Dear Well-Meaning People: Here’s What Actually Helps When Someone’s Grieving

A heartfelt guide with a few truth bombs and a dash of sarcasm

Grief is a wild, messy, heart-ripping ride—and everyone around you either disappears or gets weirdly awkward. So, this is for the well-meaning folks who genuinely want to help but end up handing out platitudes like stale cookies at a pity party.

Here’s a little love letter (laced with some truth bombs and side-eye) about what actually helps when someone is grieving—and what you can kindly just... not do.

1. Please, for the love of all things sacred, stop saying “Sorry for your loss.”

Let’s just say it: you start to loathe that sentence after a while. Like, violently.

It’s not that people don’t mean well—it’s just that it lands like a wet paper towel on a burning house. We know you’re sorry. We do. But it doesn’t help. It’s filler. It’s autopilot.

When my dad was dying in the hospital, every nurse on his floor seemed to take a solemn vow to say “Sorry for your loss” in passing like it was a greeting. I don’t remember much from those days—it’s a foggy, grief-colored blur—but I do remember feeling irrational rage at hearing that line over and over. Eventually, it turned into me muttering under my breath, “Yeah? Not as sorry as I am.”

Instead, try something human. Try:

• “I wish I had the right words.”

• “I hate that you’re going through this.”

• “There’s nothing I can say to make this better, but I’m here.”

Or honestly? Just sit quietly beside us. Being present is louder than anything you could say.

2. Don’t offer help. Do the thing.

Please don’t say, “Let me know if you need anything.”Because 1) we won’t, and 2) we don’t even know what day it is, let alone what we need.

You know what actually helps?

• Drop off groceries and text, “There’s soup on your porch.”

• Send a takeout gift card and say, “Feed yourself. Or don’t. Just know it’s there.”

• Show up with a trash bag and declare, “I’m cleaning. Argue with me, and I’ll Swiffer your face.”

The day Dakota passed, a friend brought over a box of Tim Hortons coffee and a case of beer. That same day, he and his spouse came back with hand soap and food. (Hand soap. Who remembers they’re out of soap when their world just collapsed? Not me.) A couple days later, another friend showed up with groceries that didn’t require thought or effort—just heat and eat. I couldn’t even go into a grocery store without falling apart, so these little things? They were everything.

3. Skip the spiritual clichés. Seriously.

“Everything happens for a reason.”“They’re in a better place.”“God needed another angel.”

Please stop. I beg you.

If your faith brings you comfort, that’s beautiful. But this isn’t the time to hand out cosmic brochures. These phrases often feel like someone’s trying to polish a cracked mirror with glitter glue.

Just... sit in the silence. That’s sacred enough.

4. Don’t try to cheer us up. Just be with us.

No one wants to hear, “They wouldn’t want you to be sad.”Yeah? Well, guess what—we are sad. Deeply. Unapologetically. Devastatingly.

Trying to force smiles feels like slapping glitter on a bruise. Let us be a mess. Let us ugly cry. Let us scream at the toaster. Let us rage and sob and unravel—and if you can sit with us in that chaos without trying to mop it up with Hallmark energy? That’s love.

5. Keep showing up. Long after everyone else disappears.

The funeral passes. The flowers wilt. The world keeps spinning. But we’re still stuck in that moment—the before and after.

Want to support someone through loss? Be there on the random Tuesday when grief decides to sucker-punch them again. Check in on birthdays. Text on anniversaries. Say their name at dinner.

After the first few weeks, most people fell off the radar. Poof—gone. It was like they’d crossed “condolences” off their checklist and bounced. Except for two people: my best friend (my sister in everything but blood) and another friend who called almost every day, even when I didn’t want to talk. She wouldn’t let me disappear into the dark. She laughed with me, cried with me, sat in silence with me. That’s the kind of love grief needs.

6. Ask about their person. Use their name.

Some people act like if they mention the deceased, they’ll accidentally summon a ghost. But the silence around our loved ones is louder than any memory.

Say their name. Share a story. Ask us to tell you who they were.

Just yesterday, my daughter mentioned Dakota after hearing a song that reminded her of him and his best friend, who also passed recently. The lyrics hit hard, in the way only music can, and the song is by one of their all-time favorite artists, which makes it feel even more personal. She’s planning to get a lyric tattooed as an ode to both of them. And this morning, we were laughing about my dad’s “dad jokes” and how he was “Papa Jungle Gym” when the kids were little. Her partner’s grandfather reminds her of my dad, and she says it with this warm smile that tells me the stories live on. And that’s what matters

7. Be awkward. Be clumsy. But show up anyway.

You don’t have to get it perfect. You don’t need the “right” words. You just need to show up and stay. Even if it’s awkward. Even if we’re awkward. Even if all you do is sit on the couch and stare into space with us for 20 minutes while we decide if we’re okay enough to microwave something.

Final Truth Bomb: Grief doesn’t go away. Your love shouldn’t either.

There’s no end date. No timeline. No “back to normal.” There’s just life—different, reshaped, raw and real.

So if you want to love someone through grief?

Love them through all of it:

• The silence.

• The breakdowns.

• The memories that hit like a freight train.

• The healing.

• The humor that somehow shows up in the middle of it all.

And if you’re the one grieving right now?It’s okay to speak up.It’s okay to say, “That doesn’t help.”It’s okay to ask for what you need.

And it is more than okay to tell someone, very nicely, that if you hear “sorry for your loss” one more time, you might scream into a pillow and throw a casserole dish through a window.

(But only if it’s a cheap casserole dish.)