By Natalie Silverstein

I recently attended a wake for the father of an old friend.

It was good to hug my friend, to make him laugh and tell him that I loved him. A wake is filled with bizarre moments when you’re not entirely sure what to do or say, how you might actually comfort the bereaved. Having lost my mother in October, I understand that the words said are mostly irrelevant and almost immediately forgotten. Grief, fatigue, and overwhelm are a good recipe for tuning out and pushing through. There are only so many times one can accept expressions of sympathy and say “thank you” before the words begin to lose their meaning.

The language around loss and grief can be both comforting and confounding. So much of it is wrapped up in cultural traditions, religious beliefs, and geographic colloquialisms. Depending on your faith and where you live, you might hear someone say the deceased person is resting now or is at peace; that we have lost them, they have passed away, crossed over, earned their wings, or gone home. 

It seems odd to say we’ve “lost” a loved one as if they might be found if we look hard enough. I think of this all the time as it relates to my mother: If she isn’t in the house in New Haven or on the other end of the telephone line every afternoon around four o’clock, where is she? Apparently, she’s lost, but no matter where I look, I won’t find her.

We certainly suffer a loss when someone dies.

We once had a father, a mother, a sibling, a friend, who was walking, talking, and living among us, and now their physical presence is absent from our everyday lives. We don’t hear their voices, see their smiles, or feel their hands in ours. We had those things once and now they’re gone. And we miss them.

Perhaps using the word “lost” is a kinder, gentler way to describe a death, particularly one that is unexpected or unimaginable. One of my husband’s fraternity brothers was killed in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. When my husband heard that Rich had been at work in the South Tower that day, he sprang into action, collecting a college fund for the young daughter Rich left behind. I remember driving out to Rich’s home to meet his wife and little girl and to update them on our fundraising efforts. Sobbing, his widow hugged me in the front foyer and simply said,

“I can’t believe I lost him.” 

In my anger and disbelief about the tragedy, I remember responding, “You didn’t lose him, he was taken from you.” Rich wasn’t lost, he was simply gone—stolen in a horrifying instant, like so many other innocent people. Saying she had lost Rich was probably the only way his widow could deal with the incomprehensible absurdity of the situation.

After my own recent experience with loss, I’m processing the words “resting” and “peace.” For decades, I worried about my mother. She lived alone in a second-floor apartment with the laundry located in the basement two flights down. She prepared her own meals and only reluctantly agreed to accept any outside help. As the years went by, her ability to live independently became more tenuous, and I repeatedly offered to find an alternative arrangement. She was content where she was and stubbornly refused my suggestions and offers of help. 

My siblings and I muddled through, respecting her wishes, though the worry that surrounded our interactions weighed on me. Some years were heavier than others, but I continued to live my life, consumed as I was with the joys and burdens of raising my family, working, and managing a home. Concern over my Mom’s well-being was always there in the distance, or just over my head like the sword of Damocles. I would sometimes forget to worry and then startle with remembrance, calling to check in. I wondered how she would live out her final days, hoping she’d allow me to make the process easier. Perhaps some miraculous rational understanding of her precarious situation would take hold. Spoiler alert: it never did.

When she died, there was a stillness, a quiet calm. There weren’t many words.

She can rest in peace now, people said, and I hope that’s true. She’s at peace. In many ways, so am I.

Maybe the words we say to each other are less important than the words we say about the person who has died, like the ones I said to my friend at his father’s wake. “Your Dad was such a good guy, you were lucky to have him.” And, “He was so proud of you.” How we describe what has happened, or where the deceased is now — crossed over, gone home, passed away, or lost — is less important than what he meant to the people who loved him when he was here, and the memories they will carry with them into the future.

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Natalie Silverstein, MPH, is an author, speaker, consultant, and passionate advocate for family and youth service. Her first book, Simple Acts: The Busy Family’s Guide to Giving Back, was published in 2019, and her second book, Simple Acts: The Busy Teen’s Guide to Making a Difference was published in July. Natalie is the New York coordinator of Doing Good Together, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit. In this role, she curates a free monthly e-mail listing of family-friendly service opportunities distributed to thousands of subscribers. Her personal and parenting essays have appeared on a variety of blogs including Grown and Flown, Red Tricycle, Motherwell, and Mommypoppins. She is a frequent public speaker and podcast guest. Natalie holds a master’s degree in public health from Yale. She lives in New York City with her husband and three children.