Rosemary Raven Hearth

By Erika Hall, Death Doula
A reflection on acceptance, presence, and the freedom to feel

🌙 Introduction

We talk a lot about grief and dying—but we don’t always talk about the rules we silently place on them.

There are expectations. Unspoken checklists. Timelines and tones that we believe should be followed. We measure whether someone is “too ready” to die or “not sad enough” to grieve properly. And when someone doesn’t fit those expectations, we judge—quietly, or not so quietly.

But grief is not a performance.
And dying is not a failure.

In my work as a death doula—and in my own lived experiences—I’ve witnessed how damaging these judgments can be. They isolate people in their pain. They silence the dying. They deepen the sorrow of those left behind.

This post is an invitation to pause.
To reflect.
And to consider what it might look like to hold space without needing to understand, fix, or correct.

Because when it comes to death and grief—what people need most is the freedom to be exactly where they are.

🌒 Grief Isn’t a Performance—A Story From the Beginning

I remember sitting in the back of a funeral once, watching one of my clients. Her father had just died, and she was sitting next to her uncle—silent, inward, folded into herself. Grief was thick around her like fog. And still, her stepmother and sisters kept coming up to her, whispering, “You need to go greet the guests. People are here for your dad.”

Eventually, she left the funeral.

Not because she didn’t care. But because she did. She just needed to grieve in her own way—inward, still, present with the loss.
But what people saw was a refusal to perform.
And so, they judged her.

We do this a lot, don’t we?

We assign rules to grief. We measure what “appropriate” mourning looks like. We label people as strong or fragile, brave or selfish, based on how they process pain.

But grief is not a formula.
And death is not a test of character.

This post is a call to release the judgment we place on the dying and the grieving. It’s a reminder that we do not need to understand someone’s sorrow in order to respect it.

💬 Have you ever been told how you should feel—or how you should behave—while grieving?

⚖️ The Quiet Harm of Judgment

Judgment often comes dressed as concern.
It says things like:

• “You’re going back to work already?”
• “You really should let yourself cry.”
• “You can’t give up—you have to keep fighting.”

But these responses, however well-meaning, can silence the grieving and pressure the dying. They ask people to abandon their inner truth for someone else’s comfort.

🕯️ Grief Doesn’t Always Cry

When my mother died, I went back to work soon after. Not because I wasn’t grieving—but because I was. I needed structure. I needed something I could do on autopilot while the rest of my world felt disoriented.

But people questioned me.

They told me I wasn’t taking enough time. That I needed to “let it out.” That I was avoiding something.

What I really needed was permission to do what felt right to me.

Grief doesn’t always look like sobbing or silence. Sometimes, it looks like going through the motions because motion is the only thing that holds you together.

💭 What has grief looked like for you that others didn’t understand?

🧓🏽 When the Dying Say “I’m Ready”

We are taught to resist death at all costs. So when someone says, “I’m tired,” or “I’m ready,” it makes us uncomfortable. But sometimes, readiness is not giving up—it’s making peace.

🗣️ A Daughter’s Silence

I met with a woman and her daughter to discuss support during her end-of-life journey. I asked the mother, “What do you want for your final chapter?”

Her daughter quickly interjected:
“She’s not ready for that yet.”

For 30 minutes, the daughter answered every question I asked her mother. Eventually, I asked to speak with her mother alone.

When I repeated the question, the woman looked at me, eyes brimming with exhaustion, and said:
“I’m ready to go. But my daughter’s not ready, so I’m trying to hold on.”

Without meaning to, her daughter had emotionally silenced her—because she wasn’t ready.

💬 Can you think of a time when fear kept you from hearing someone else’s truth?

🌍 Grief Across Cultures

Grief is not universal. It’s cultural. It’s personal. It’s fluid.
Here are a few examples of how different cultures approach death and mourning:

🇲🇽 Mexico – Día de los Muertos

Rather than hide grief, families celebrate the memory of their loved ones through food, music, and altars that invite their spirits home.

🇬🇭 Ghana – Celebratory Funerals

Ghanaian funerals can be weeks-long events filled with color, dancing, and public mourning. Death is honored as a communal transition, not a private sorrow.

🇯🇵 Japan – Ancestor Veneration

The Obon Festival and daily home altars keep connections to ancestors alive. Grief doesn’t end—it evolves into ritual.

🇮🇳 India – 13 Days of Mourning

In Hindu tradition, the family enters a period of intense mourning and purification, allowing space to fully process the transition of the soul.

🇺🇸 U.S. – The “Move On” Culture

Western grieving often comes with the expectation of productivity, emotional restraint, and quiet sadness—pressuring mourners to appear “strong” by minimizing their pain.

💬 Which grief tradition speaks to you most deeply? How does your culture influence how you express sorrow or healing?

🤲 What It Really Means to Hold Space

To hold space is not to fix. It’s not to soothe.
It’s to witness someone’s truth—without changing it.

It sounds like:

• “I hear you.”
• “You’re allowed to feel that.”
• “You don’t have to be okay for me to stay.”

When someone is grieving or dying, your job is not to narrate their experience.
It’s to let them have it.

🧠 Gentle Tools: If You’re Supporting Someone in Grief or Dying

🌱 Be aware of your own fear. Check in with whether you’re reacting—or really present.

👂 Listen, don’t label. Let them speak freely—even if it’s uncomfortable.

🗓 Ditch the timeline. There’s no “normal” pace for mourning.

🤐 Let quiet moments exist. Sometimes silence is the deepest form of connection.

💬 Ask “What do you need right now?” It may change hour to hour. That’s okay.

💬 If You’re the One Who’s Grieving (Or Ready)

Here’s what I want you to know:

• You don’t have to grieve the way they expect you to.
• You don’t have to explain why you’re tired of fighting.
• You don’t have to prove that your pain is real.

You are allowed to be sad and grateful. Angry and still. Hopeful and ready.
You are allowed to feel all of it—or none of it—without shame.

You are not doing it wrong.
You are doing it your way.
And that’s enough.

💬 Your Turn

What has grief looked like in your life?
Have you ever felt judged for how you mourn—or how someone else did?

✨ I’d love to hear your reflections. Leave a comment, send a message, or share this with someone who might need it.

Because every story deserves to be witnessed.

🧡 Conclusion: Let Them Be

When someone dies, or when someone grieves, they are not asking us to understand them.
They are asking us to respect them.

They are not broken for feeling ready.
They are not fragile for feeling too much—or too little.
They are just human.
Just like us.

The work isn’t to fix it.
The work is to stay. To witness. To let them be.

That, too, is love.