Remembering and sharing their grief
Former Poet Laureate of the UK, late John Betjemen wrote about Easter:
“The last year’s leaves are on the beech
The twigs are black, the cold is dry
To deeps beyond the deepest reach
the Easter bells enlarge the sky”
The phrase ‘to deep beyond the deepest reach’, describes the lowest point in Lent, the bleakest of days that was Good Friday, the day Jesus Christ was crucified after a mock trial. He died on the cross, after hours in agony. Kneeling at the foot of the cross was His mother, Mary. One could barely fathom the anguish, the emotions and the depth of despair she had to endure that fateful day.
The grief, emotions and depths of despair would be the same for a parent who sadly had lost a child. Whether due to a fatal accident, incurable illness, terrorist assault, knife crime or indeed, taking their own life, no parent expects to bury a child during their lifetime. Sadly, it does happen. The shattering experience and the void created, is something that would never go away.
My friend who lost his 19-year-old son in a car crash said to me that his whole body felt numb when he received the devastating news at his doorstep.
In an article she published in a UK tabloid in 2015, Lindsay Nicholson, former editor of the Good Housekeeping Magazine revealed how she felt immediately after her nine-year-old daughter succumbed to a rare form of cancer. She wrote, “To say my world had spun off its axis is an understatement, I got through the days on autopilot.”
Swiss-born psychiatrist, Elizabeth Kubler Ross identified different stages of grief. In her view, there is the initial period of shock, followed by a state known as denial, in which the brain refuses to accept the news. As the reality breaks through, there is the anger. Then, after months and sometimes years, the stage of acceptance. Duration of these stages could be variable - extending to years and in some cases, could be lifelong. Bereaved parents try to cope with such grief in different ways. The majority of parents seem to bear the loss and endeavour to get on with their life, the best they can.
Some of these parents do get involved in campaigns to raise awareness and even change laws. Sarah Payne of Hersham Surrey, disappeared on July 1, 2000 while playing in a cornfield near her grandparents’ home. After a lengthy search her body was found about 15 miles from her home – she had been abducted and killed by a paedophile. Her mother campaigned tirelessly for a similar law to that of America’s Megan’s Law to be introduced in the United Kingdom. ‘Sarah’s Law’ was established which allows every parent in the country to know if a registered child sex offender is living nearby. Sarah’s father, however, never got over his daughter’s death. He had separated from Sarah’s mother and was found dead in his house, after a couple of years.
Legendary musician Eric Clapton lost his four-year-old son Connor, in a tragic accident in 1991. The boy fell out of a window of his partner’s apartment which was on the 49th floor of a New York skyscraper. Grief-stricken Eric went away and lived as a recluse in Antigua. With time this tragedy inspired two of the artist’s iconic songs. The deeply emotional lyrics of the song “Tears in Heaven” are well known -a tribute to the son he lost.
Musician Bob Geldof, co-founder of Band Aid which in 1984 raised millions of pounds for famine relief in Ethiopia recently spoke of the death of his daughter, Peaches, of a heroin overdose six years ago. He describes his ‘infinite grief’, as “boundless and bottomless; time doesn’t heal – time accommodates and it is ever present.”
Such infinite grief would have engulfed the families who lost their loved ones in the terrorist bombings on Easter Sunday in Sri Lanka last year. That senseless carnage killed 321 including 45 children. As we approach the first anniversary of that fateful Easter Sunday, let us remember, reach out and share their grief. Hopefully this would offer those parents and their families some solace.
Easter symbolises the dawn of a new life. For the bereaved mother Mary, seeing Her risen son, would have brought great joy. The celebratory mood is captured in John Betjemen’s line “the Easter bells enlarge the sky”.
Sadly however, for the mortal parent who has lost a child, there is a void unfilled. This quote from former US President Dwight Eisenhower who lost his three-year-old son, says it all: “There is no tragedy in life like the death of a child. Things never get back to the way they were”.
For them the bell tolls!
(The writer is a retired Consultant Physician in the UK)