Losing

I have a student who has had a rough semester. His aunt died in late August. She was 43 and it was a suspected drug overdose. His step-grandmother died about a month ago. And, he found his 73 year old grandfather dead on his floor last week. He's a sweet kid who's having kind of a hard time coping. It seems like he looks at all of the people around him with a kind of clock over their head that's counting down to the time that he loses them. It also seems like he might not have the greatest support system in his life. But, he's made good use of our guidance services at school and seems to be hanging in there.

We were chatting this afternoon about our respective experiences of finding our deceased grandparents; I think that he felt better knowing that someone else had experienced and survived a similar encounter. And, we were talking about the suddenness of death, sometimes. And, we were talking about the things that so often go unsaid to the ones that we lose. And, since it's my 'Grandma' time of year, I was feeling perhaps more chatty than usual. I think that it helped him a little to just talk and share. Maybe. I know that I'm not qualified to be a real assistance, but I'd like to think that his afternoon might have been a little bit less stressful. Maybe.