Realities of Communal Grief

Author's Note: This is a reflection of my grief in my community as a teen/young adult. This is not meant to be taken as advice.

In the past decade, my high school community has experienced a lot of grief. We lost 2 grads and 1 current student before I graduated in 2014. A few years later, we lost another current student. Recently, we lost another grad.

All of these experiences were sudden. Grief becomes a habit. I was not close to the 3 who passed away while I was in school. However, I felt a responsibility to grieve, even if it was only on the surface.

Some of the community would question the circumstances behind these events. We would mention "living life to the fullest" to encourage each other. It was scary to see young life taken so many times.

The community is culturally religious, so vigils and services were natural. These helped us connect with the families and celebrate the lives lost.

Fellow classmates would come together to remember the person, then we would go about our lives in "recovery mode" until the next tragedy. It was difficult to process the sequence of events because we had little time in between them. We all have various memories and connections with each one.

I wonder sometimes why we went through so much in such a short period of time. Communal grief can hurt for a long time, despite someone's best efforts to accept it.