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| Heartfelt insights into loss and grief | Heartfelt insights into loss and grief |
| (5 days later) | |
| Readers respond to a piece by Kat Lister about grieving for her husband – and share their own experiences | Readers respond to a piece by Kat Lister about grieving for her husband – and share their own experiences |
| Reading Kat Lister’s article (Anyone who’s lost a loved one knows the pressure to visit shrines to the past. But it doesn’t always help, 7 June), I felt reassured, as I relate strongly to what she says about not having a physical monument, or “visible conduit”, as a place to grieve a loved one. When my father died last August, we scattered his ashes on the recreation ground in his home village, where he first played cricket, and it felt totally fitting, but afterwards I briefly questioned the lack of a grave. Since then, however, I have found it more fitting not to have one; like Kat, we have the place we could visit but may not do so very often. | Reading Kat Lister’s article (Anyone who’s lost a loved one knows the pressure to visit shrines to the past. But it doesn’t always help, 7 June), I felt reassured, as I relate strongly to what she says about not having a physical monument, or “visible conduit”, as a place to grieve a loved one. When my father died last August, we scattered his ashes on the recreation ground in his home village, where he first played cricket, and it felt totally fitting, but afterwards I briefly questioned the lack of a grave. Since then, however, I have found it more fitting not to have one; like Kat, we have the place we could visit but may not do so very often. |
| The article made me think that the need for a physical object to visit can be an attempt to create a version of the lost person’s physical existence, and this could perhaps be more upsetting, in prolonging the sense of tangible absence, whereas not having a physical grave might help acceptance of the “no-place-ness” of the dead, and perhaps a greater understanding of their being nowhere, and everywhere. Of course, for each person the experience of grief is entirely personal and unique.Cal Walters-DaviesAberystwyth, Ceredigion | |
| I read Kat Lister’s article and pondered. Next month, it will be the 11th anniversary of the day my son lowered himself into the North Channel, off the Firth of Clyde. He was to dive on a second world war shipwreck lying 60 metres down. On reaching the bottom, visibility was too poor for photography and he indicated to a fellow diver that he was going to go back to the surface. He never arrived. | I read Kat Lister’s article and pondered. Next month, it will be the 11th anniversary of the day my son lowered himself into the North Channel, off the Firth of Clyde. He was to dive on a second world war shipwreck lying 60 metres down. On reaching the bottom, visibility was too poor for photography and he indicated to a fellow diver that he was going to go back to the surface. He never arrived. |
| Despite a search of the seabed by his diving buddies, and of the waters by the RNLI and nearby fishing boats, his body was not found. | Despite a search of the seabed by his diving buddies, and of the waters by the RNLI and nearby fishing boats, his body was not found. |
| There is no tombstone, no swirl in the river, there is no place. One of my other children has had the coordinates of the dive site tattooed on to an underarm so they always know where he is to be found. For me, he is the sea. A molecule of him is in every drop of seawater: he has become the element he loved. | There is no tombstone, no swirl in the river, there is no place. One of my other children has had the coordinates of the dive site tattooed on to an underarm so they always know where he is to be found. For me, he is the sea. A molecule of him is in every drop of seawater: he has become the element he loved. |
| The grief remains, the loss still raw, the absence heartbreaking. On every anniversary I go to a beach and throw his favourite pork pie into the water, and a libation of a good beer to share with him. He is now part of his beloved ocean, and every time I am by the sea I am as close to him as I ever can be.Name and address supplied | The grief remains, the loss still raw, the absence heartbreaking. On every anniversary I go to a beach and throw his favourite pork pie into the water, and a libation of a good beer to share with him. He is now part of his beloved ocean, and every time I am by the sea I am as close to him as I ever can be.Name and address supplied |
| Kat Lister ends a very thoughtful piece about her grief since her husband died, with a quote from CS Lewis, that nothing “stays put”. It’s 11 years since my husband died, and it has been a very challenging journey, which only others who lose their soulmate can empathise with. I feel little sense of real attachment or belonging at Alan’s grave, but it hits me in other unexpected places – for example, an ice-cream shop we visited, at the Ulster Orchestra or when I see an aeroplane overhead. A friend who once said “Grief never ends, it just changes” got it right. Sharman Finlay Portrush, County Antrim | Kat Lister ends a very thoughtful piece about her grief since her husband died, with a quote from CS Lewis, that nothing “stays put”. It’s 11 years since my husband died, and it has been a very challenging journey, which only others who lose their soulmate can empathise with. I feel little sense of real attachment or belonging at Alan’s grave, but it hits me in other unexpected places – for example, an ice-cream shop we visited, at the Ulster Orchestra or when I see an aeroplane overhead. A friend who once said “Grief never ends, it just changes” got it right. Sharman Finlay Portrush, County Antrim |
| The first letter above was amended on 16 June 2022. An earlier version gave the address incorrectly as Waunfawr, Ceredigion. |