her cubby is diagonal from mine and i look over my right shoulder periodically just to make sure she's "here". today she's not. she tells me "i thought i was going to get better but i'm only getting worse". i worry about her but i have yet to find words to console her. it pains me that all i have offered her is a hug or a warm hand on her arm.
when i came back to work, silly me, i kept giving her the sad face... the i-know-you're-going-through-and-so-i'm-going-to-show-you-my-miserable face. i didn't realize why she kept avoiding me until i saw another co-worker giving her the same face. i quickly corrected myself.
when she returned to work, i knew that she wanted to get back to normal. she wanted to be around her friends, her co-workers and her work to prevent her from thinking about her grief... but her managers gave her even more grief by telling her that her performance was off, she was here but not here, not realizing that she needed time to cope. they took 15 minutes away from her annual time because she left work at 9:45 on the morning her husband died. some folks are incredibly insensitive... and that's putting it lightly.
however, she has a strong support system. plenty of children, grandchildren and her close friends. one of our co-workers, who is a good friend of hers, bought her a cat. she named the cat after her husband's nickname.
it is my hope that she becomes stronger daily... that she and her entire family find peace. at some point in our lives we've all sat on the front pew of a church or funeral home... some of us have sat shiva... all of us have mourned... and i pray that my fellow co-workers, her supervisors, find compassion and offer it to her...
