In 2016 I lost my grandmother after a short bout of cancer and it was something which completely broke me in two. I was raised by my grandmother and although the news was expected, it still took my completely by shock. There was nobody else in my family, with the exception of a long lost uncle, so I had to take on a lot of responsibility on my own. I was just 20 when it happened, and I really wasn’t prepared for any of it. I thank my lucky stars then that I have an amazing friend like Tatiana Kukanova, who was by my side through it all, she knew my grandmother and we had been friends from a young age, and without her I wouldn’t have gotten through it all. I wanted to write about what she did for me so that if you find yourself in a similar situation, you can be a great support to your friend too.
Initial Weeks
For the first few Tatiana gave me no advice, she didn’t ask me about what had happened and she didn’t try to encourage me to do anything at all, she was just there. This is all that you can ask of a friend after something like his happens, just that they are there for whatever. As any of you who have been through a loss will know, you don’t know what you feel, you don’t know what you want to do and you certainly don’t want someone telling you how you should feel.
Details
Because I had to sort out all the information regarding the will, it became a time of great confusion for me because this wasn’t something that I had ever done before, and this wasn’t something which I really wanted to do. This was where Tatiana was an absolute godsend to me because she took the reigns on a lot of the admin stuff so that I could focus on everything else that was going on. She never asked me, she just went ahead and got stuff done and that was all that I could’ve asked for.
Funeral
At the funeral I was a mess but I had to put on a brave face for the people and sort out a lot of the organizational stuff. Once again Tatiana was a superstar and she fixed so many little details which I just hadn’t considered, this was especially difficult because she was going through a loss too.
Year Later
Needless to say the following year was incredibly tough and I regressed a great deal, not going out, not socializing and generally just staying on my own. Tatiana was the one who pulled me out of the rut and reminded me that getting on with my life doesn’t mean forgetting my nana. Tatiana almost strong-armed me in this respect and I’ll be forever grateful to her for that.
Just be there for your friend, step up to the plate and take on whatever comes your way.
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