As many of you will know my Dad has just died. Thank you so much for the lovely messages you have all been sending. Every one of them is hugely appreciated.
But without wishing to denigrate any of your kind, thoughtful comments here’s something I just have to get off my chest. Please try to resist using the phrase: “I’m sorry for your loss.”
I know it feels like a sensitive and appropriate formula designed to tread lightly on the delicate feelings of the grieving. But that’s part of the problem. It’s so depressingly, euphemistically greetings-card formulaic. And quite a recent formulation too. It only came into popular usage in the late Twentieth century but now it’s everywhere. People innocently think of it of as ‘the thing you are supposed to say’. If you’re one of them please don’t think I’m criticising you personally. I’d hate that, not least because I’m so grateful that you took the opportunity to say something (of which more in a moment…)
Here’s why I think it doesn’t work, though. It treats the beloved person you’ve just ‘lost’ like a glove or one half of a pair of socks. Or some car keys. Or some spectacles. The dead loved one was not an inanimate object but someone who, till very recently, was living and human and cherished. And the reason they are no longer there is not because they were mislaid on a walk or got stuck to the wall of the drying machine. They didn’t get lost: they DIED.
So what do you say instead? Not ‘my condolences’ - that’s another hideous phrase. The very word ‘condolences’ is so mealy mouthed and prissily formal and doleful (the very sound of it is like a tolling bell) that I wish it could be erased from the dictionary. Originally it had a use: in its singular it meant the state of sharing in another’s pain (‘con’ - with; dolere - to grieve or suffer) but now it’s just another bloody greeting cards formula. I suspect, as with “sorry for your loss”, the Americans are to blame for this development.
Not that I’m advocating silence. That’s even worse. If you know someone’s loved one has just died - and especially if they know that you know - then it’s no use not saying anything just because you are awkward or embarrassed or struggling to find the right phrase. Yes, it’s difficult. But the onus is on you as the grown-up, socially functioning and not-currently-stricken-with-grief person to get over that hurdle. Otherwise you are in danger of causing hurt, even resentment.
In the case of someone’s dad dying, for example, I’d probably say something like “So sorry to hear about your dad.” You don’t need to be any more specific than that. They’re not going to go “Sorry? Which dad?” Or: “My dad? What? Has something happened to him?” But what you’ve done is specifically identified the person being mourned, unlike in the “sorry for your loss” formula which feels almost like a cop-out, as if you know someone has died but you can’t remember exactly who.
There’s no need to tread on eggshells. Special mention here to yet another of my least favourite euphemisms: “pass”/ “pass away”. Not using the word ‘die’ doesn’t make the deceased any less dead. “I was feeling really terrible but because that person used the euphemism ‘passed away’ it feels like my loved one is still with us!” said no grieving person ever.
[I don’t much like the phrase ‘loved one’, either, come to think of it. But I’m not sure there’s any way round that one.]
Anyway, on the ‘no need to tread on eggshells’ front, what I mean is: don’t be afraid to talk about the Elephant in the Room.
The grieving relative is not going to be thinking: “Please nobody remind me that my loved one has just died.” Rather, they are likely going to be all too eager to mention what you might have feared was the unmentionable.
When someone you love has just died you think about them an awful lot. And sometimes it’s nice to put some of those swirling thoughts into words. So being a sympathetic listener is the kindest, most helpful thing to do. You might worry about the risk of being dragged into someone’s grieving psychodrama but this is unlikely to happen. The serious unburdening stuff is reserved for fellow mourners. But when someone less deeply involved asks a follow up question like “And were you close?” you’re not going to bore them rigid with teary reminiscences. You’re just going to be very appreciative that they didn’t look embarrassed and swiftly change the subject as, unfortunately, so many in this grieving-illiterate age of ours tend to do.
One more thing: again - I really do want to stress this - please, please, PLEASE don’t feel ashamed or embarrassed if you used one of my forbidden phrases when writing to me about Dad. You did the most important thing of all. You showed that you cared. Thank you.
Malcolm Hugh Delingpole 1935-2026. If you want to know more about him, check out this great conversation we recorded in 2017 (when we both held rather different views than we did later on issues like Donald Trump)
https://www.jamesdelingpole.co.uk/Podcasts/2017-11-01-malcolm-delingpole
See also these films where my Dad talks to my brother Dick about some of the cine film he took of his early adventures as a racing driver
