Having been in the depths of grief during the process of my life, the inability of people I love to understand and support astounded me. Faced with the inevitable that touches all of our lives, human beings turn away from support because of their inability to grasp the reality of the situation and it really is no-one's fault. It's simply a lack of understanding, mostly caused by never having been in that situation themselves and being faced with a dilemma that is new and very intimidating.

There are many ways that you can support a friend through grief, though the obvious ones often slip through and fall by the wayside because we feel they are inappropriate. Friendship is something that brings out the best and the worst in people, and learning how to cope with something as tragic as the loss of someone we love requires continuation of friendship rather than avoidance. Even though the bottom has dropped out of your friends life, what they need in order to see a path forward are the following friendship traits:

*Normality
*Constance
*Caring
*Being able to cry
*Being able to talk when they need to

NORMALITY

Faced with a situation that takes them out of the normal behavior cycle of life, the friend who loses someone is lost for a while. The whole basis of normality upon which they based their own wellbeing and life upon has suddenly gone, and they have no foundation upon which to rebuild their lives. Many people treat death like a plague. Friends avoid the grieving person because they don't know what to say, and in snubbing the person for whatever their own inadequacies, what they do is reinforce the fact that their friend's life isn't normal and prolong the grieving period.

The way to help a friend through grief is to bring them back into the world of normal everyday activity that teaches them that there is good in the world and that they are indeed part of it. Treading too lightly and wrapping their lives in cotton wool makes them feel more fragile, not less, and being there for them, calling at their house, talking about normal things and including them in responsibilities like picking up kids from school, and showing them from your actions that they are normal is the best way forward.

Normality gives the grieving person balance. It helps them overcome.

CONSTANCE

People in a situation where life has thrown obstacles in the way need to know that there is some kind of constance in life. They need to grieve of course, but they also

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