When Someone You Love Dies, There's No Such Thing As Moving On
I came across this YouTube video and it hit home. The concept, just everything about it. So I decided I
wanted to share it. I have attached the link below if you choose to listen to it. In addition,
I have transcribed the video for future safe keeping.
By: Kelley Lynn, Garden City, New York, March 2017
wanted to share it. I have attached the link below if you choose to listen to it. In addition,
I have transcribed the video for future safe keeping.
By: Kelley Lynn, Garden City, New York, March 2017
Best selling author and widower, C S Lewis said in the opening line of his brilliant book,
A Grief Observed. Nobody ever told me that grief, felt so much like fear. That's a powerful
statement, fear. The fear of what, the fear of losing yourself, the fear of growing old alone,
the fear that this intense pain will never stop. The fear of forgetting the sound of his voice or his
laugh, or that others will forget him. That his life won't have mattered. Grief makes you feel isolated,
alone, terrified and damaged, and scared of absolutely everything.
On October 27, 2006, at the age of 35, I married my very best friend, Don Sheppard. Four years
and nine months later, my healthy, active, beautiful husband left for work one morning and never
came home. They found him collapsed on the floor, a massive heart attack. No symptoms,
no warnings, no goodbyes, here one minute and then boom, gone. In the past 5 years or so,
since my husbands death, I've become friends with and met a lot of other widowed people.
A few months ago, a dear widower friend of mine gave me a challenge, he said Kelley, I want
you to change the world. Is that all I said to him? I will get right on that after my morning cup of
coffee. But when I stop to think about that concept, a favorite phrase of mine came to mind.
“Change your mind and change the world.” In other words, the way that people see and perceive
an idea has to change in order for everything surrounding that idea to also change. So I’m going
speak the truth today about grief and then wait for that truth to then become contagious.
Any widowed person, any any person who has lost someone they love to death, will tell you
about the well intentions but sometimes insensitive comments coming from those on the outside.
“It was God's plan.” “Everything happens for a reason.” There are many more but these
are some of the “greatest hits.” Now the justification for these comments is always the same,
they don’t know what to say. I feel like it’s time to change the conversation from "they don’t
know what to say" to "well then, let's teach them". Like the Maya Angelou once said, "When
you know better, you do better".
So let’s focus on the most insensitive comment of all times and the one that I feel is the
most harmful, “You need to move on.” “Get over it.” “Get on with your life.” Let me say this as
simply as I can, when it comes to the death of someone you love, there is no such thing as
moving on. It’s a lie, it’s a made up concept created by people who are too uncomfortable with
death and sadness and grief. But here's the thing, it’s not their fault. They are only repeating what
has become familiar to them throughout the years, what has been taught to them created by
society over and over again. You need “to move one” is a phrase born out of centuries of ignorance
and fear because grief feels a hell of a lot like fear. Now the “move on” mentality starts very early.
Its constant, it doesn’t really ever end. Within minutes of my husband’s sudden death, I was attacked
with questions. “Will you be donating his organs?” “Would you like cremation or casket with that?”
“When can somebody come by your apartment and pick up some of his items?” Now at the time,
I was told by people that these decisions were for my benefit. That it would help me to let go,
to put all this behind me. At my husband’s funeral, a total stranger, came up to me, stood right
by the casket, and said to me, “Today you grieve, tomorrow you get out there and find a new
man.” Really, tomorrow, that seems a little soon.
A widower friend of mine, was offered this proposition from a relative friend of his,
“For every picture you take down of you and your wife from your bed stand, I’ll give you $50
bucks.”
A widow goes to the cemetery all the time to visit her husband and she keeps a lawn
chair in the back of her car so she can sit with him at his graveside. One day she goes out
to her car and notices her chair is gone, her friends thinking that they are helping, said
“We took your chair, we don’t think you should go there anymore. It’s not healthy.”
Another friend was told by her priest, after her brother died in a skiing accident,
“Stop talking about him. You need to let him rest in peace.”
Another friend, fathered two sons, when he filled out a school field trip form and such he was
told by the school principal, “Your other child has died, so you only have one son now.”
These heart wrenching stories are from real people. And this is the kind of treatment that they
face every single day. Taking away someone's connection to someone they love who has died,
what purpose does that serve, what kind of message are we sending. That the people we
love are replaceable, that the love you have for your daughter, your mother,
your brother, your best friend has an expiration date. That their life really didn’t matter.
When someone you love dies, and you are told over and over again to "move on",
something inside of you breaks. Now, when that happens, you don’t really feel much like
living anymore. You figure “Hey why should I stick around? When I’m not allowed to continue
to love my person that I miss.” So you start isolating yourself, you keep to yourself, your world
becomes smaller and smaller. You disappear.
My friend who was offered money, to get rid of pictures of him and his wife, you know he no
longer talks about his wife anymore with anyone. He says it’s just not worth it and he's tired of
being silenced.
The widow who had her lawn chair taken away, she still goes to the cemetery, but now she
does it in secret. She tells nobody because she’s tired of being judged for loving her husband
who died.
The woman who was told by her priest to stop talking about her brother, she did, she also
stopped going to church. And her faith has suffered greatly because of it.
The father that was told you only have one son now. Was recently asked by his 6 year old boy,
“Daddy, if I die like my brother did, does that mean I’m not your son anymore?”
This is not the way to honor love, to honor those that we love who have died. You can't move on
from love. Love is the only thing that never dies. So, if there’s no such thing as moving on.
Then what is it that I’m proposing? What is the message that we need to make contagious in the
hearts and minds of people. The message that will change people's minds and in turn change
the world. Well, here’s the truth, love grows more love, all good things are born out of
love. So what if instead of saying to someone, “Hey, stop talking about your brother”, we
said, “Tell me more about your brother who died.” What if in trying to fix someone, we sat with
them inside of their pain and we let them tell us what comes next. What if we got rid of the
phrase “Move on” and instead we began to “Move with” and “Move through” our losses.
Imagine what could happen.
Take a look.
This is Ethan, at his 20 week ultrasound, he was diagnosed with developing CHD or Congenital
Heart Disease. He wasn’t supposed to make it to birth, instead Ethan lived 7 short years of life.
And in that time, he went under some of the most innovative cardiac surgeries know to date.
When Ethan died, his parents, Jessica and Eric, took their forever love for him and with it
created HOPE, the Ethan M. Limburg Foundation, offers grants, housing, support and even
music therapy to families living with CHD. Because they did not move on or get over their son,
his life is now a legacy and countless of families and people are affected by his life going forward
forever.
This is Philip Hernendez. Philip was a wonderful husband, father and a great man. His life
ended instantly when he was hit by a car while out cycling. That’s Michelle, Phil’s wife,
she had no plans on becoming a widow at the age of 35. After Phil’s sudden death, Michelle
didn’t know what to do and she couldn’t find the support in the community that she so
desperately needed. So she built it. Michelle created, Sorrowing Spirits International, a
non-profit that connects widowed people worldwide. Their most popular program, Camp
Widow, is a three-day event offering workshops, presentations and social gatherings for
widowed men and women of all ages. If Michelle had listened to the countless people who
told her to let go of her love for Phil and to get over it, her life would have continued down the
road of isolation and loneliness. Instead, her foundation has served over 3 million widowed
people world wide and still counting. All because she made the choice to live and share Phil’s
life forward. On the right there, that’s Michael. Michael is Michelle’s husband today. He knows
that just because Michelle found love with him, does not mean that she is over loving Phil,
nor does it mean that the pain of losing Phil has magically disappeared. He knows that the
heart expands and that Michelle’s love for Phil is part of what makes her the great woman that
he loves today. Not only does Michael support this, he’s a part of it. Michael is the Camp
Widow photographer.
Meet Shelby. Shelby was only 7 years old when her mom, Megan died from Cystic Fibrosis.
Mike, Shelby’s dad, Mike, met Sarah at Camp Widow in Tampa, Florida. Sarah was there because
her fiance, Drew, died in a helicopter crash. Drew’s parents have made the choice to continue to
love Sarah as an extension of their love son. Megan’s parents have chosen to do the same by
continuing to love Mike and Shelby. Now Shelby knows that Sarah is not her mother but she is
a mother figure and the two have formed a really special bond. You see Sarah was just about
Shelby’s age when she lost her own mother. So every time the two are around each other, their
hearts heal just a little bit more. Back to this picture on the left under the Christmas tree, it’s about
2 weeks before Christmas, there’s a knock at the door. This giant box arrives. Inside it, present
after present after present from Drew’s entire family. His grandparents, his parents, his aunts and
uncles, all of them for Shelby, for Mike and for Sarah. This 9 year old little girl, who had not had
enough time on this earth with her own mother, now giddy with joy as she opens multiple gifts
from Drew’s family, a man she has never even met, but whose life and death is now exploding
into an avalanche of love right on her living room floor. If even one person in this serinero made
a different choice this beautiful picture would not exist and all of these people would be living
much smaller lives. Instead, all of their lives grew bigger and wider, more love. The love that
Mike and Sarah have for each other does not diminish or delete the love that Sarah will always
have for Drew and that Mike will always have for Megan. In fact, it multiplies it, it honors it.
Love grows love. And what about me, what have I done with the forever love that I’ll always have
for my husband Don. Well, I’m happy to tell you, I am a speaker at Camp Widow, where I have
been giving my comedic presentation about life and loss since 2013. I started a campaign
called ‘Pay It Forward for Don Sheppard Day’, where I ask people anywhere and everywhere to
do acts of kindness in his honor and then they get published in my blog. Now over the years,
hundreds and hundreds of people have taken part in these acts of kindness and many of
them don’t even know me nor did they know my husband. I’m writing a book about our forever
love story and about my story after. And I’m standing here with all of you today, giving this
very personal and important message into the universe. My husband’s heart may have
stopped beating on July 13, 2011, but he lives on every single day because it’s my mission to
make damn sure of it.
Great things can happen when we continue to tell the stories of those we have lost who have died.
And it doesn’t have to be on this grand of a scale; each of us can be the person that changes the
message for someone else about grief, love and loss. That is how change happens, one person
one mind at a time. Every single one of us in this room, everyone watching this online and me,
guess what? We’re all going to die. Not right now, so don’t panic, hopefully it’s not right now.
But we are, we’re all going to die at some point. We have no choice about that, we have no choice
about that. But guess what we do have a choice about, how we talk about those who have died,
the language we use. So let me ask you this, when you die do you want to be forgotten?
Do you want people to tell your loved ones, "Hey, get over it". "Get over her". "Get over him".
"Move on". "Stop talking about that".
OR
Do you want the people who love you to use that love to create a life for themselves filled with
joy and purpose and meaning. Isn’t that what you deserve? Isn’t that what we all deserve?
The question that is asked in a closing song of Lin-Manuel Miranda hit broadway brilliant musical
‘Hamilton’ is this, ‘When my time is up, have I done enough? Will they tell my story? Will they tell
your story? Who tells your story?’ My wish for everyone here today, for each one of us, is that
when our time is up, the people who love us never move on. The people who love us, they tell
our story. Because here’s the truth, if we move on and let go of and get rid of the people that we
love that have died; if we do that then guess what, they really are gone, their gone, just gone
forever. But if we tell each others stories, and if we use that love to create more love and to multiply
each others worlds, if we can do that then nobody ever really dies. Not truly.
Thank you so much.
A Grief Observed. Nobody ever told me that grief, felt so much like fear. That's a powerful
statement, fear. The fear of what, the fear of losing yourself, the fear of growing old alone,
the fear that this intense pain will never stop. The fear of forgetting the sound of his voice or his
laugh, or that others will forget him. That his life won't have mattered. Grief makes you feel isolated,
alone, terrified and damaged, and scared of absolutely everything.
On October 27, 2006, at the age of 35, I married my very best friend, Don Sheppard. Four years
and nine months later, my healthy, active, beautiful husband left for work one morning and never
came home. They found him collapsed on the floor, a massive heart attack. No symptoms,
no warnings, no goodbyes, here one minute and then boom, gone. In the past 5 years or so,
since my husbands death, I've become friends with and met a lot of other widowed people.
A few months ago, a dear widower friend of mine gave me a challenge, he said Kelley, I want
you to change the world. Is that all I said to him? I will get right on that after my morning cup of
coffee. But when I stop to think about that concept, a favorite phrase of mine came to mind.
“Change your mind and change the world.” In other words, the way that people see and perceive
an idea has to change in order for everything surrounding that idea to also change. So I’m going
speak the truth today about grief and then wait for that truth to then become contagious.
Any widowed person, any any person who has lost someone they love to death, will tell you
about the well intentions but sometimes insensitive comments coming from those on the outside.
“It was God's plan.” “Everything happens for a reason.” There are many more but these
are some of the “greatest hits.” Now the justification for these comments is always the same,
they don’t know what to say. I feel like it’s time to change the conversation from "they don’t
know what to say" to "well then, let's teach them". Like the Maya Angelou once said, "When
you know better, you do better".
So let’s focus on the most insensitive comment of all times and the one that I feel is the
most harmful, “You need to move on.” “Get over it.” “Get on with your life.” Let me say this as
simply as I can, when it comes to the death of someone you love, there is no such thing as
moving on. It’s a lie, it’s a made up concept created by people who are too uncomfortable with
death and sadness and grief. But here's the thing, it’s not their fault. They are only repeating what
has become familiar to them throughout the years, what has been taught to them created by
society over and over again. You need “to move one” is a phrase born out of centuries of ignorance
and fear because grief feels a hell of a lot like fear. Now the “move on” mentality starts very early.
Its constant, it doesn’t really ever end. Within minutes of my husband’s sudden death, I was attacked
with questions. “Will you be donating his organs?” “Would you like cremation or casket with that?”
“When can somebody come by your apartment and pick up some of his items?” Now at the time,
I was told by people that these decisions were for my benefit. That it would help me to let go,
to put all this behind me. At my husband’s funeral, a total stranger, came up to me, stood right
by the casket, and said to me, “Today you grieve, tomorrow you get out there and find a new
man.” Really, tomorrow, that seems a little soon.
A widower friend of mine, was offered this proposition from a relative friend of his,
“For every picture you take down of you and your wife from your bed stand, I’ll give you $50
bucks.”
A widow goes to the cemetery all the time to visit her husband and she keeps a lawn
chair in the back of her car so she can sit with him at his graveside. One day she goes out
to her car and notices her chair is gone, her friends thinking that they are helping, said
“We took your chair, we don’t think you should go there anymore. It’s not healthy.”
Another friend was told by her priest, after her brother died in a skiing accident,
“Stop talking about him. You need to let him rest in peace.”
Another friend, fathered two sons, when he filled out a school field trip form and such he was
told by the school principal, “Your other child has died, so you only have one son now.”
These heart wrenching stories are from real people. And this is the kind of treatment that they
face every single day. Taking away someone's connection to someone they love who has died,
what purpose does that serve, what kind of message are we sending. That the people we
love are replaceable, that the love you have for your daughter, your mother,
your brother, your best friend has an expiration date. That their life really didn’t matter.
When someone you love dies, and you are told over and over again to "move on",
something inside of you breaks. Now, when that happens, you don’t really feel much like
living anymore. You figure “Hey why should I stick around? When I’m not allowed to continue
to love my person that I miss.” So you start isolating yourself, you keep to yourself, your world
becomes smaller and smaller. You disappear.
My friend who was offered money, to get rid of pictures of him and his wife, you know he no
longer talks about his wife anymore with anyone. He says it’s just not worth it and he's tired of
being silenced.
The widow who had her lawn chair taken away, she still goes to the cemetery, but now she
does it in secret. She tells nobody because she’s tired of being judged for loving her husband
who died.
The woman who was told by her priest to stop talking about her brother, she did, she also
stopped going to church. And her faith has suffered greatly because of it.
The father that was told you only have one son now. Was recently asked by his 6 year old boy,
“Daddy, if I die like my brother did, does that mean I’m not your son anymore?”
This is not the way to honor love, to honor those that we love who have died. You can't move on
from love. Love is the only thing that never dies. So, if there’s no such thing as moving on.
Then what is it that I’m proposing? What is the message that we need to make contagious in the
hearts and minds of people. The message that will change people's minds and in turn change
the world. Well, here’s the truth, love grows more love, all good things are born out of
love. So what if instead of saying to someone, “Hey, stop talking about your brother”, we
said, “Tell me more about your brother who died.” What if in trying to fix someone, we sat with
them inside of their pain and we let them tell us what comes next. What if we got rid of the
phrase “Move on” and instead we began to “Move with” and “Move through” our losses.
Imagine what could happen.
Take a look.
This is Ethan, at his 20 week ultrasound, he was diagnosed with developing CHD or Congenital
Heart Disease. He wasn’t supposed to make it to birth, instead Ethan lived 7 short years of life.
And in that time, he went under some of the most innovative cardiac surgeries know to date.
When Ethan died, his parents, Jessica and Eric, took their forever love for him and with it
created HOPE, the Ethan M. Limburg Foundation, offers grants, housing, support and even
music therapy to families living with CHD. Because they did not move on or get over their son,
his life is now a legacy and countless of families and people are affected by his life going forward
forever.
This is Philip Hernendez. Philip was a wonderful husband, father and a great man. His life
ended instantly when he was hit by a car while out cycling. That’s Michelle, Phil’s wife,
she had no plans on becoming a widow at the age of 35. After Phil’s sudden death, Michelle
didn’t know what to do and she couldn’t find the support in the community that she so
desperately needed. So she built it. Michelle created, Sorrowing Spirits International, a
non-profit that connects widowed people worldwide. Their most popular program, Camp
Widow, is a three-day event offering workshops, presentations and social gatherings for
widowed men and women of all ages. If Michelle had listened to the countless people who
told her to let go of her love for Phil and to get over it, her life would have continued down the
road of isolation and loneliness. Instead, her foundation has served over 3 million widowed
people world wide and still counting. All because she made the choice to live and share Phil’s
life forward. On the right there, that’s Michael. Michael is Michelle’s husband today. He knows
that just because Michelle found love with him, does not mean that she is over loving Phil,
nor does it mean that the pain of losing Phil has magically disappeared. He knows that the
heart expands and that Michelle’s love for Phil is part of what makes her the great woman that
he loves today. Not only does Michael support this, he’s a part of it. Michael is the Camp
Widow photographer.
Meet Shelby. Shelby was only 7 years old when her mom, Megan died from Cystic Fibrosis.
Mike, Shelby’s dad, Mike, met Sarah at Camp Widow in Tampa, Florida. Sarah was there because
her fiance, Drew, died in a helicopter crash. Drew’s parents have made the choice to continue to
love Sarah as an extension of their love son. Megan’s parents have chosen to do the same by
continuing to love Mike and Shelby. Now Shelby knows that Sarah is not her mother but she is
a mother figure and the two have formed a really special bond. You see Sarah was just about
Shelby’s age when she lost her own mother. So every time the two are around each other, their
hearts heal just a little bit more. Back to this picture on the left under the Christmas tree, it’s about
2 weeks before Christmas, there’s a knock at the door. This giant box arrives. Inside it, present
after present after present from Drew’s entire family. His grandparents, his parents, his aunts and
uncles, all of them for Shelby, for Mike and for Sarah. This 9 year old little girl, who had not had
enough time on this earth with her own mother, now giddy with joy as she opens multiple gifts
from Drew’s family, a man she has never even met, but whose life and death is now exploding
into an avalanche of love right on her living room floor. If even one person in this serinero made
a different choice this beautiful picture would not exist and all of these people would be living
much smaller lives. Instead, all of their lives grew bigger and wider, more love. The love that
Mike and Sarah have for each other does not diminish or delete the love that Sarah will always
have for Drew and that Mike will always have for Megan. In fact, it multiplies it, it honors it.
Love grows love. And what about me, what have I done with the forever love that I’ll always have
for my husband Don. Well, I’m happy to tell you, I am a speaker at Camp Widow, where I have
been giving my comedic presentation about life and loss since 2013. I started a campaign
called ‘Pay It Forward for Don Sheppard Day’, where I ask people anywhere and everywhere to
do acts of kindness in his honor and then they get published in my blog. Now over the years,
hundreds and hundreds of people have taken part in these acts of kindness and many of
them don’t even know me nor did they know my husband. I’m writing a book about our forever
love story and about my story after. And I’m standing here with all of you today, giving this
very personal and important message into the universe. My husband’s heart may have
stopped beating on July 13, 2011, but he lives on every single day because it’s my mission to
make damn sure of it.
Great things can happen when we continue to tell the stories of those we have lost who have died.
And it doesn’t have to be on this grand of a scale; each of us can be the person that changes the
message for someone else about grief, love and loss. That is how change happens, one person
one mind at a time. Every single one of us in this room, everyone watching this online and me,
guess what? We’re all going to die. Not right now, so don’t panic, hopefully it’s not right now.
But we are, we’re all going to die at some point. We have no choice about that, we have no choice
about that. But guess what we do have a choice about, how we talk about those who have died,
the language we use. So let me ask you this, when you die do you want to be forgotten?
Do you want people to tell your loved ones, "Hey, get over it". "Get over her". "Get over him".
"Move on". "Stop talking about that".
OR
Do you want the people who love you to use that love to create a life for themselves filled with
joy and purpose and meaning. Isn’t that what you deserve? Isn’t that what we all deserve?
The question that is asked in a closing song of Lin-Manuel Miranda hit broadway brilliant musical
‘Hamilton’ is this, ‘When my time is up, have I done enough? Will they tell my story? Will they tell
your story? Who tells your story?’ My wish for everyone here today, for each one of us, is that
when our time is up, the people who love us never move on. The people who love us, they tell
our story. Because here’s the truth, if we move on and let go of and get rid of the people that we
love that have died; if we do that then guess what, they really are gone, their gone, just gone
forever. But if we tell each others stories, and if we use that love to create more love and to multiply
each others worlds, if we can do that then nobody ever really dies. Not truly.
Thank you so much.
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