my husband
automatically assumes that I have been held up on the telephone or have run
overtime with my patients. Unless I am dramatically late, he is not unduly
disturbed and assumes I will be home soon.
In contrast, I have a
much different response when he is later than expected. This is because all of
the important deaths in my life have been sudden, unexpected ones. As a
consequence when he is later than usual I automatically assume that something
terrible has happened. I experience a considerable amount of apprehension. What
makes me different from someone who has not worked so hard on these issues is
that I will not immediately jump to call the hospitals or the police. I will
remind myself that statistically the chances are that he all right and that
there are reasons for his delay. Nevertheless, I am concerned.
Does this mean that I love my husband more than he loves me because I am
more concerned when he is late? I think not. What it reveals is the scars of
sudden death. I have been taught all too well that the people I love can be
snatched from me without warning, and that death doesn’t always happen to
someone else.
This awareness that
you can lose someone without warning does not have to be negative. It can
prompt you to deal with your loved ones on a timely basis. It can help you not
to put off until tomorrow those things you should say and do today. It may
assist you in making sure you don’t have too much unfinished business with the
people you lose.
If your loved one
died from a sudden death, you know that tomorrow is promised to no one. This
awareness also can help you keep in mind what is important in life, so you
don’t get lost in trivial matters and lose sight of those things that are most
important to you. It is an ironic but positive consequence of sudden death that
it can make you appreciate life more than you ever would have if you had not
undergone such a traumatic experience. This does not mean that you would seek
out such a loss in order to teach yourself such a lesson, but it does let you
know that you can pull something meaningful out of such a tragedy.
Taken from Therese A. Rando, How To Go on Living When
Someone You Love Dies. New York: Bantam Books, 1991, pp. 90-93
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