Whatever you do, do something

We’ve all felt that feeling when we hear of a friend’s bereavement - ‘What should I say?’, ‘I don’t want to upset them/make them feel worse/remind them of what’s happened’, ‘When I see them I won’t mention it’. The most important thing you can do is say something - acknowledge what has happened, give them a hug (it’s okay to do that again now), make them some food for the freezer, give them a card. What you actually say doesn’t matter. What matters is that you recognise that a huge thing has happened to them and that the last thing they want to do is pretend it hasn’t. There is no blueprint for how to feel, what to say, or what to do when someone you care about has experienced the death of a friend or close family member. But what you must never do is ignore it for fear of ‘making it worse’. You can’t make it worse, but you can make it easier to bear.