What help would you want?

[CleverQuacks]

Hi all,
My uncle was diagnosed with terminal cancer two weeks ago and passed away on Wednesday. He has left behind a wife and son. I am visiting them tomorrow and want to be helpful. I was thinking I can offer to do a supermarket shop or clean the house. My Aunty is very house proud so I don’t want to offend her. So my question to those who have experienced bereavement (this is my first loss) is what would you have found helpful in those early days?

Sorry for your loss, CleverQuacks.

Be specific, not general about help. It's a pisser to be bereaved and have the added burden of asking for help after the well-meaning; "Anything I can do..."

You've so thoughtfully considered your auntie's possible need, so possibly the supermarket shop is the best way in: I'm going to shop tomorrow, is there anything I can pick up for you? This gives her time to think and plan.

If no, then fine, but keep asking, especially later when the dust settles and a different grieving and need sets in.

I’m sorry for your loss - what a shock for everyone.

Everyone is different so it is difficult. When my dad died, my mum went into overdrive for the first couple of weeks. She had my brother and I stay with her and she was like a woman possessed. She could do anything and wanted to.

The crash came about a month/6 weeks later. That’s when she needed people to rally round and almost think for her. That was the point when life goes back to normal for everyone else and she had the realisation that this was her new normal. Plus everything started breaking - clocks, doorbell, freezer and mum just couldn’t deal with it!

So for my mum, she wouldn’t have needed anything much practical at this point (she did run out of vases though so if you take flowers, take a vase as well) but you could use this as an opportunity to suss our what might be needed in a few weeks.

The thing I found the most helpful was company.
It’s easy for people to say text to say do you need anything but the people that turned up made all the difference.
A really helpful article I read was the grieving need you most after the funeral ( sorry don’t know how to link).
Between the death and funeral it’s a busy time but I remember going home from the funeral and putting a washing on etc, life was suddenly expected to go back to normal.

For me it was having snacks,

Taking things round like, cakes, biscuits, whatever she likes to nibble on when she’s hungry but doesn’t want to cook.

I didn’t eat much in the two weeks after my mum died, but I did snack which seemed to keep me going, if she’s someone who doesn’t eat when she’s going through emotional trauma, snack items could help both her and their son.

Food. Things that are easy to prepare and eat. Things with a long shelf life.
Shopping. Who is doing the washing etc?
A very useful thing ds2 did for me was to bring me a few vases from charity shops. People brought us flowers but I had no vases.
I donated them back again.