What We Don’t Say

I am inviting you into a big conversation.  I want to talk about how we support each other, and how we fail.  It’s embarrassing, because we are all, or have been at one time (or fifty) stupid people with good intentions.


I will be telling you several of my own cringe inducing stories including my ridiculous responses to others’ heartbreaks and, sadly, I was trying so hard to do and say the right thing.


It’s a big conversation.  And I really want it to be a conversation, if any of you are willing.  Through a series of difficult experiences I have been given a strange education in how to be supportive in various hard times but I am not an expert and we’re talking about people so it’s going to be subjective anyway.


Yesterday I said, in most cases, nothing needs to be said in the face of suffering.  I intended to say more and decided to save it for another time, so I realize now I did say something I didn’t intend, by not saying it fully.  A friend commented:


All of us can use encouragement at one time or another. If it’s someone you don’t know intimately, it’s hard to know how to give encouragement so that it won’t be taken amiss. We struggled with infertility for a number of years. Lots of friends and family meant well…but their words to us didn’t always mean what they hoped it would. They tried because they knew we were struggling. I would have been disappointed had they not even tried to encourage us.


Jeremy is so gracious, “…their words didn’t always mean what they hoped…”  


I can imagine.  


And he makes an important point.  A friend of mine was devastated when a close, close friend said NOTHING after the death of my friend’s father.  She kept waiting and it really became a big thing for her that her friend said NOTHING.


So there are errors of omission and commission.  


And I really hesitate to say errors, because that just sets up the whole performance aspect and I want to deactivate that bomb.  And yet that desire is really at the heart of it.


So I want to talk about intentions.  I am being charitable when I say “good intentions” since my assertion is that, many times, our intentions aren’t good enough.  Mine too, which is where the humiliating stories come in and you can see what I thought my intentions were, the actions I took and what I know now.  Blech.


Ultimately it isn’t about what we say or even what we do.  It’s how we are.  


When my father died, one of my sister’s school friends dropped off a meal for our family.   When I came to the door, he handed me the food and we briefly spoke.  I don’t remember what he said or what he brought us.    I can’t tell you if he actually articulated, “I am so sorry for your loss” but everything about him did.  And I’ve never forgotten that.