Grief defies definition, expert says
Mourning differs with each death
GRIEF from page 1
who is grieving suffers through denial
first, then anger, a period of genuine
mourning, feelings of guilt and finally
acceptance.
These stages were readily appar
ent in the cases of the families and
friends of Candi Harms, Brook
Berringer, Jake Taylor, and Richard
Tierney and Paul Mackin.
Out of Harms Way
Stan and Pat Harms were not ready
to lose their 18-year-old daughter
Candice.
On Sept. 22, 1992, during the fall
semester of her freshman year at UNL,
Candi Harms was abducted and mur
dered by Roger Bjorklund and Scott
Barney.
Stan and Pat never had a chance
to say goodbye to their beloved daugh
ter. Candi’s boyfriend, Todd Sears,
didn’t either.
For three months they searched for
the loved one they had lost without a
trace. Finally they learned the truth.
Almost two years later, both Bjorklund
and Barney had been sentenced, and
the nightmare was over.
But Candi was still gone.
Stan and Pat, enraged at the two
men who had dared to destroy their
daughter, were helpless to do anything
hilt wait TnHH in a fit of miilt anr>
anger, took to drinking and smoking,
trying to suppress the pain that swelled
within him.
But things changed, and time less
ened the pain. Toidd later married.
Stan and Pat, receiving hundreds of
letters from sympathetic supporters,
found ways to deal with the pain.
Life moved on.
“That’s the most important thing
for people to do,” McCoy said. “The
loss of a child is unnatural for the par
ents; your children are supposed to be
your legacy, what you leave behind.
“It’s hard to deal with losing your
legacy.”
She said sudden, violent deaths are
often difficult because the family goes
through feelings of rage first, accept
ing what happened but demanding
vengeance for the act. That, combined
with the unexpectedness of the death,
makes for a serious clash of emotion.
Families of murder victims can
experience violent mood swings, from
anger to sadness to guilt and back
again.
“Often the grieving process doesn’t
even begin until after there has been a
conviction,” McCoy said. She said she
knew of one case where a man fought
through his anger for years before the
suspect was convicted. As soot as the
trial was over, he fell into despondency
for months before recovering.
“He was able to go back and do his
grieving afterward, but not before,”
she said.
Moving on after there has been
acceptance of the death is the most
important part of dealing with a mur
der. The family and friends of the vic
tim must accept that the ordeal is now,
in all earthly terms, over.
For Stan, Pat and Todd, Candi’s
death is now over, although she will
never truly be gone.
Heaven Help Her
Without her faith in God, Jan
Berringer said she may never have
been able to live on after her son
Brook’s death.
As mother of a nationally known
collegiate quarterback, Jan had to face
the cold fact that the media knew of
her son’s death before she did.
She also had to live with the fact
that national media were being fo
cused on her constantly.
But her.son’s death in a plane crash
on April 18, 1996, days before the
NFL draft, was softened by Jan’s be
lief that Brook was taken to a better
place. She comforted herself in her
faith that a loving creator had taken
her son from her so he could be safe.
The belief, Jan said, is what saved
her from complete misery. She had no
time to deal with the loss on a per
sonal basis, as she was hounded day
and night by media outlets that wanted
to know just how she felt.
“In the grieving process, you need
time,” McCoy said. “You need privacy.
You need time to think things through
and you need time to cry.
“You kind of go all over the map
in terms of emotion.”
McCoy said because Jan did not
have that time, her faith is probably
what saved her.
“There’s tremendous anger as well
as sadness in a situation like that.
Microphones in her face all the time
must have made the pressure unbear
able just as her world was coming
apart,” McCoy said.
A belief in God is often what pulls
people through their grief, McCoy
said.
“For people who have a religious
faith, the belief that a loving God that
is there to help than is often all the
comfort they need,” she said.
Jan used that faith to put her son’s
death behind her. The cameras went
away, letters from across the globe
poured in and she, along with her two
daughters, was able to lay her son to
rest beside her dead husband in
Goodland, Kan.
Fostering Hope
Ann Taylor knows she is going to
cry.
Every day of ha life she tries to
prepare for it. Every day of her
children’s lives, she tries to prepare
for it.
But nothing helps her in the end.
As a foster mother to AIDS babies,
Taylor devotes her life ensuring that
her children have lives of their own,
no matter how brief. Each and every
one will die in the end -— and despite
Ann’s efforts to prepare herself for the
loss, when one finally passes away it
hurts.
Jake died when he was 14 months
old from complications from AIDS.
Ann had tried to provide everything
for the child, but the one thing that
eluded her was the security of know
ing Jake would live to adulthood.
And even though Jake was a fos
ter child, his death hurt as much as
the death of a blood relative would.
“Losing a child, whether biologi
cal or a foster child, is traumatic,”
McCoy said. “It’s especially hard
when the child is an infant because
then the only way you can express
your love is through caretaking.”
McCoy said that even though
Ann’s loss was to a disease, the pain
she felt was not lessened.
There is no way to prepare for
death, she said, no matter how much
it is expected.
McCoy said such a situation is of
ten misunderstood by others. There is
often an insensitivity present in
people’s attitudes that normally
wouldn’t be there, she said.
“People try to minimize the loss;
they say, ‘You knew this was going to
happen,”’ McCoy said.
She said Ann was going to experi
ence this pain again and again, and
learning to deal with it probably never
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children she is caring for, and they are
all HIV-positive.
Ann said she has learned to take
the days one at a time and cherishes
every moment, but she knows the pain
is out there, waiting.
“Even though these kids aren’t
hers biologically, she’s chosen a tough
road for herself,” McCoy said. “In the
future, she’s left herself open for more
loss and the possibility of loss.
“It is a rewarding experience, but
difficult nonetheless.”
Ageless Question
The Tierney family knows the pain
of slowly losing a loved one.
The silent killer of cancer came for
the eldest father figures of both fami
lies. First Richard Tierney and then,
six years later, Paul Mackin.
Grandchildren were without their
grandfathers, and children were with
out parents. Regardless of how they
tried to ready themselves, the mem
bers of the Tierney family were
crushed when the bodies of their
grandfathers finally gave up.
The loss was devastating for both
generations. The adults had lost the
people who had accompanied them
throughout life, while the children had
been stripped of the kind and wise role
models age can provide.
They made their peace with the
loss. After all, death is a part of life,
they reasoned.
Source: Dr. Kathleen McCoy
The loss was still there, however.
“Often there is a realization among
adults when their parents die,” McCoy
said. “There is a linear ladder of time
they must step up. They realize when
someone dies that they’re next.”
McCoy said the one comfort of
such a loss was the ability to say
goodbye and make peace with the ones
who are dying. Unlike an accident or
unexpected death, sick or elderly fam
ily members often are there for the
person to talk to.
“With a lingering illness, people
have the chance to say what they want
to say,” McCoy said. “They’re able to
express their love fully, without leav
ing a lot of unresolved problems.”
Because of that, McCoy said, such
deaths are painful, but the easiest to
deal with.
“It hurts for a long time, and things
bring back the pain — music, an an
niversary, a holiday — but there are
rarely a lot of regrets,” she said.
The Tierneys have moved on, but
the memories remain.
Thankfully for the family, most of
the memories are good ones.
Moving On
McCoy said there are other factors
in dealing with death, and how people
react to the loss of loved ones depends
on the circumstances involved.
Suicide, for example, involves tre
/mendous feelings of guilt for the sur
viving family, she said. Often the fam
ily spends much of their grieving time
feeling guilty or bargaining, thinking
Matt Haney/DN
things would have been different if
only one thing or another had been
done differently, she said.
Murder involves anger. Sudden
death involves regret. Prolonged sick
ness can cause prolonged sadness. All
deaths involve grief, she said, and the
five stages are observed at one time or
another.
She said people don’t all grieve in
the same fashion, though.
“Some people start in different
stages,” McCoy said. “Sane are an
gry, then sad. Some may start at sad
ness and move into denial before they
finally accept the death.
“Some may never accept the
death.”
McCoy suggested that people hav
ing problems dealing with their grief
join a support group or see a counse
lor. There are numerous support re
sources everywhere, she said, and
people shouldn’t be quick to discount
them.
Support can even be found on col
lege campuses, she said, with most
universities offering some sort of coun
seling.
UNL’s Counseling and School of
Psychology Clinic in Bancroft Hall is
open fa students having trouble with
personal grief.
But most of all, McCoy said, time
heals the pain of losing a loved one.
“The hurt lessens with time,” she
said. “Whether it’s a parent, child or
friend, somehow it’s always with you.
The difference is between having it
dominate your life and being a part of
your life.
“Death always changes who we
are; it’s a part of the growth process.
We need to leam to accept it as such.”
The five stages of mourning
Denial In the first stage of grieving,
the survivor fails to admit that the deceased
has even passed on.
Anger In a torrent of emotion, the
survivor lashes out in an attempt to vent
confusing feelings about the recent death.
Sadness Also known as the
bargaining stage, the survivor begins to grieve
in earnest over the recent death.
Guilt In this stage, the survivor begins
to think he or she is at fault somehow, or
perhaps there was something that could have
been done to prevent the death.
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Acceptance Finally, the survivor
learns to accept the fact that the loved one is
gone forever. McCoy noted that not everyone
reaches this stage.
California to set share of settlement
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Califor
nia, which remained on the sidelines,
as 22 other states sued tobacco com
panies, will be able to share in settle
ment money promised by the Liggett
Group, California Attorney General
Dan Lungren said Thursday.
“This historic settlement is ex
traordinary in that California did not
even have to sue Liggett in order to
strike this agreement,” Lungren said.
Meanwlule, the first scheduled
trial in a series of state lawsuits seek
ing to recoup the cost of smoking-re
lated health care was pushed back a
month, and the city of San Francisco
settled an individual lawsuit with
Liggett.
Lungren, a Republican, has re
fused to join the other states in suing
the tobacco industry, despite pressure
from Democrats and anti-smoking
activists. He has said state law pro
hibits California from suing.
The law exempts from liability the
manufacturer of a product that “is in
herently unsafe and is known to be
unsafe by the ordinary consumer” and
specifically mentions tobacco.
At a news conference, Lungren
urged state lawmakers to repeal the
law and allow California to pursue
further legal action. Bills to do that
are being considered in the state As
sembly and Senate.
The settlement with Liggett also
gives California access to key inter
nal tobacco documents from the com
pany, which could provide evidence
that die industry targeted minors and
manipulated nicotine levels.
Asked how much money the settle
ment would mean for California,
Lungren said: “You are probably not
looking at a great deal of money. It's
the best that could be done under the
circumstances.”
Based on Liggett’s 1995 income,
$575,000 a year would be divided
among the 22 state Medicaid funds
and the suing Liggett smokers,
Lungren said.
Lungren said the agreement would
be finalized next week.
Vame County’ headline draws ire
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — There’s
nothing like a dame headline to get
people calling for the headline writer’s
head.
When Dane County voters elected
women as county executive and Madi
son mayor fa* the first time ever, The
Capital Times ran a bold, above-the
fold headline Wednesday proclaiming:
“Dame County!”
Then came the complaints and
cancellations.
One caller found the headline
“tasteless, stupid and offensive.” An
other called it “an example of the worst
form of sexism and chauvinism that
I’ve encountered in a long time.”
At least two of the more than a
dozen callers in this liberal college
town canceled subscriptions to The
Capital Times, circulation 22,000.
Associate City Editor Rem McCrea,
who wrote the headline, said he was
just aiming for a playful way to report
the story.
He toyed with “On Ms. Consin!” -
a play on the state song, “On Wiscon
sin!” “Another one was 'Femme Fi
nale!’ and of course Women Rule,”
but none of these looked very good
when we put them on the page,” he
said.
Before going with the headline, he
took an informal poll of women in the
office, and they didn’t find “Dame
County!” offensive, he said.