It’s not an exclusive club.
Anyone can join and often do when they least expect it.
Dues are paid in tears.
The moment you lose someone close to you, the very instant you learn of their deaths, you immediately become a lifetime member of a group you never wanted to be associated with.
You are one of the ones left behind.
You now have a kinship and a bond with fellow suffers of grief and loss whether you like it or not.
It doesn’t matter if you lose and an aunt, grandmother, best friend or father, you now “get” it. Or, at least have the ability to understand a little better what other “members” of this grief stricken club are going through. You can empathize in a way few can.
When you lose someone, other people’s losses are harder on you. In part because it conjures up your own loss and because you know what they are going through. You know that kind of pain.
I learned yesterday that my cousin’s son, Zach died.
He shot himself for reasons that are still unclear to me, as well as the rest of our family.
I never met Zach. I regret that, not because he’s gone now, but because he was family.
I know two things about death: it’s final and a parent should never outlive their child.
My heart aches for Zach’s mother and father.
