What NOT to Say to a Grieving Parent

This is not your standard list of “what not to say to a grieving parent.” Lots of those exist already. Instead, this is my therapist exploration of why people might say “the wrong thing” to a grieving parent. And why it is “the wrong thing” to say. I won’t focus so much on the statements themselves, though I will of course give some common examples. My focus will instead be on the intention of what’s said. I’ll explain why people might approach grieving parents with a certain attitude, and why that approach often leads to saying “the wrong thing.”

People Aren’t Trying To “Say The Wrong Thing.” They Just Don’t Know What To Say.

Now let’s start with the basic understanding no one wants to say “the wrong thing” to someone who has experienced a pregnancy or infant loss. Well, most people don’t want to. If someone does, then I would guess they have some deep pain of their own that they need to attend to far outside of this blog post. But for most of us, we don’t actively want to cause harm with our words. And we certainly don’t want to cause additional harm to someone who is already in the deepest emotional distress of their lives. (NOTE: to actively grieving parents: I understand that sometimes it can feel like people are being intentionally mean. And I would never come to the defense of anyone who is being intentionally harmful to you. But, I find that most people who didn’t want to hurt you before your loss, likely don’t want to hurt you now.)

However, let’s face it, most people don’t know what to say to someone who is grieving the loss of a child. So they try to come up with the most logical thing they can think of to make the person feel better… And that’s how they end up saying something unintentionally hurtful, insensitive, cliche, or just plain old unhelpful.

Now, let me be clear that I don’t want to shame anyone who has accidentally said “the wrong thing” to someone who has experienced a pregnancy or infant loss. Again, they were probably trying their best. And the truth is there is actually some pretty understandable logic behind the tendency to say unhelpful things to a grieving parent. In fact, understanding this logic is key to avoiding its pitfalls.

Sympathy is Offered at an Emotionally Safe Distance.

Grief is uncomfortable. It makes us think about our own immortality. Our own losses, either past or future. Grief is raw. And messy. And painful. And most people want nothing to do with it. And the grief of a baby? Well, as I’ve discussed in previous entries, there is something uniquely horrifying to humans about the loss of a small child. It makes people squirm in the deepest crevasses of their existence. We are programmed to love our children. To care for our babies. To protect our young. And the very thought of losing a child? Even the most proudly stoic of the world feel a lump forming in their throats.

This pain is so unthinkable that we actively try to avoid it when other people are experiencing it. To protect ourselves from feeling by proxy. When this type of grief hits our own doorsteps, we can’t help but accept the package. There is no “return to sender” option. However, when this grief is delivered to the house next door, we tend to retreat inside and watch from the window of our emotionally safe fortress.

What I mean by all of this is that we try to protect ourselves from feeling other people’s grief. But at the same time, we don’t want to seem like we don’t care. So while we may offer sympathy for other people’s grief, we dare not empathize with it. What’s the difference? When we have sympathy for someone, we feel bad for them. When we empathize with someone, we feel bad with them. And while this may sound like a minor linguistic argument, sympathy and empathy speak quite differently.

Sympathy Tries to Make the Person Feel Better

The reason sympathy and empathy can make us say such different things is because they are distinctly different mechanisms of the brain. Sympathy is a more cognitive, rational, and emotionally detached experience. When we have sympathy for someone who has experienced a loss, we think things like “They must really be in pain.” This leads to thoughts like “I should say something to make them feel better” or “I should help them make sense of this.” Empathy is a more emotional experience. When we have empathy for someone who has experienced a loss, we aren’t thinking “They must really be in pain.” We are trying to acknowledge, validate, and understand their pain. We aren’t “trying to make them feel better.” Rather we are trying to meet them in their emotional state, so they don’t feel alone.

And while it may seem more helpful to provide a logical response aimed at finding reason and hope, that’s not actually the case. People who have just experienced the loss of a baby are not in a logical, rational, or cognitive state of being. In fact, that part of their brain may be offline altogether. Instead, the emotional part of their brain is in complete control. So if you say something from more a cognitive perspective, it’s going to sound hurtful, insensitive, cliche, or just plain old unhelpful. And it’s definitely not going to meet the needs of their emotional brain.

When someone is in active pain, they generally aren’t looking for logical responses. They are looking for, and need, emotional responses. When you stub your toe, you don’t want someone to tell you “At least you have a toe to stub!” You want someone to tell you “That looked like it hurt so much! I’m so sorry.” So by that same logic, someone who just lost a baby doesn’t want to hear “At least you know you can get pregnant.”

Obviously stubbing your toe and losing a child are completely different situations. But it’s about recognizing that logic is not always the best medicine for pain. And we often understand that when someone is experiencing a level of pain, we can allow ourselves to empathize with them - like when someone stubs their toe. But when their pain becomes too much for us to personally entertain - like when someone experiences the loss of a pregnancy or infant - we protect ourselves by moving away from emotions and into logic. We feel for them, but not with them. And our responses give us away.

This is of course a complete oversimplification, but hopefully it at least gets the point across that trying to help someone feel better with a logical response, is usually how we end up saying “the wrong thing.” Responses based on emotion tend to land much better.

Common Logic-Based Statements to Avoid

The following is a list of logic-based statements that are used frequently with people who have experienced the loss of a pregnancy or infant. While they are generally intended to make the person feel better, they are rarely heard that way. Again, an emotional brain is not going to respond well to logic.

“It happened for a reason.” - Faith can be a wonderful tool for grieving parents. But this statement can be really hurtful for parents to hear as it is unimaginable what reason there would be for such a loss. Parents can interpret this as “The reason must be that I deserve this.”

“At least you know you can get pregnant.” - This is meant to help someone find hope. But this statement completely downplays their current emotional experience. It suggests that one child can be replaced with another and thus they don’t need to be grieving.

“You can always have another baby.” This is similar to the statement above.

“They aren’t in pain anymore.” - This is meant to make the parent feel better because logically they don’t want their baby to be in pain, right? Of course they don’t. In fact, the parents didn’t want their baby to be in pain in the first place!

“They are in a better place.” - Again, faith can be helpful. However, for most parents, they see their arms as the best possible place for their children.

“You didn’t want a [boy/girl] anyways.” YES!!!! I have actually heard this one used. I can see the logic here, but I am honestly pretty horrified that anyone would say this to a grieving parent. Gender disappointment is a real thing. But it doesn’t mean that a baby wasn’t still loved.

“At least it happened when it did.” - This is usually said in the context of an early loss. This completely downplays the emotional experience. A loss is a loss. It is so unhelpful to compare losses as it makes people feel like their feelings are less valid than other people’s.

“Just give it some time and you’ll feel better.” - Again, this is trying to instill hope. But hope can seem so foreign when in the depth of despair. And there is no timeline for grief. So saying stuff like this can make the person feel like they are on the clock and people are just waiting for them to “get over it.”

This is obviously not an exhaustive list of things not to say. But these are some of the most common statements. And hopefully you see the pattern. These statements are all intended to give the person some bit of logic to help them see their grief differently. But none of them really acknowledge the grief itself. And for the person experiencing the loss, GRIEF IS ALL THEY KNOW. Anything meant to challenge, downplay, or remove that grief is “the wrong thing” to say.

Emotion-Based “I Statements” Are More Helpful

Let’s be clear that there is no “right thing” to say. But there are things that are more helpful to say.

Notice how none of the above statements acknowledge emotion? None of them reference the person speaking either. Statements that start with “I” and that acknowledge the emotional distress tend to be more empathy-based. These statements are often received much better by grieving parents. These statements include:

“I am so sorry for your loss.” - This statement is simple but appropriate. It acknowledges that you recognize their emotional distress. If you can’t think of anything else to say, that’s fine. Just leave it at this.

“I can only imagine how painful this must be.” - Don’t say you “understand” unless you really, really, really do understand. And even if you think you do, you may not. So still don’t say it. Acknowledge that they are in pain but that you don’t know exactly how it feels. And if you’re able to hear it, allow them to tell you how it feels.

“I am here to listen if you need someone to talk to.” - Only use this if you are sincere. But if you are, this can go a very long way. Again, empathy is about joining people in their grief to help them feel less alone. It’s not taking the grief away or making them feel better. It’s just about supporting them in their grief.

Again, this is not an exhaustive list. But hopefully the pattern is clear. Speak from your heart, not your brain. Emotion responds better to emotion than logic.

Please don’t let your discomfort with grief make someone else’s grieving experience even worse.