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I have been grieving for someone who recently passed away. Life is replete with beginnings and endings; with first and last experiences. Memory often focuses on recent experiences and that focus keeps us grounded in the present. But an emphasis on recent experiences isn’t always what we want. I don’t really want to remember the painful end of this person’s life. I need to remember earlier, happier times. But those recent experiences continue to invade my awareness. How can I choose my memories when recent events are dominating my recollections?
Memory is designed to remember first and recent experiences. I can, for example, remember my first date with my wife and I can remember our most recent date. Remembering recent experiences is important. I need to know what my wife and I have done recently: the last place we went to dinner, our recent conversations, and our last visits to our sons. Keeping these experiences easily accessible keeps me grounded in the present. When people experience difficulties remembering recent events, they have all sorts of problems. They lose track of now. We all experience some of these memory failures—forgetting where we put something, forgetting that we’ve already told someone about something, forgetting where we parked our cars. Generally, we can track our recent experiences in many different domains—family events, work events, parking our cars, and other things we care about. Remembering recent experiences is important for staying connected to the current slice of time in which we are living.
But sometimes recent experiences are painful. Sometimes we want to forget the recent events and remember earlier, perhaps happier times. As I’ve written in earlier blog posts, my wife and I have been primary care providers for a family member with Alzheimer’s disease (narrative in Alzheimer's; Seizures in Alz; time confusions). Our family member passed away a few weeks ago. The last year and particularly the last few months were challenging. Actually saying challenging is making a pretty serious understatement. She suffered. She lost the ability to move on her own. She was in constant pain. She knew she was losing her mental capabilities. For the last few weeks, she could no longer leave her bed. Then she had difficulty talking. Finally she could no longer swallow so she stopped eating and drinking. By this time hospice was involved and provided medication to limit her physical suffering. But this once energetic woman lost so much and suffered for a long time through this disease. I write this to simply say—my recent memories of her are painful.
I would rather not remember these recent experiences, but memory prefers recent experiences. Memories of watching our family member die come to mind easily and repetitively. How can I remove these horrible memories? How can I stop these memories from intruding into my thoughts? Sometimes we try to not think about something, to suppress the thoughts when they return to awareness. I could try suppressing these thoughts. But as a cognitive psychologist, I know the risks of attempting to suppress. Attempting to suppress a thought has the unfortunately consequence of making that thought more likely to return to awareness later. You may forestall the thought in the moment, but you cause the thought to keep coming back. Telling myself to simply not think about her death would be the worst advice I could give myself.
The preferred approach is instead to think about something else. Don’t try to suppress your thoughts. Instead focus on something else. For our family member, I needed to focus on other memories. I needed to remember the earlier, happier times. This sounds simple when I write it, but honestly I found it impossible to do immediately after her death. I couldn’t follow my own advice. Instead I could only remember the last few months and watching her pass away. Memory’s focus on recent events kept the horrible returning to my awareness.
Luckily most of us have traditions that help us remember different times and not just the last events. We held a funeral service for our loved and lost relative.
My wife and I wanted the funeral service to not only be about grieving but to also be a celebration of our relative’s life. She lived a great life; giving back to her family and community. She changed the lives of people around her. For her service, we returned to community in which she had spent most of her adult life. We heard wonderful stories from friends and family. We heard funny stories from 5, 10, and 50 years ago. We heard how this woman had touched the lives of others. We started sharing our stories from before Alzheimer’s disease struck. We cried of course, but we also laughed. We remembered the woman who lived. My happy memoires returned to me. Remembering the happier times has been an important aspect of healing from this painful loss.
The power of the funeral service was that it refocused my memory. I was no longer focused on her suffering and watching her die. Instead I was remembering how she lived. Sharing stories with friends and family is important because it helps you choose the way you want to remember someone.
So good-bye Mary. I will remember you well.
