Halloween

There seems to be a bit of debate in death work circles between those who see Halloween and the accompanying ghoulish paraphanalia as disrespectful and distasteful to those who are living with the realities of loss, and those who embrace spooky season as one of the few times if the year where acknowledging death is acceptable.

I'm firmly in the latter camp: I love it all, but I'm happy to respect the views of those who don't.

Learning to live with loss is hard, and however you do it, if it helps, then you do you! If skulls everywhere works for you, go for it, but if you'd rather avoid plastic tat in your grief, that's great too.

I can get that seeing ghosts and ghouls everywhere can be triggering for those going through a bereavement, and I'm not a fan of the glorification of violent death that we sometimes see, especially at this time of year. But I think we can celebrate Halloween without going down that road, surely? And I find some comfort, strange as it is, in some of the Halloween decorations, a reminder of the ancient belief that the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead is thinner around now, a sense that our dead are that little bit closer at the moment. A fairy lighted, plastic cemetery in a glass jar definitely doesn't say that to everyone, but it works wonders for me!

Let's try to respect each other and not assume that a skeleton decoration implies disrespect and not knowing true loss, or that not wanting to engage with it all means someone doesn't understand your way of coping. We don't often know the reasons behind why someone else feels the way they do, yet most of us can be somewhat quick to judge.

I have friends who have faced death more than most, who use Halloween tat as a way of dealing with that, and I also know people who keep well away from it for the exact same reason. We all deal with things differently, and that's fine: there's no right way to grieve.

Happy Halloween to those who celebrate, and, to those who are finding this season difficult, sending love and remember that it will be over soon.... and then the Christmas tat moves in instead!