President, Arlington Memorial Gardens
The funeral is
over. You have left the cemetery
following the committal service. Perhaps you had a family gathering after the funeral, but now you’re home. Eventually, whether it’s today, tomorrow or
several days from now, your support system, those relatives and/or friends
who love and care about you, will take their leave, departing to return to the
hustle and bustle of their own lives. And it’s at this time, this precise moment, that reality will set in -- the
crushing, empty finality of your loss.
You try to deal with
it because you loath the very notion that you could ever become a burden to
anyone, especially to those you love; but you’re suddenly feeling strangely
disconnected from your former life, you know, the one that ended abruptly just
days earlier. So, you choose the “I’ll
do this on my own” road to travel.
You
awake in the morning after having experienced a fitful night of sleep – if you
slept at all. You prepare breakfast for
yourself and begin your forlorn day of going through the motions, doing those
things you feel compelled to do but which seem to suck energy from your very
soul. Wash and repeat – this is your new
life; this is who you are. Despondency
sets in. The nights grow longer and even
more fitful than before. The days are
more challenging. The depression deepens
and it feels as though there is little hope of ever feeling better.
Unfortunately,
many survivors feel this way after the death of a loved-one. It’s just part of the crummy hand that you’re
dealt when someone close to you dies. In most cases, survivors suffer grief and
anxiety to one degree or another. In
some cases, the grief is so overwhelming that it can be a form of
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). And actually, there’s very little that anyone can do or say to purge
those feelings of loss. Because losing
someone you care about is a sad and gut-wrenching experience. It’s a condition of our species. Homo sapiens.
While in these
circumstances grief may be our captor, fortunately for us, we need not remain
its long term prisoners. There is a way
out. Well, “out” may be a misnomer;
really, there is a path “through” the grief, a path that leads to an ultimately
healthy recovery. And that path is not
for solo trekkers. It’s one where
survivors band together, walk together and draw strength from each other. That path is called grief support.
Our grief support program is here for you, designed to help you begin to see over the
horizon and understand that there are possibilities of living a full life again
- even in the aftermath of a death. It’s
not a replacement for your loss nor is it a panacea. But it can be a kick-start to your healthyrecovery -- if you’re willing to make the effort and commitment to attend and to
participate.
One of our
Core Values at Arlington Memorial Gardens is to “Make a Difference that Matters.” Providing a grief support program that leads
survivors to a healthy recovery does just that.
If you have suffered a loss and are finding life burdensome, I invite
you to attend our grief support program.
Daniel Applegate became part of the Arlington Memorial Gardens organization in 2001 and has worked in the cemetery industry since 1981, including serving as Secretary/Treasurer and then as President of the Ohio state cemetery association. He was appointed by Ohio Governor George Voinovich and served two terms on the Ohio Cemetery Dispute Resolution Commission, Ohio's cemetery oversight agency. He is a graduate of The Ohio State University holding a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Political Science.
