The Word Void
New Grief Words
This will be my last essay for a few months. Instead, I will be posting notes of new vocabulary words I’ve created to define the world of grief, as we are sorely inept in the arena. I emphatically realized this two years ago when I wrote this column in the vortex of my passing thoughts. My first word has everything to do with the following essay. I’ll post more in the coming weeks. I’m still adding new words, and I invite you to do so, too!
It’s been nine months. The length of a pregnancy. A human gestation. We get nine months to prepare for a baby’s birth. To wrap our heads around the fact that our family will imminently grow. Nine months to find room for a crib, high chair, diaper pail, changing table, swing, bassinet, car seat. To create a home. Nine months to tell family, friends, co-workers, neighbors. Everyone in our orbit, through the seasons. To make exciting phone calls. For baby showers. For our whole world to welcome a new addition. To adjust. To make changes to our home, location, job, and friendships. Nine months to make room for a new little person: mentally, physically, and emotionally.
What’s the word for the opposite of pregnancy? When we lose someone near and dear, the phone calls are dreadful, and the anticipation of making them brings on anxiety and more tears. More crying than we can bear. These tears, each one, feel like tears, ripping our hearts apart.
Is that where the word comes from? Do we produce tears when our hearts are torn apart? We have hours, or days at best, to notify family and friends, while we’re still in shock. In those calls, we may give some details, but then there are no words.
“Condolences.” “Sorry for your loss.” “Our thoughts and prayers are with you.” This is the best we can come up with? Catch phrases to express something so profound that we have no words of our own to offer.
Sitting through silent Shiva makes so much more sense. Just sit with the bereaved without saying a word. Just be there.
Speaking of words… Widow: when we lose a husband. Widower: when we lose a wife. Orphan: when we lose both parents. Strikingly, there is no word for when we lose a child, or a sibling, or a grandparent, for that matter. Common experiences. We have words to label and define all things material. Every particle, mammal, bird, reptile, and bug on the planet has a name. Is it true that the Eskimos have 30 different words for snow to clearly label and define each type?
But then, they need to talk about snow for their survival. To describe it as articulately as possible.
No word. No label. No description.
Is this our cultural way to say, “Move on. You cannot stay here. Don’t brood”? We say to be human is to feel, so why haven’t we defined our feelings beyond the basics? It’s like someone tried but became too exhausted to finish the task. Emotions are exhausting. When we have no words to express them, we also feel isolated and alien. Words are the keystone of how we connect. Words evoke feeling. Words can offer comfort. Words build community, belonging, and understanding.
Funerals are held soon after death, for health and safety reasons. To bury the body. To say goodbye. To pay our respects. To move on. Is the point to bury our feelings, along with the body? A clean, sanitized burial, to wrap it all up and leave the dead with the dead and move along with the living, as if we’re all riding a conveyor belt? Have we assimilated with the British diaspora of keeping a stiff upper lip? Although that may work for some acquaintances, it’s not possible for those who feel love. Love is not a switch to be turned on or off with determination, choice, or even death. Oh, if only it were so! All of life’s tragedy would be spared.
Emotions have their own vocabulary; a language our thoughts do not control or understand. Grief is only a word, but it is so much MORE. Grief is a process; an experience that has no end. It is learning to live with life-long loss. To live with the savage and constant throb of scars on our hearts.
This absence somewhat thwarts my motto and goal of “Let’s Talk About it.” Grief is difficult, at best, with a full vocabulary, and even more so, frustrating when we can’t find the words. We need the words. We need to articulate how we feel.
Let’s think about that. Let’s do something about it.
I’ve decided to try to add a few words to our grief-torn community. I know it sounds ridiculous, but we have to start somewhere, right? I want to help bind us. To help us commune. And heal. I invite you to join me.
DIGESTATION
(n.) the time needed to prepare, mentally, physically, and emotionally, after an extreme loss, like divorce or death. (v.) To digest the changes we will need to make. To digest the loneliness and forge other relationships. To digest what we need, want to keep and leave, and how our lives will change. To divest any assets and property. This time is variable across individuals and circumstances. It is a (n.) noun and a (v) verb. And an (e.) for emotion. Definitely an E.
I’m determined to keep adding to this list so that those who suffer from loss may one day feel less isolated by having the language, community, and support they need to help the healing process. We need more words. We need to use them, as words never spoken will soon die. Once we speak them out loud, we can make them part of our community. The community that one dare not speak its name. But for those of us within that circle, we need the voice and language to share, communicate, support, and bond in our journey to heal. You’ll find more words each week in your email and in Substack Notes.
Do you have feelings or experiences in grief that have no names? Share the experience, and we’ll try to attach a name to it. It can be a community project.
Nikki, so true. We need more words to describe the feelings of grief. I want to suggest griefaniversary. We need a word for the day your loved one dies. It’s a hard day and I think grief needs the headline. Looking forward to your new words.
"I am with you always.
With-ness is the whole thing, really. That’s the Trinity collapsed into a sentence. A pervasiveness, a presence. An everywhere-ness." ~ Nadia Bolz-Weber
These are the words that bring me peace. To be reminded that my son, Douglas, is with me always, a with-ness, and that he is everywhere, an everywhere-ness.
I'm excited to read what springs forth, Nikki. I'm a seeker of words to help build bridges to one another. You're onto something vital. My gratitude. 💜