What I Wish People Know After My Husband Died | Terri Budek | TEDxCentennialCollegeToronto

[Music] in 2016 on a very normal thursday july morning my husband dave and i were going through the motions getting ourselves ready for work and our two young daughters eve and zoe ready for daycare it was a beautiful day out so i very naturally took the girls with me in the car so dave could ride his motorcycle to work i was in a rush as usual so i just blew him in air kiss from the driveway like and off i went at around 2pm the police showed up in my office to ask if i knew a david budeck i remember the feeling of my stomach dropping i said he rode his motorcycle to work was there an accident is he dead he wasn't dead but there was an accident they were going to drive me to the hospital to see him i arrived at the hospital through the police and ambulance entrance with no one else around and was eventually taken into the trauma icu to see dave for less than a minute just to make sure that it was my day they were working on and then i waited and waited after more waiting and signing paperwork for an eventual surgery i left the hospital but barely slept that night throughout the time in hospital it wasn't that i was holding on so tightly to hope i actually thought dave would recover i called our insurance company to find out what coverage we had for his eventual rehabilitation needs in my small brown spiral bound notebook i tracked everything going on in that room i tracked the numbers and beeps from the machines i counted the staples in his head and there were 50 from ear to ear and i wrote down every word the doctors were saying so that when dave recovered i could tell him about it being the scientist he was i knew he would want the details 40 days after dave's accident on the night before eve's very first day of kindergarten at 808 pm dave died i became a widow at the age of 33 with a two-year-old and a five-year-old what was i gonna do well what do most of us seem to do these days when we just don't know the answer to something we google it do you know if you google how to support a widow the first thing that pops up is a list with 10 suggestions there's also a picture of two elderly women holding each other and the number one recommendation bring food and coordinate food drop-offs with others so that grievers have one less thing to think about when dave was in the hospital and after he died people brought food and google was right it was helpful and the rest of the suggestions on that list are definitely helpful too but what i want to talk about today is what happens after the so-called grieving period is over when it seems that people want those grieving to get back to normal and not be so sad anymore in different religions and regions across the world grieving and mourning look different but generally we don't know what to say to each other how many of you have googled what to write in a sympathy card we struggle with how to interact with each other when people die every day not just weeks after loss but what happens months or years later when life keeps going i'll tell you what happens we stopped talking about our people who died life goes on and we get busy i get it but what would it look like if we were more intentional and made it the norm to talk about our people who have died to say their names and tell their stories let me tell you how you can support a grieving widow years later quite simply talk about the person who died after dave died i got a lot of well-intentioned let me know if i can do anything offers but i knew i wasn't reaching out i had to pretend that we could live a normal life i stuck to the nightly routine dave followed because asking for help for what i eventually realized i did need might signal that i wasn't okay and that i couldn't do it on my own so that meant talking about dave less and just focusing on everything else that needed to be done and then it got harder to talk about dave because i thought that if i did people might think that i was stuck in grief i remember this one time someone asking me how i was doing you know with the head tilt and eye squint and that unconscious look of pity how are you doing you know what i said we're doing okay yep i'm figuring it out we're doing okay i walked away got into my car and suddenly the tears were just gushing down and i was doing the ugly cry that you can only really do in the car or in the shower basically anywhere you're alone so nobody will see you lose it yeah it turns out i was not okay but grief is complicated and fast forward to today i can honestly say that most days i'm okay i'm also totally comfortable saying now that some days i'm still not being okay and being resilient are unconscious pressures placed on people in grief doing well in the face of adversity is so subjective if resilience looks at your capacity to recover quickly from a difficult situation and bounce back to normal there is simply no resilience possible from this type of loss i can't bounce back to the life i had because dave isn't here anymore i will never get back a future that is forever gone resiliency for widows isn't about bouncing back it's about creating a meaningful life with the way things are now what i have found is making meaning of my life now has to include talking about dave his life and his death influenced and shaped me into who i am today and while not all widows want to talk about their dead husbands i can tell you that when i feel free to do so i'm comforted by my memories that continue to have this place to live i found the most welcoming environments to talk about dave and his death and life since his death have been with my fellow young widows whether that's in person or online these online organizations groups therapists blogs are all there to support those in grief and i think they are most helpful when they complement our existing relationships with our family and friends for example a widow in florida can offer a lot of comfort and support simply by having a shared life-altering experience but she doesn't know dave she can't laugh at his quirks and remind me that he would never pay full price for anything he loved flipping coupons we are on the verge of becoming a community where we can openly talk about people after they have died except people don't know what to say to someone who is grieving or quite frankly they're worried they're gonna say the wrong thing so it can seem easier not to mention the person at all but just how you want to share stories of your loved ones i want you all to know about dave's annoying obsession with sunflower seeds he would eat them one by one at his computer desk every night and lucky me would shift to the bed if he was finished checking his emails before his tiny tupperware of seeds was empty acknowledging relationships can be complicated but in my opinion part of life includes talking about our people who have died but isn't it interesting that we don't talk about death we purposefully avoid talking about death because it produces this terror inducing fear that one day we will die too we have so much anxiety knowing we will die we do anything we can to avoid talking about it so let me clarify we don't need to talk about death we just need to talk about our people who died communities exist that talk about people who have passed away but you may be thinking when is it appropriate the next time you see something that makes you think about someone who has died or you have a memory or a thought that you want to share share it talking about somebody's dead husband doesn't make them more upset or remind us that they died trust me we remember we know and if you say something that makes someone emotional it's okay because i tell my kids when they get upset seeing me upset it's okay to cry i will tell zoe my youngest daddy died and it's sad and so i'm going to be sad for a moment bringing up memories about someone who has died means they mattered they still matter they aren't forgotten even zoe have very limited memories of their dad talking about dave will be the only way they get to know who he was seeing the kobit 19 statistics unfold and the death rate continue to rise has made me think about two things one dave would have been all over the science behind this pandemic and we would have looked quite prepared thanks to the seemingly lifetime supply of cleaning and paper products thanks to his extreme couponing and two there are new coved widows and widowers out there and their wounds are still raw so while they may not be ready to talk about their loved ones just yet in three or four years from now they may be it's been over four years since my dave died and the sadness while still always there feels a little less unbearable and it gets easier to listen to the ways others choose to talk about dave my sister recently told me that the family used to place bets on which shirt they would be wearing when we came to visit because majority of the time it was his favorite white shirt with yellow sleeves this waffle shirt from old navy and that shirt is now eve's daddy shirt and has been in her bed with her every night since the day of his funeral i've also taken that shirt with me to school concerts and plays because she tells me she feels like he's watching her too and because eve is still so young i went to ebay and i bought a backup daddy shirt just to have for when his shirt wears out completely talk about people when there are big decisions to make for instance hearing someone who knew dave say they would he they think he would have understood my decision to move brought so much comfort holidays and birthdays are more obvious hard times and you can still mention the person but the hard times are also the really good times eve earned her yellow belt in karate the same day she did well on a difficult math test last year and and that was hard because dave should be here for this he should be here to watch his children grow up but he's not here he's missing and is going to continue missing all the milestones he isn't in any back to school pictures he won't teach his girls to drive he won't see them graduate and he won't be with them on their wedding days so when you think about when would be a tough time for a widow check in when things are seemingly really good that might just be the perfect time for a reminder that years later dave still matters time passes and grief changes when you aren't sure what to say to a widow or anybody who's experienced loss it's okay to ask can i talk about dave do you talk about him in front of your kids just asking questions tells me he matters if a widow says they like talking about their late partner go for it but if they don't doesn't matter why just accept it move on regardless of how uncomfortable you may feel you've asked a question that acknowledges a person existed my story while sad is not consumed in and doesn't end in sadness i am so lucky to have known a love so deep that it cannot die with the person and i'm beyond grateful to have repartnered with someone who told me he watched a movie he thinks dave would have liked we have talked about dave to the point where someone who never had the chance to know him knows him those who work with people preparing for death will tell us that when somebody is dying they just want to know that their lives have been meaningful did they make a difference in this world what will they be remembered for if we stop talking about people after they die then really what are they being remembered for dave was the smartest man i've ever known i will continue to tell his story and love sharing his favorite mantra was never pay someone to do a job that you could learn how to do yourself he read how to books for fun and studied the owner's manuals of items we hadn't even bought yet like our vacuum cleaner just to make sure it was the perfect one for us there's a saying that a person actually dies twice the first time is when they take their last breath and the second time is when somebody says their name for the last time i want you to keep in mind that talking about our people who have died helps keep their memory alive it keeps them alive how are you going to support someone in their grief years after loss you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 274,435

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Life, Pain, Personal growth

Id: JPYHh7Ascrk

Length: 16min 25sec (985 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 16 2020