By: Darcie D. Sims, Ph.D., CGC, CHT –
There’s an empty chair in our house and I am not sure what to do with it. It’s been empty a long time and although we’ve moved more than a few times since it became empty, we still haul it around with us. It’s not a particularly classic chair or even a very pretty one, and it is empty…all the time.
I never really know which room to put it in whenever we do move, but once it has found its place, I’ve noticed that it simply stays there. No one moves it, no one suggests putting it away. No one sits in it. It’s just an empty chair.
As a military family, for many generations, we are used to having members of the family off in faraway places for long periods of time. My father would be gone for up to a year or even two. His chair was often empty at the table. My husband’s military career took him away for many months at a time, and his chair was often empty. And then, when our daughter was commissioned in the military, we knew her chair would also be empty sometimes. So empty chairs at our house are not an uncommon thing, but this chair…this chair should never have been empty.
As the holidays approach, I am always faced with the task of deciding what to do with our empty chair. Should we put it away for the season? Should we decorate it? Or should we just ignore it?
One holiday season, we did decide to put it away. Even though it was an empty chair, it left an even bigger empty space when we did move. How can that be? How can something that is empty leave a bigger empty space when it’s gone?!
We’ve tried to ignore it, but its emptiness is very loud and it is hard to miss an empty chair in a room filled with people sitting in all the other chairs. And even when we could manage to ignore it, others could not and they always commented on it. An empty chair is not invisible.
Then, one year, we decided to simply include it in our holiday decorating scheme; that was the cause of some interesting discussions. Should we put a special holiday pillow in it? What about tossing a colorful quilt or afghan over the back? Should we put something in the chair? But nothing we tried could fill the emptiness of that chair. It just sat silent like a sentinel, waiting for something…or someone.
It took us many years of living with that empty chair, day in and day out, to finally figure out what to do with it. Our empty chair is pulled up to the table and a single rose is placed on the plate, a symbol of everlasting love. The empty chair represents all of those who are not with us for this occasion, but who live within our hearts forever. It is not a sad sight because we know that empty chair represents a love we have known and shared and with that gift, our family is forever blessed.
We join hands in thanksgiving, completing the circle with the empty chair within our family circle, for even though death may have come, love never goes away.
So, if your holiday table will have an empty chair this year, remember that it is not truly an empty space. That place is still occupied by the love and joy of the one(s) who sat in it. Don’t hide that chair away. You may not wish to bring it to the table as we do, but take time this holiday season to remember the laughter, the joy, the love, the light of those who are no longer within hug’s reach, but whose love still fills us with gratitude.
Join hands around your table, however small, and say a prayer of thanksgiving…for the love you have known and still hold deep within your heart. You are rich beyond measure for having had a chair filled. Don’t let death rob you of the heart space that love keeps.
Our little empty chair…no one has sat in it for 25 years…until this season. The empty chair at our house has been filled with the tiny spirit of a new life as she found that chair to be just the “right size.”
We are a family circle, some chairs filled and others not, broken by death, but mended by love.
Reach Darcie Sims at www.griefinc.com.
December 18th, 2008 at 3:56 am
I lost my dad two years ago this last November and my mom two years ago on this upcoming February 2009. They were both acutely ill at the same time which was a horrific experience for my siblings, immediate family, and friends.
My question to anyone out there that has experienced loss of parent(s) as adults is;
is there a phenomenon that occurs in which you lose feelings for your spouse as a part of the griving process? My husband and I have been separated for 2 months now and I cannot seem to find any emotions for him. Good or bad. I feel no changes in my love for my children so I find this pinpointed emptiness very peculiar and frustrating. I keep waiting for some change to occur miraculously one day but to no avail…
Any words of wisdom?
April 28th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
Hi. I’m kinda new to this – so i’m not sure where to begin. My father passed away three years ago following a stroke. I loved him very much but I have never gotten on with my mother. My sister told me yesterday that she has started dating again. By start, apparently it’s been going on for six months – maybe more. I realise it’s childish but I’m very angry with her. I feel like it’s a betrayal of my father and of course to us (the children). I should be happy with her, I know, that she’s able to get on with her life but I can’t. My sister tells me that Mom keeps a picture of her new man (& herself) next to Dad’s bed. For me, that’s disrespectful. How can I stop hating the witch? Should I arrange for a morphine infusion – which is what my mother did to her mother because she was tired of waiting for her to die – or should I just pretend not to know & treat her with the indifference that has been our relationship all our lives. Oh, and I’ve just been diagnosed with cancer. I’m thinking I won’t tell her because she’s already too happy. Yes, I’m very bitter. Are there pills that would help with this? Oh and family counselling won’t help because she won’t change..
Any thoughts or helpful comments would be appreciated.
Thanks
Sasha
June 26th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
I lost my mom 4 days ago. She had been ill for a long time. Her death was expected by everyone, even me. However, when I got the call from the hospital in the middle of the night, I was shocked. I guess that no matter how you prepare yourself for what is coming, it isn’t enough. I think I’m in some sort of weird shock…I haven’t even been able to cry for her. I can’t sleep and I throw up most of what I try to eat. I sat at the funeral home making the arrangements that my mom wanted with this strange feeling of unreality…I had to call insurance companies to get her estate straightened out. It was brutal. I’m her only child. Until now, I never felt cheated about not having a sibling. Now, I’m thinking of how nice it would be to have someone who truly understands what I’ve lost. I feel like a machine; doing what has to be done…I think I’m losing my mind.
December 8th, 2009 at 12:40 pm
My mom died a little over a year ago. The first week of my senior year of highschool. She had been fighting different kinds of cancer for 4 years. The Ovarian cancer she had moved to the lungs and then one day she got pneumona and and got very bad very quickly. I still cant bring myself to believe it. It still seems like she’s on vacations and she will come back. One thing that just tares me apart is that I never really got to say goodbye to her. By the time we new she was going to pass for sure she was on so many drugs she was a vegetable. It infuriated me, it still does. I wish I would have been able to tell her so many things, tell her I love her, hear her tell me It was going to be alright and that she loved me. But I didnt. Im so mad at everything and everyone. I cant help but feeling robbed. She was such an amazing wonderful person. Her smile could light up any room. I strive to be like her, I guess I almost try to be her so that maybe I can fill the void in myself by trying to duplicate her. Graduation was the hardest, I tried so hard to be strong. There was another boy in my class who had lost his father to suicide around the same time and we werent particularly well aquainted or anything but we locked eyes, and hugged eachother long and fiercely. I knew that at that moment we were thinking the same things, how our weddings, and childs births would be just like this graduation…bittersweet and dampened.
Sometimes I cant help feeling a pang of jealousy when one of my friends mentions their mom. I know its a horrible thing to do, but im so envious of what they have. I feel selfish saying all these things about me, me, me. But I cant help it. I miss her so much and It feels like I dont have anyone to talk to. No one understands. Its been a year, I already recieved the hugs and “sorry for your loss” cards. To them, its the past now, but I relive it every single day. Seeing her take the last breath and the line going straight. Im so mad inside, Why did it have to be her? WHY? That empty chair is a killer. My family is pretty large, and we all have our spots that we sit at at the dinner table. She sat right across from me. That empty chair is a killer…
December 11th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
I am so sorry. My father dies last spring….this is our first holiday season without home. We had Thanksgiving at my house because I did not want to be at his house and feel the loss more keenly. But as time goes by I notice how we are carrying on……we keep going in his honor…..I am so proud of that…it is almost a comfort.