TMI [View all]

My daughter has been widowed for six months. People keep asking her very personal questions about how her husband died. They want all the details. Close friends and family already know. He died of a heart attack. She came home and found him a short time later. She called 9-11. He could not be revived, at home, by her, by the EMTs, or at the hospital.

Every time someone asks, she relives the worst two hours of her life in graphic detail. I know it will get better, but people are not helping. Why should people he went to school with twenty-five years ago, or old neighbors, or acquaintances, need to know everything?

I told her it is okay to tell them he died at home, suddenly. If they press her, she can say, "I don't want to discuss it. It is too personal. It is too soon."

I feel the same way about people who have cancer. Everyone asks, "What kind of cancer?" Then they ask for other medical details. I think people should be able to say, "I'd rather not go into any more detail."

I hear many people discussing how others are silent about their grief, because they don't know how to react to someone else's loss. The other extreme can be just as bad.