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Comforting someone who is grieving is not about becoming an expert in grief psychology.

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It is not about delivering a flawless speech that like lifts their spirits like the ending

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of a movie, and it is not about fixing what can't be fixed because grief is not a thing

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that can be fixed.

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Comforting someone who's grieving is about using your pre-existing strengths, things you

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already have inside you to support someone you care about who is in pain.

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Hi there grief growers and welcome back to another episode of Grief Grower.

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I am so grateful to be here with you as always.

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If you have been growing alongside me in my work for a while, welcome back.

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And if you are new to me and my work, hello.

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My name is Shelby for Scythia, I am a Grief Coach, a three time author and the founder

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of Life After Loss Academy, where I have helped dozens of grieving people stop feeling

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lost, stuck, broken and alone, and start building lives that they genuinely love from

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the lives that lost forced them to live.

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This includes not only death-related losses, but also losses like divorce and breakup,

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major diagnosis and every single other loss that changes our lives.

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Here on Grief Grower, we believe that grief is not something to get over.

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It is something that we grow with and alongside and that when we stop treating grief like a problem

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to be solved and start treating it like an invitation to live more deeply, we can create

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meaningful lives that are which with the memories that we carry, the struggles that we

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faced and the precious awareness of what it is to be right here and right now.

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Today on the show we are diving into the supporting someone series once again with episode

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6.

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So, all together, I have given you six episodes on what to say and do to support someone

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who is grieving.

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But before we get into it, just a quick reminder that release day for my third book, of course

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I'm here right now, three actually helpful things to say to someone who's grieving is coming

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up in less than two months on March 31st.

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This little guidebook teaches you how to support someone who's grieving in your life with the

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best free tool that any of us has and that is our words so that you will never enter another

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conversation with a grieving friend, family member, coworker, client wondering what on earth

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do I say in this situation in order to comfort them.

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As an author, pre-orders are always immensely helpful when it comes to getting the book scene

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by the powers that be and bookstores in every other place that would like to stock this

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book so you can find a link to pre-order.

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Of course I'm here right now, three actually helpful things to say to someone grieving in

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the show notes for this episode.

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If you have already pre-ordered the book, thank you so incredibly much.

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You can submit your receipt number.

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No photos required.

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All you have to do is type it in from your local bookstore, from Amazon, from Bookshop,

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from Barnes & Noble on my website, which is ShelbyFersethea.com, to access the free six-week

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book club that is kicking off April 14th.

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In that book club, we will read, of course, I'm here right now, chapter by chapter, over

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six weeks, there's six chapters in the book, so we will read one chapter a week, and we

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will discuss it together.

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We will talk about scenarios, how to use the phrases in real life, and what to say to

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someone who is grieving in your life, even if that person who is grieving is you.

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Once again, this book club kicks off in early April, so make sure you have the book in your

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hands and submit your receipt number on my website by then.

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You can find the link to do that in the show notes as well.

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And last thing I'll say, if you would like to celebrate the launch of this book with me,

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I would be so honored to see you at two launch parties.

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The first one is taking place, the eve before the book comes out, here in Chicago on March 30th,

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when you get your ticket, the book is included, so you get the book in your hands before the

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rest of the world, the night before it's released to the world, which is so fun and so exciting.

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And the second launch event, if you are not located in or around Chicago, is happening

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on March 31st on YouTube.

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So no matter where in the world you live, you can tune in to hear more about the clients

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and interactions that inspired this grief book.

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And I will also read some excerpts from the book live during the launch party.

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And of course, the replay of that virtual launch party will be made available if you cannot

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attend live, because I want to honor the fact that so many my clients and students and friends

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and family members are in different time zones of the world.

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And yet we are all either grieving or supporting someone through grief, sometimes both at the

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same time.

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So I really want to make this launch party and sort of the thesis of this book available

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to you whenever you would like to watch it.

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You can save your spot for both of these launch parties at the link in the show notes.

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Okay, let's get into supporting someone series number six.

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And this is how to comfort someone who is grieving.

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This is inspired by my new book, of course, I'm here right now.

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Three powerful ways to show up with care.

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The reason I wrote this episode and wanted to bring it to you is because odds are whether

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you're grieving or you consider yourself not grieving in this season, you are probably

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listening because someone in your life is experiencing a loss.

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That person, maybe you, that person, maybe someone that you know someone just died or a

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physical or mental health diagnosis just changed everything about your life, their life.

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Maybe a married or relationship has ended.

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Maybe a future that someone was counting on has just just poofed into the ether.

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And now you are standing next to a grieving person's pain and thinking, what on earth do I

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say?

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What if I make it worse?

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And how do I support someone who's grieving when I don't know what to do?

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And as I was writing this book and as I talk to people who are curious about how to support

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someone who's grieving, they often have three main motivations.

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They want to be a good friend to someone who's grieving.

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I want to feel as if I can support them and I want to be perceived as a good friend and

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I want to act in the behavior that a good friend would have.

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I want to know what to say and do.

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I want to have the words that are genuinely comforting specific to this moment.

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And sort of on a larger perspective on a worldwide level, I want to live in a society where

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people are there for each other when hard things happen.

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And oftentimes these three motivators, I want to be a good friend, I want to have the tools

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and I want to live in a world where everyone has the tools to support someone and be a good

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friend when someone in the world is grieving.

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These are all driving people who want to comfort someone who's grieving.

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So if this is you, I feel you like raising your hand in the headphones of this podcast

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episode.

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I see you and I hear you.

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What I want you to do, if you are spiraling of like, what do I say?

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I don't want to screw it up, I really want to make sure that I am comforting someone who's

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grieving in a way that actually feels good and okay to them.

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I want you to take a breath and know this.

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Comforting someone who is grieving is not about becoming an expert in grief psychology.

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It is not about delivering a flawless speech that like lifts their spirits like the ending

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of a movie.

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And it is not about fixing what can't be fixed because grief is not a thing that can be

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fixed.

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Having someone who's grieving is about using your pre-existing strengths, things you already

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have inside you to support someone you care about who is in pain.

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And after more than 10 years of working with grieving people and listening very carefully

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to what actually helps versus what harms, I have found that comforting someone who is

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grieving comes down to three core ways of showing up.

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And these are all based on strengths that I imagine you already have somewhere inside

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of you.

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They're at one of these three than others, so see which one sounds the most like you and

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then we're going to look at each of them individually and get even more detail.

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First, your strength may be validating what they're feeling.

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Second, your strength may be remaining present over time.

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Or third, your strength might be gently reminding the person who's grieving that this moment

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exists within the context of a larger life.

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And if you are not sure which of these three strengths most describes you, pause right

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now, pause this podcast episode and look at the show notes for this episode unless you're

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driving in which case, wait until you get where you're going and then look at the show notes

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to take the free two minute quiz that I have created called what is your grief supporter

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strength.

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Once you have your results, come back to listen more about each grief supporter type and

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we're going to get into them now.

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What I want you to take with you as we continue this episode is that comforting someone after

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losses a lot easier and less pressure cooker filled than most people think and it does not

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require you to be a therapist which we've already mentioned.

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But you also don't have to know how to make a casserole or have the money to send a bunch

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of flowers or groceries to their home.

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So if you want to meaningfully support someone grieving, let's explore these three different

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types of strengths that you can already have as a grief supporter that you can hone and

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perfect and add words to to comfort someone who is grieving and you can figure out what

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type of grief supporter you are, what your innate gifts and strengths are and use those

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to your advantage the next time someone you know is in crisis.

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Okay, the first type is a comforter who supports someone grieving by validating their emotions.

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And this is important because grief is very disorienting.

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It can make the person going through it feel irrational or reactive or foggy or angry

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or exhausted or overwhelmed a whole plethora of things.

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And on top of all that, so so many grieving people have told me in more than 10 years of

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grief coaching that they're doing grief wrong or they're afraid that they're crazy or

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they think that nobody really understands what it is they're going through.

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They wonder if they're too emotional or not emotional enough or they're talking about

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the loss too much or not talking about it enough or crying about the loss too much or

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not crying enough to prove that they care about who or what they lost.

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So one of the most stabilizing things that you as a comforter can offer them is simple

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emotional validation.

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And what validation means if you're not familiar with this term is that you help a grieving

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person's emotions make sense.

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Not in a clinical way, you don't have to break it down for them from a psychology perspective

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and not with really long explanations, but just in a human way.

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So here's some examples of what validation, emotional validation looks like in practice.

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So when someone says I can't even focus at work, you might respond, well, of course you can't

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focus at work the way you used to.

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You're griefing or when they say I'm so angry and I don't even know why, you might say

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that makes sense to me.

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There's a lot that feels unfair about loss.

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You are not analyzing them.

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You are not correcting them and you are not redirecting them toward like gratitude or

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positivity or growth.

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Instead you are communicating one simple, powerful statement.

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Your reaction to grief is normal.

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And this matters because grieving people are constantly exposed to this subtle pressure

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to look on the bright side or to move forward or to be like everyone else.

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And so when you validate instead of minimize their emotions, you create emotional safety

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within your relationship.

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And in my free quiz where you can discover your personal grief support strength, one of

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the supporter types is called the perceptive permission granter.

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These are the emotional validators.

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This is your innate strength.

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So maybe you naturally think or say things like your feelings make sense.

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I can see how you got there.

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I hear you.

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I believe you.

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People who are emotional validators or perceptive permission grangers because I had to come up

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with a fun name.

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They do not try to fix what a griever is feeling.

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They legitimize it.

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Sometimes even offering evidence.

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And here is what is important.

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You do not need to be an emotions person or a feelings person to do this well, to grant

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someone emotional permission to have their feelings.

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You do not need a degree in counseling and you do not need a huge emotional vocabulary.

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And you also do not need to cry alongside them.

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Again, you do not have to come up with any further proof.

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Then simply you are standing alongside them whether literally or virtually or over text

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message or however you're communicating with them and just reflecting back what you

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are observing to be true about them.

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And what this does is wraps their heart in this unspoken comfort that however they're

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feeling about their loss is normal and okay.

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Underneath every validating phrase, I see you.

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I hear you.

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I believe you.

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That makes sense to me.

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Of course you would feel that way.

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Is the same foundation.

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You are granting your grieving person permission to feel over and over and over again.

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And that is the gift of the perceptive permission granter.

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So if you think you might be the perceptive permission granter, take the quiz and see if

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that is your type.

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Let's get into the second type of comforter or the second way that you can comfort someone

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who is grieving.

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Number two is comforting by being a consistent presence.

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Something that a lot of my grieving clients and students say often is everyone showed up

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at first right when the loss happened and then they all disappeared.

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Society writ large, I'm kind of speaking in generalizations, tends to rally around fresh

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loss like the thing just happened.

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There are meal trains and texts and flowers and an outpouring of sympathy and then slowly

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or sometimes quickly life resumes and people go as grievers often put it back to their

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normal lives.

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And while this sort of grief ghosting by friends and family is really intentional, it makes

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grieving people feel like no one truly cares about them or their loss because no one is

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willing to go the distance, the distance of time.

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For many grieving people it is another sort of loss to be left alone to deal with the

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pain of grief on top of grieving another already painful loss.

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So for instance, my person died and now I'm being abandoned by all my friends and family.

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So if you want to be a really good grief supporter to someone grieving, learn how to stick

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around.

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And sticking around does not mean hovering or bombarding your griever with daily.

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How are you?

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What are you doing?

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How are you feeling today texts?

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It doesn't mean forcing deep conversations.

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It means maintaining gentle but ongoing contact.

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So this could look like a short text that says, "No need to respond, just thinking of you

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today."

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Or verbal acknowledgement, the grief anniversary, like a death day or a birthday is coming up.

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So like, "I know your dad's birthday is coming up.

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Are you doing anything special to honor him?"

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Or "I know that the anniversary of your divorce is coming up.

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Are you doing anything to commemorate the day or are you interested in taking a day off

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if you're in someone like a management position or a friend or something who could cover

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for them?"

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You could offer an invitation to walk with no pressure to join or to go see a movie or

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to go to a very low-stakes restaurant reservation or a concert or something similar.

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You could even just have a willingness to sit in the same room with someone who is grieving

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or on a phone call without needing to fill the silence.

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So many grieving people say, "I just want someone to show up to be there."

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And this is often what they mean.

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These gestures of ongoing contact are all important because we live in a society that

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doesn't make space for grief after the crater, the initial impact.

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When you choose to keep acknowledging grief over the long haul, you communicate to your grieving

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person, your loss is still important to me.

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So in my free quiz, which once again you can find it in the show notes for this episode

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or if you're watching on YouTube, you can find it in the description.

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One of the quiz results is called the Compassionate Companion.

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If you are a compassionate companion, you understand instinctively that grief is not a thing

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that happens one time.

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There's not just the moment the crater is created.

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You recognize that what comforts most is often consistency, showing up as the person who

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is dealing with this crater that blew this giant hole in their lives, slowly pieces things

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back together.

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To accompany a grievous heart over time, you don't have to say profound things.

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In fact, you honestly don't really need to say much at all.

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It is the checking in and the checking in over time that is the most important.

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Set another way.

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You do not have to spend a lot of time with a grieving person.

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You just have to keep showing up over time.

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Your continued presence in their life communicates something very powerful and that is one of my

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favorite phrases, whether you say it out loud or not, I have not forgotten that you are grieving.

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Many people worry that they will say the wrong thing and make things worse for the person

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who are trying to comfort and so they pull back.

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But for most grievous silence from others or stepping away, hurts more than imperfect words.

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If you are someone who does not love long heart to heart conversations, showing up over

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time in small ways might actually be your strength.

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You might be the steady one in their lives, the one who keeps checking in, the one who sends

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the short, simple message without requiring anything in return.

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And your reliability as the compassionate companion lets them know that it is okay that they are

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still grieving and that they are still remembering and processing and being changed by their

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loss.

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At the core of every check in that you have with them of "I'm still here," you demonstrate

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that you are one of the ones who gets it.

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Grief does not vanish with time and neither do you.

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And what a gift that is to somebody who is grieving.

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Okay, let's get into the last way that you can comfort someone who is grieving here and

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this is by gently providing perspective.

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This is not everyone's gift in life after loss, but for people who this is their gift,

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they are really, really good at it.

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And let me say more on what I mean by gently providing perspective.

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Grief can make the pain of this present moment feel permanent, especially when a permanent

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loss like a death or a life-changing diagnosis is the thing that they're mourning.

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The intensity can convince someone grieving that because this is how it is right now, this

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is how it's going to be forever.

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When you carefully place your grieving person's pain in some kind of context, you create breathing

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room in their brain and sometimes a shred of hope that their suffering is not all there

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is.

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To be very clear, this does not mean saying, "It will get better.

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You can try for kids again.

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You'll find love again."

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It does not mean pointing out silver linings or asking them to look on the bright side.

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And it really, really, really doesn't mean rushing them towards joy or happiness.

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This means offering perspective means acknowledging how hard this specific unique moment is while

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also anchoring it in time, almost like tying an anchor to the reality of right now and

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saying, "Yep, this is true.

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This is heavy.

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This is real."

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And also, this is not all there is.

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So people who are good at this, this flavor of comforting, say things like, "Right now,

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everything feels really heavy."

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Or, "This season is incredibly difficult."

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Or, "I can see how hard you're trying in this chapter."

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These small phrases, these prepositional phrases of "Right now, this season, this chapter,

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all these time-oriented sayings."

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They do something really, really important.

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They frame your grieving friends' pain as real and intense and valid, but also not endless.

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In my free grief supporter quiz, what's your grief supporter's strength, this supporter

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type is called the narrative navigator.

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These are the people who can hold two truths at once.

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This is really effing awful, and this is not the entirety of your existence.

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You do not need to be poetic, to be a narrative navigator.

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You do not need to predict someone's healing timeline.

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You are not promising anything about their future.

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You are simply naming what is happening in a way that prevents the pain from swallowing

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or consuming their whole entire rest of their life.

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And for someone who feels consumed by grief, that subtle reframing, whether they recognize

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it or not, can be incredibly stabilizing.

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Again, as I said in the beginning of this episode, you do not need to be a therapist to offer

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this.

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You do not need specialized training.

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You just need to be thoughtful about your language.

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So instead of saying, it won't always hurt this bad, you'll have future kids, you'll find

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love again, it's okay, blah, blah, blah, it'll all work out in the end.

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You say instead, right now I can see how much this hurts.

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And your framing of this moment in time, as just that, a moment right now in this season

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for the moment, shows them that it is possible to honor and be present to the grief that is

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happening right here, right now, while also acknowledging that the hearing now is always

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changing.

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Life may never end, but it does change shape and pain while it is very real is rarely a permanent

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state of being.

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What I really want to drive home as you go out into the world after this episode is that

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you do not have to become someone different in order to comfort someone who's grieving.

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I think so many people hesitate to support someone who's grieving a friend, a family member,

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a coworker, a neighbor, a client, because they believe that it requires a special personality

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or formal training.

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They think things like, I'm not going to the motions or I never know what to say or I don't

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want to mess this up, but supporting someone in grief and I believe this like to the core

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of who I am is less about charisma and education and more about your relationship to them and

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their pain.

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And frankly, your innate comforting gifts and I think we all have them.

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Are you willing to validate their feelings instead of dismissing them?

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That is one kind of gift.

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Are you willing to remain present instead of disappearing?

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That is another kind of gift.

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Or are you willing to frame the moment gently instead of forcing fake optimism?

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That is another kind of gift.

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That's it.

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That is all it takes to comfort someone who is grieving in your midst.

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The world does not need more people who are trying to get grief right.

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It needs more steady humans who are willing to show up thoughtfully exactly as they already

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are.

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So here is your next step, whether you are grieving or supporting someone who is.

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You are listening to this episode because you want to support someone well.

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Please take the quiz.

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What is your grief supporter's strength?

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It is free.

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It takes less than two minutes.

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You will discover your natural way of comforting someone who is in pain.

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You will see how your personality can be an asset, not a liability, in the midst of loss,

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and you will walk away with practical guidance that is tailored to how you uniquely show up

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for the people in your life who are suffering.

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And in case you haven't already guessed, this quiz is inspired by my new book.

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Of course I'm here right now, which goes deeper into what supportive presence actually

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looks like in everyday conversations using words and words alone.

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It's powerful little magical free things to validate a company and offer time anchoring

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to all of the grieving people in your life, whether they are facing a death divorce diagnosis,

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bust, splash them with water and ruin their dress all the way to their sister just died

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in the hospital.

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Once again, you do not need to overhaul who you are to comfort someone who is grieving.

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You do not need to memorize a script and you do not need to rescue any single grieving

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person from their pain.

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You just need to show up in a way that says, "Your feelings make sense?"

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Validator.

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I am still here.

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A company or this moment as hard as it is is a moment in time contextualizer.

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These three ways are how you comfort someone who is grieving.

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Thank you so much for joining me today on this episode of Grief Grower.

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I cannot wait to hear what type of grief supporter you are.

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That's all for this episode of Grief Grower.

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Thank you so much for joining me today.

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If you're looking for grief support beyond the show, you can find free workshops, articles,

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and my new "What's Your Grief Supporter Strength Quiz" at shallbeforcythia.com/links.

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And if you'd like to get support from me for your unique loss experience, join us in

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life after loss academy, my online course, and community.

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As a student, I'll walk you through my five step grief framework for rebuilding after

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loss, and you can get live coaching from me every single week to answer your questions.

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Replays are always available if you can't attend life.

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It's just $33 a month to join or $22 a month if you're marginalized or financially stressed

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griever, and you can cancel at any time.

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If this podcast felt validating, comforting, educational, or otherwise helpful to you, please

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subscribe and leave a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify.

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And be sure to share Grief Grower with a friend, because you never know what someone you love

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is going through.

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Grief Grower is hosted by me, shallbeforcythia, and the theme music is by our very own Addy Goldstein.

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Until next time, I see you.

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I am so proud of you and the work that you're doing in the world, and I love you.

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Because even through grief, we are growing.

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[Music]