Rituals for Grieving?

Question

I am currently co-authoring a book about rituals that help people cope with loss and grief. I am curious if anyone here has found strength or comfort in any type of grieving ritual.

(You don't have to belong to any specific religion to answer this)

By ritual I mean, some people visit the graves of their loved ones on the same day every year. Others might ask their priest to mention their loved ones in a special mass every year. Some people might put up an ancestral altar in the home with pictures of their loved ones in rememberence. Those sorts of things.

Laptop - that's a beautiful ritual. It's heartfelt and genuine. Thanks for sharing this. (I imagine that was awkward on dates. lol)

Phantom - very interesting points how certain rituals can actually keep someone from moving on. Hmmm. I suppose I never considered that being that I'm one who generally burns bridges and never looks back to dwell. My past only gets an occasional glance or nod.

It's Me - lots of good ideas. I agree. Rituals have changed with the times.

Luna - it does indeed help. Thank you so much for sharing.

Prarie - That is really interesting and unique. Thank you for sharing.

Answer 1

I have heard about one thing that seems to help a lot of people

writing a letter to the deceased person , writing feelings down , writing your anger and grief down , writing how you loved them and writing any unanswered questions you have
then simply popping it in the mail box with no address ( obviously )
and it is said that this lifts a lot of the guilt/grief/unhappiness as it releases a lot of emotions

another one is and seems to be popular is plaques on benches or trees that can be visited by grieving loved ones ...
a sacred space so to speak where they can feel a closeness with that person

my sister had a dvd made for my mother
it was pictures of my dad with appropriate music playing along
this made something very sad into something very beautiful
we laughed and cried at it ... but left feeling happiness at the memories

times are changing and it seems the rituals are changing with it

Answer 2

I don't know if this fits any where in your question but my family has a kind of ritual that I believe has been handed down for many, many generations. My father's people are from norway and sweden. They are norsemen. When a blood member of the clan dies, someone (Usually a young man but it can be a female too) is picked out before the funeral to be a "waiter" (one who waits). After the funeral is done this person is to go to a high point near the grave and wait there until the graveyard workers come and fill in the grave. Then they are to report back to the closest family members of the deceased that the deceaced is on thier way to Valhalla. Some old stories about this practice is that when members of the norse clan were buried at sea or on water that someone would be sent to keep watch over the burning ship to ensure that the body and thier things went to the bottom of the sea and that no one tryed to sneak up to it and steal anything before it sank. It is now a tradition that is carried on in my family but I have never seen it anywhere else. Blessed Be.

Answer 3

This is an interesting subject to me. Since I am under the care of a doctor for advanced stage lyme, and and some other things that could put me in the ground if I'm not careful, this question caught my attention. My doctor told me 2 weeks ago that if I don't start taking care of myself that I would eventually die and my friends and family would miss me or cry for awhile, but their lives would certainly go on. Well Dr. Klass is right. People's lives do go even if they don't want it to for a short time.

Now, to tell you what I have done to help me get through the grieving part of all the people I have loved that have died is this. The worse was my brother's suicide. I have his wallet, the one that was on his body when he was found dead. Initially, I looked through it all the time because in it, most of the pictures he had were of me and my children. I had the comfort of knowing that he loved us. His reason for his death had nothing to do with me and I don't believe he'd want me to grieve the rest of my life. He wanted me happy.
As for others that I have lost, when at all possible, and it's not that often due to the distance, I may visit their graves, but I don't hang around very long when I do.

My father was cremated. He had a service. I wrote his eulogy and I was the one who presented it in the funeral home. That was my closure. A few months after he died, my brothers and I threw his ashes into the ocean. That is what he wanted.

My cousin Maurene's grave stone has written on it "To live in the hearts we leave behind, is not to die" She died at age 19 due to drugs. So my aunt had that put on her stone to help her deal with it.

There are no particular dates or order that I do these things. Maybe their birthday or an event may trigger a passing thought. If it were anything more than a passing thought, I would question myself as to why I am feeling that way. It is probably something totally unrelated to someone's death.

Answer 4

For me, I finished grieving for my sister when I went to the place she most wanted to go (Key West) and threw her ashes into the ocean. She loved the beach and wanted so badly to go to Key West.

I was kinda surprised when I went there and there really is no beach there (so I actually put some of her ashes on a local beach so that just in case she didn't like that Key West had no beach--she was laying on the beach too)

But I felt like I had finished her part. I hope if I die without ever having seen the Mediterranean that my husband will finish the journey for me. Go see Italy and Greece and then move on. I'd love to know that after I die (especially if I'm young) that he still has children and they have a woman in their lives to love. I don't have any kids but I'd hate for if I left children behind, that my children would never achieve the dreams I had for them simply b/c they spent too much of their childhood in tears.

My grandmother went to my grandfathers grave on their 50th anniversary. He died somewhere around their 41st and she went all the time for a few years. She went every birthday and anniversary. Somehow after the 50th, it was done and she doesn't go anymore. That seemed to conclude it for her.

I liked on Desperate Housewives how Gabby went to the park and released the red balloon into the sky. A very symbolic "letting go" and I've also seen movies where they do a fire ceremony (which I've actually had friends do for a breakup they couldn't get over but I'm sure it would work just as well for death). She threw all of his things--the pictures, the old shirt, favorite cd--into the fire and we stood there and watched the fire consume it and in her words "her dreams go up in smoke." As the embers burned out, it was sorta like she let that part die out as well and stopped obsessing over him. A Wiccan friend told me it was similar to her candle ritual for a lost loved one, where the candle burns the energy of that person and allows them to move past it. (I'm not Wiccan; I dont know if thats true or not)

I think a lot of the wearing black, not going out, going to the grave every year is more of a habit. You do it b/c thats what you used to do--not b/c it actually helps you any. After a while, it's more of a fear of change than actual grief.

You know when you love someone that at some point, only one of you will be left on earth. I think the important thing is to figure out a way to let go. I don't think visiting their grave every year or creating a shrine helps with that at all. That person loved you in return and doesn't want your life to end b/c theirs did. Everyone wants to be remembered but not if every memory of me is going to make you sad. Not if it means you stop living.

Answer 5

Hi. I'm an atheist. I wasn't going to answer this because I don't really have any "rituals", I thought!

When I was 6 my grandmom died. My big sister and cousins, who were the wise age of 10, took a pledge that every time they went past the funeral home, they would put their hand over their heart in honor of grandmom. I vowed to join this, but they scoffed and said I was "too little." I kept the pledge anyway. The funeral home was on the same street my home was on, and one of the main streets in town. My dads office was a block away as well. Every single time I pass by that funeral home, my hand goes over my heart. (This was very awkward on dates, when I would make a coughing sound and try to fake like I was clutching my chest.)

I beat out my sister, cousins, and everyone who has long forgotten our little pledge. Now my daughters watch for it, when I go back home to visit my parents. "Is she still going to do that corny thing....?" they wait and...yes! I do! :) And I still think of her. I don't think I would have thought of her nearly as much if I hadn't made that vow.

Answer 6

Being single and childless, I cared for my elderly mother during the final years of her life. As a child, I remember thinking that my mother was the best mother in the world. My sister closest to me in age is eleven months younger than I; when we were very young, our mother read to us every night and sang little songs to us when she put us to bed as well as listening to our prayers which she taught us. She took us to Sunday School and to Rhythm Class which an elderly neighbor taught in her home. As an adult, I abandoned my religious upbringing, finding that I was incapable of blind belief, and regard myself presently as an agnostic or a Magician, depending upon my frame of mind. During my mother's last years where, due to brain damage, more and more she withdrew from the world until it became impossible for me to communicate with her in the accepted manner, I grieved for my loss of her while she lived. When she died, immediately I felt grief, but shortly it faded. Watching my mother's lengthy demise was more traumatic to me than coping with the finality of her death. She was a believer, a liberal Christian, and I am hopeful that she has joined my father (who was killed in an accident many years ago) and her friends upon a higher plane.

Answer 7

The way that I have grieved for unfortunately the many (13)...11 people and 2 cats...
What I mainly did with the people I missed in my life was to create something from my heart to remmeber them. When my Dad passed, I wrote a poem which expressed how I felt and I also continue to create in my life writings, poems, and drawings for he always encouraged me. My cousin was brutally murdered and the way I dealt with it was when justice finally came to our family in the form of her killer being sentenced to life in prison with no way of parole....I said good-bye to her, and as with the many people whom have passed took a special picture of her that I had of her before the tragedy when she was happy and another beautiful picture to represent things in her life she liked, and framed them...

There are many ways to grieve, many feelings need to come out. I got angry, sad, denied, all the "normal" feelings...I feel also that no one ceases to exist, they just go to another world...I am half Lakota Sioux Indian and I feel that Death, as Chief Seattle says is place between worlds.... I hold fast that also my cats are in this wonderful realm....I feel the place that my kin go to is called "Their Heaven" or "The Otherworld".... Hope this helps with your book....I also visit my Dad's grave on occasion just to "feel" I am near him, altho he is right with me, if that makes sense..... Thank you for letting me share this with you...