Prince William And The Trouble With Anonymous Grief

Prince William and the trouble with anonymous grief
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Recently both Prince William and Prince Harry have started to speak openly about the loss of their mother with the launch of their new mental health initiative, Heads Together.

It's been almost 20 years since her tragic death. Few people who were alive at the time, myself included, could forget watching those two boys trail behind their mother’s coffin.

This week, in an interview for GQ magazine, Prince William said: "It has taken me almost 20 years to get to that stage [where I can talk about it]… And also it is not like most people's grief, because everyone else knows about it, everyone knows the story, everyone knows her. It is a different situation for most people who lose someone they love, it can be hidden away or they can choose if they want to share their story."

Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook and now founder of OptionB.org, wrote something similar in her brave and vulnerable book OptionB: Overcoming Adversity, Building Resilience and Finding Joy which she co-authored with psychologist Adam Grant. She talks about how everywhere she went after the death of her husband Dave Goldberg, she knew people had heard about her loss and were anxiously wondering what they should say to her.

Both Sheryl Sandberg and Princes William and Harry have had to deal with their losses in public. For them there is, as Prince William put it, no way of hiding from it. I can't even imagine how difficult it must be to know that literally in every room you walk into, everyone knows everything there is to know about you (or at least think they know everything), including about your loss.

But the interesting thing is that I also find the opposite is true for me. I’m basically anonymous, a person whose “grief story” is not known outside of my own circle, and yet sometimes I actually fervently wish that everyone I meet would somehow just magically know that my husband has died so I don’t have to deal with the awkward moment when it, inevitably, arrives.

Because, much as Prince William might wish it, unfortunately even anonymous people can't really keep a grief story about the loss of someone close to them hidden.

In the three years since the sudden death of my husband I've had many of those awkward moments.

At a new hairdresser, I talk about my kids and get asked what my partner does. “Um, he passed away a few years ago”.

When I started a new part time job I was asked what I do "on my days off", and have to explain that I use those days to manage my late husband's business. Immediately, eyebrows were raised at the word “late”.

When I was buying a car I was asked whether my partner would need to come and help me make the final decision. “No, that won’t be possible”. (Never mind the sexist nature of this question…)

When I fill in a new patient form at the doctor’s office, I have to tick the widow box, and get “the look” when I hand the form over the desk to the receptionist.

Of course, unlike the Princes or Sheryl Sandberg or anyone else with a public profile, tabloid magazines aren't writing big headlines about my loss, or making up stories about how my husband died. And that certainly makes a difference. I have some level of choice about exactly what I share, and with whom.

But I can’t actually hide from my loss entirely. It's there in every assumption that society makes about people.

I could lie... I could nod and smile and make something up when I get asked questions about my partner. I could call my husband's business my "side hustle" and pretend that I'm like every other 30-something who seems to have one nowadays. I could even tick the single box instead of the widow box. Both are true I suppose.

And unquestionably there are some days when it would be easier to pretend to live the life that people assume I am living rather than reveal the truth.

But I don't. I always tell the truth when the questions get asked in these private conversations.

Publicly, I speak and write about grief and loss in the Facebook group 2lookup and elsewhere for the same reason: because I believe silence contributes to social isolation. The less we talk about difficult things, the more people who are dealing with them feel somehow "abnormal". It's as true for physical illness as for mental illness. For grief as for domestic violence. For the challenging behavior of our children, as for financial difficulties.

Often when we do talk about these difficult things, we speak in hushed tones. We worry that someone will not really understand. We worry about our reputation. We worry that people will think less of us if we are seen to be "not coping". We worry so we say nothing.... and even when we choose to reveal our secret we worry that every conversation will somehow then be tainted in the awkward silence of the knowledge itself....

Hide the secret and people won't know what you're going through.... Reveal the secret and worry that people will avoid the elephant in the room - and possibly spending time with you altogether - for fear of putting their foot in their mouths... it can feel like a catch 22.

As part of the interview, Prince William commented: “I am shocked we are so worried about saying anything about the true feelings we have. Because mental illness is inside our heads, invisible, it means others tread so carefully, and people don’t know what to say, whereas if you have a broken leg in plaster, everyone knows what to say."

I’ve been both of those people: the one who is hiding feelings and the one who doesn’t know what to say, and neither feel good.

A long time ago, a girlfriend’s mother died. She was young and well loved and it was tragic. I went to visit and my friend was distraught. I remember feeling helpless. She was crying uncontrollably and I said to her "is there someone I can get for you?" And then I realized.... the one person who could comfort her was the one who had died. I felt awful. I had meant well of course, but what a dumb thing to say. I beat myself up for it for a long time and actually avoided my friend because I felt like such an idiot. That conversation stayed with me for over 20 years.

I remember thinking about it in the week after my husband died. I remember thinking, I've said dumb things to others and people will say dumb things to me. Sometimes they will realize it afterwards and sometimes they won't. But mostly they will mean well when they say it.

And I decided then and there to be open with my "secret", to never shy away from talking about the loss. I decided that having people say hurtful things to me unintentionally was better than having them say nothing at all. That if I tried to put people at ease even when they said a dumb comment, perhaps they'd be less awkward when speaking to me or someone else dealing with something difficult. And perhaps if I was open, it might encourage others to be more open too.

My perspective isn't the same as everybody's of course; for some speaking about loss or some other difficulty opens the scar anew. And it doesn't mean that some conversations don't hurt me. But I know I'd prefer to deal with a difficult conversation or two, than to live in silence and secrets. And I wonder if the Princes are starting to feel that way too…

Life isn't always shiny/happy. But I think it's a lot easier to look up to the light if you aren’t hiding all the time in the shadow of a secret.

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