‘You go into a numb shock’: mourning family finds solace in new grief support group

Doriano and Patricia Baisi’s eldest daughter Jenny was the kind of person you’d find first in line if you mentioned you needed some help.

‘The COVID pandemic has brought to our attention with even more urgency the importance of support, rituals, and the caring presence of others while people are grieving.’

“She had a huge heart. She was generous and liked to help people,” said Patricia. Despite a learning disability, mental illness, and serious back pain, Jenny volunteered at community events, kept close relationships with her two sisters and parents, and babied her dog Sarah.

So when Doriano and Patricia learned 46-year-old Jenny was found unresponsive in her home March 14, they raced to the house and waited outdoors in cold, driving rain for hours fearing the worst before police let them in.

“That’s not how you want to see your child,” her mom said. “Let me go in and see her. Let me hold her for two minutes in my arms, like Mary did Jesus.”

They learned she had likely died of a heart attack. The sudden loss broke their hearts.

“You go into a numb shock at first. My brain wasn’t functioning, it was a fog,” said Patricia.

The couple sought various ways to cope with the pain, including buying a cabinet to fill with Jenny’s favourite knick-knacks and talking about her with family and friends. But when the people around them seemed to grow tired of talking about the loss, they found solace in a new grief support program at Gardens of Gethsemani cemetery in Surrey.

“We just talk about our grief. Grieving hurts and everybody understands that pain,” said Patricia. “When you really sit and listen you can hear the pain but you can also hear the lessons.”

“We are praying to the same God, we’re using Bible readings, they all have the same perspectives, and their loved ones are all there in the cemetery,” added Doriano. “It makes it much easier to be with them and express our mourning with them.”

The grief support group at Gardens of Gethsemani is made of nine participants and cemetery outreach manager Anna Loch, who is also a trained counsellor. The initiative, launched this year, grew out of a cry from members of the community.

In March 2020, staff began sending five cards a year to people whose loved ones were recently buried at the cemetery with messages of hope, comfort, and prayer. During that program, Loch phoned each person and conducted a survey to learn more about how to best support those grieving.

“I would hear from people: ‘I would love more grief support. I am all alone. I am really struggling. It would be great if the church could do more.’”

She soon realized there were no Catholic grief support groups in the area and a great need for one. “We’re always waiting for the perfect building or the perfect COVID situation, but there was a need, so we just started one,” she said.

Loch is using a Catholic program called Seasons of Hope, written by hospice care and bereavement specialist Donna MacLeod, which offers four seasons of six weekly sessions each. She started the first season July 16.

From day one, Loch said the response has been positive.

“Being with other people who get it, they don’t need to keep back the tears,” said Loch. “They can just share, and look around, and see everyone nodding and saying, ‘I get you.’ There is this power and strength in empathy and common experience.”

Loch said in some cases group members experience emotions they can’t quite voice, and it takes someone else with a similar experience talking about it to help them understand it.

“The COVID pandemic has brought to our attention with even more urgency the importance of support, rituals, and the caring presence of others while people are grieving.”

In one session, Loch invited all members to bring photos of the loved ones whose deaths they are grieving. The Baisis brought a photo of Jenny, along with her favourite stuffed unicorn. For Loch, the images and stories were incredibly powerful.

“As a facilitator it was such an honour to listen to these love stories. That’s what they are to me,” she said. “Grief is a witness to love: to the love they had for that person, and the fact that we were made for love and connection.”

The second season of this grief support program begins Sept. 24 and runs for six consecutive weeks. For more information about this or other available grief supports, contact Anna Loch at [email protected].

This small new program is only the start. Plans are in the works to train Catholics to run confidential, faith-based grief support groups in parishes across the archdiocese. The training will be hosted combination in-person at the John Paul II Pastoral Centre in Vancouver and online for six weeks beginning Jan. 12. More information is available from Michele Smillie at 604-683-0281, ext. 50209*.

*An earlier version of this story listed the wrong extension. We regret the error. - Editor

How to support a grieving person

“One of the biggest things I’ve learned is you don’t understand how much a flower from the garden, that card in the mail, or that meal that I was too tired to cook means until you have lost someone,” Patricia said.

She suggests journeying with loved ones who are grieving by calling them regularly, bringing meals, and sharing memories of the person who has passed on.

“After the death you need friends and family to gather around, not constantly, but periodically. You need to have the odd dinner, a card, a phone call saying ‘how are you doing?’ Send a memory by email. Say, ‘I was just thinking of Jenny today. I love how she used to help out at family gatherings.’”

Sharing memories can be a precious gift, said Patricia, as the grieving person does not necessarily have all the same memories as you do.

Finally, she said, grief and mourning do not just last a few weeks. “For a whole year after a person dies, go with them,” she said. “The pain really hits you” on significant dates such as birthdays, Christmases, and anniversaries of the person’s passing.