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Description

How are you supposed to go on after suffering an unimaginable tragedy? Shortly after comedian Michael Cruz Kayne welcomed his identical twin boys into the world, his son Fisher suddenly passed away at only 34 days old. Michael and his wife were left trying to grieve their son while raising a newborn at the same time. This week, we talk about what helps in the face of loss and how to tell people that you’re not ready to stop talking about your grief. Michael and Claire answer your questions on child loss, from how to cope with anxiety, to how to let go of what you dreamt for your child.

Resources from the show

• Listen to Michael’s podcast “A Good Cry”
• Read Claire’s book, “Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief”
• Read “The 6th Stage of Grief: Making Meaning” by David Kessler
• Read “It’s OK That You’re Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn’t Understand” by Megan Devine
• Read “Grief Is Love: Living with Loss” by Marisa Renee Lee
• Read “Lincoln in the Bardo” by George Saunders

Do you have a question about grief or other ways you can take care of your mental health? Send Claire a question to be featured on an upcoming episode www.bit.ly/newdayask

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Transcript

SPEAKERS

Claire, Michael Cruz Kayne

Claire  00:09

Hi, I’m Claire Bidwell Smith. Welcome to NEW DAY. So before we jump into the episode today, I want to tell you about No One is Coming To Save Us the hit show from Lemonada Media. It’s back as a weekly series covering America’s ongoing childcare crisis and the people of all ages who are crushed by it, because access to early education and care determines a kid’s future. Every Thursday, veteran reporter Gloria Riviera examines what’s broken in the system and how we can work together to fix it. Gloria is a mom herself and brings compassion, wit and real solutions to each episode. The series features interviews with experts, politicians, influential thinkers, and real testimonials from parents. No one is coming to save us has new episodes out every Thursday wherever you get your podcasts. Lastly, just a reminder that I’m offering a new grief certification course for mental health professionals, nurses, teachers, coaches and counselors. It starts April 18. And I would love for you to join me, visit my website, ClaireBidwellSmith.com For more information, and use promo code, New Day for 15% off registration. Okay, that’s it for updates. Let’s dive in. I want to begin by acknowledging that we talk about grief a lot on this show. But that’s not just because I’m a grief expert. Grief affects all of us throughout our lifetimes in both big and small ways. And I believe it’s vital for us to learn how to make space for it, know how to talk about it, and understand how to support others when they’re going through it. That way, when we go through big grief, we have a better idea of how to not just cope with it but heal and grow and continue to thrive. Our guest today didn’t know how to talk about his grief at first. In fact, it took him almost a decade before he finally began to speak about it. But in 2019, Michael Cruz Kayne tweeted about the 10-year anniversary of his infant son Fisher’s death. The tweet went viral, and Michael has been talking about grief, loss and death ever since. Michael is a father, comedian and writer for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. He is also the host of his own podcast, A Good Cry, where he chats with fellow comedians and friends about grief and loss. In today’s conversation, you’re going to hear us talk about what it’s like to lose a child, what it’s like to grieve with your spouse, what it’s like to be a parent to living children when you’re still grieving when you’ve lost. And also about some of the perceptions and expectations around male grief. You’re also going to hear a lot of laughter, well, because Michaels really funny and open and warm. I hope you find listening to this conversation as healing and cathartic as I did.

Claire  02:58

Hi, Michael, it’s nice to meet you. Likewise, I start every episode of this podcast asking my guest how you’re doing, but how are you really doing?

Michael Cruz Kayne

Oh, how are you really doing? Honestly, I’m really doing pretty well. Good day at work. Haven’t seen my kids all day really. So that’s like a source of energy for me. You know what I mean? Most of the time. I mean, when they’re being annoying. It’s not a source of energy. But most of the time seeing my kids gives me a little bit of a boost. So I’m excited to hang out with them after this.

Claire

I immediately feel guilty now. So thank you for being here with me, tell your kids I said thank you.

Michael Cruz Kayne  03:34

I sure will, they’ll be like, oh, the podcast lady. And I’ll be like, yes.

Claire 

So I don’t know how much you know about me, but I’m a grief therapist. So I want to make this episode really heavy and depressing. And I think I’d love you to cry a lot.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Great. Okay, good. So just a normal day for me.

Claire 

Just want to set the tone here. Well, okay, in 2019, you tweeted that it had been 10 years since your son passed away. You wrote, this isn’t really what Twitter is for. But 10 years ago today, my son died. And I basically never talked about it with anyone other than my wife. It’s taken me 10 years to realize that I want to talk about it all the time. This is about grief. Tell me about this.

Michael Cruz Kayne  04:16

Well, my son died in 2009, shortly after he was born. 34 days old. We had identical twin boys and the pregnancy was very difficult. I mean, obviously for me, but even more obviously for my wife. And yeah, he died to oversimplify he died of sepsis at 34 days old. And everyone was lovely. Whoever talked about it, you know, even if they said the wrong thing, they always had the best intentions.

Claire

That’s a gracious way.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Thank you so much. Yes, I’m nothing if not benevolent and but it was a thing I didn’t really talk about because it felt too sad. Like it would really it’s kind of thing where if you bring it up, it bums people out to like an exponential level, you know, I mean, it’s not like, it’s not like my parents died, which is also sad, but sort of feels like a natural death to people that can process that. It’s part of their understanding of the world. When a kid dies, it’s the kind of thing where it’s like, okay, let’s all you know, like, we were eating dinner, and he just mentioned that his son died, let’s all put down our silverware and just patiently wait until the sadness has washed over us. So it was just like I didn’t talk about. And then, for whatever reason, about 10 years after he died, I started wanting to talk about it all the time, I was bringing it up him up in job interviews, I was like, in places where it’s like, maybe you don’t have to talk about it all the time, I was starting to feel like a pole towards discussing it, which is surely a sign of like my, you know, emotional center needing to process it in some way that I had yet to process it.

Claire  06:00

What was the response? When you put that out on Twitter?

Michael Cruz Kayne

The response on Twitter was astonishing. Because I didn’t have very many Twitter followers, I still don’t. And my wife, and I got 1000s of responses, like people started responding, or I tweeted it, and then like, you know, right away, maybe a couple people responded to it. And that was at, you know, 10 o’clock at night or something, we went to bed, I woke up in the morning, and there were 1000s of responses, and I started responding to them, and then realized there was no way, I wasn’t gonna be able to get to every person. And the things people were saying were either incredibly nice things, you know, or incredibly sad things like people sharing some death that they had felt like they hadn’t talked about enough or something that they had kept bottled up. And the stories were, you know, they range from sort of, you know, I don’t want to diminish anybody’s suffering, but like standard death, things to like, really horrific stories. And it made me feel sad, but also like, in a way that is, at least partially perverse made me feel amazing. Like the idea that other, I think before that I had sort of had this belief of uniqueness in a way that like, even though intellectually, I was aware that it had happened to other people. It struck me as something that only ever happened to us, it felt like that, like in the world, no one was talking about that. So to have all these people be like, no, something like as horrible as that, you know, and again, I can’t quantify the things but something as horrible as that has also happened to me and me, and me, and me and me, made me feel like part of something that I hadn’t felt like part of before.

Claire

Yeah, yeah, that’s really powerful. I think grief is interesting like that you can feel so alone in it, you know, you can feel like are the only person who’s ever gotten through it. And on some level you are, you know, you are the only person who’s ever lost your son and that particular combination of you and him. And yet at the same time, yes, there’s this universality to it that I think can be really comforting. Do you feel like it changed your grief process that it give you permission to grieve in a new way?

Michael Cruz Kayne  08:21

It gave me permission to grieve in a new way. Yes, for sure. It also gave me a sense, like how much better I felt having been exposed to this like now community of grievers, gave me a sense that I bet other people would like this feeling that I’m having, and that as like someone who is, you know, performance oriented and extroverted, that maybe I could give other people that feeling too. So now, you know, I have a show about it, and a podcast and like, it gave me a sense of purpose there to be like, you know, something I can do that will make me feel good, that will maybe fingers crossed, make other people feel good. And also that will give me a sense that I am able to keep my son alive in some way. Like having those things change the way that I mean, I guess it’s not an understatement to say change the way I live my life.

Claire 

Yeah, that’s amazing. Tell me about the podcast. It’s called a good cry.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yeah. So a good cry is a podcast where I talk to people who have experienced some kind of tragedy or feel some sort of grief. And I guess the goal of it is to just be like, no bullshit about, can I say bullshit on here?

Claire

Please do.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yes. We just try and be no bullshit about it. And, you know, a lot of those discussions are about death. And some of them even more recently have been on subjects that I’m not familiar with really and also, I’m stepping a little outside of, you know, my lane but trying to address questions that people have sent in about, you know, divorce or about, you know, traumatic injuries or whatever. And just to, like, make people aware of the fact that whatever the worst thing you felt is when you went through this, other people have felt something like that. Like, I haven’t really said this out loud before, but I think the thesis of it kind of is like, take it easy on yourself. You know, it’s okay, for you to feel angry or sad, or frustrated, or jealous or guilty or even happy. Like when something horrible has happened. And you spend one day not crying to be like, that’s okay. I actually had, you know, someone that I love died. And I also had a good day. I know, that seems insane, but it’s possible. And that it’s like, it’s okay for that to happen.

Claire  10:59

Yeah, I think, you know, I think we’re going through like a real revolution with grief right now, in terms of, I think the pandemic kind of put us ahead a bit just in terms of recognizing all the different ways we can grieve all the different things we can grieve for, you know, like your saying divorce or our health or illness or job loss, there’s a lot of different ways that we can grieve and things we can grieve, but also just recognizing that it looks different for everybody. And there’s many different, you know, permutations of it. And giving people permission to feel all of those is you know, really important work.

Michael Cruz Kayne

But yeah, I think maybe and us step in that, that is almost comically overlooked, is just acknowledging that it exists, like not even processing it just being like this happens. And it should be universalizing, because it is going to happen to everyone, but instead, it’s so isolating.

Claire

May I ask, was your wife’s grief process different than yours during those 10 years? And you have other children? How about for them?

Michael Cruz Kayne  12:01

I mean, my wife’s grief was processed differently, I’m sure. I mean, we were both simultaneously sad a lot of the time. And there would also be, you know, days when the sadness pendulum swung towards one of us more than the other. At like the ground zero of it, like when he died. I think I viewed that time as like, I gotta take care of, you know, my first priority is taking care of her like she is, I really thought of it like she’s a mom right now. And I’m a husband. And it’s like, that’s the order of operations here, And that wasn’t because anyone told me that that’s how it was it just like, I don’t know, if my like dumb man brain was like, okay, well, can you fix this problem or whatever. But also, then, because of the care we received in the hospital, like, we love the nurses that were caring for us. And for our boys, they’re truly Angel people. So my wife developed an interest in becoming a nurse. And so she went to nursing school and became a pediatric intensive care nurse, which is what she is to this day. And so that’s a like, I think there was a part of me that saw her, take what had happened to us, and make something out of it. That was like, oh, that’s amazing. But as a comedian, I was like, I don’t have any way, there’s no way I can do that. I can’t like, go to stand up shows and talk about my dead son in between, like, you know, one guy doing 15 minutes on porn, and the next guy doing like, you know, you know, what I hate about women, I don’t want to be like, here’s this deeply emotional stuff. So I didn’t have you know, an avenue for that. And then my kids, it’s something that we talk about, kind of whenever it comes up, so like they, you know, they know about Fisher who died. And, you know, sometimes we have hard conversations about it. Because, you know, just we’ll be watching a movie and at a part that doesn’t seem that sad. One of us is just like sobbing. And our kids will look at us and be like, this is actually a happy part of this movie. I don’t know if you know that. And so we’ll like talk about a little bit we, um, we celebrate will be called Fisher day, which is the anniversary of his death, we try and like do something. The last couple of years, it’s been donating food to a community kitchen, our community fridge rather. And they have feelings about it that we try and process in real time as best we can. Like, I mean, I think the number one thing for us is to not try to suppress whatever it is that we’re feeling, which, you know, as an adult, dealing with a child, I’m not trying to like lay all of my burdens on them. But I think, you know, a combination of honesty that maybe is also some withholding to just be like, well, I just had a thought about Fisher and just really laying me out, I’m really feeling sad about that right now.

Claire

That’s so important. I’ve had so many clients who have come to me in their 30s 40s 50s, who lost, say, a sibling in childhood, and the parents just never spoke about it again, you know, for many reasons they couldn’t emotionally or was cultural. But that loss was always there with them. And so, you know, 30 years later, as an adult, they’re trying to process it. They’re trying to make space for it. So teaching your kids how to do that, from the get go is so important.

Michael Cruz Kayne 

Thank you for saying that. Because I never, I’m so unsure of every single thing that I do that I’m like, you know, what is good. It’s good to like, process it and talk about your feelings. There’s a nagging voice in the back of my head being like, maybe not, maybe it’s better to just like, shove it down, and never think about it. And then once in a while, get crazy drunk and blackout, and then start the process over again. But I’m gonna assume that you’re right. It makes me feel better to believe that you are correct.

Claire  

Yeah, I mean, I think it spills out in so many ways, crazy drunk, and blackouts, but also anxiety, depression, anger, you know, I think when we don’t allow ourselves, to have those feelings to sit with them, they just spill out somewhere else. And so really just working with what’s there to begin with is, you know, the right way to do it. I think you guys sound like you’re doing great.

Michael Cruz Kayne  16:19

Okay. Thank you.

Claire

I’d love to ask you about this is something I think a lot about. And I think a lot about male grief. You know, I don’t think there’s a lot of role models for men to grieve. I think we’ve seen it here and there, but not enough of it. I think our current president had some big displays of grief and talking about it and being open with his emotions and crying. I think there’s been some actors recently who’ve been talking about it more, but it’s not something we see enough of. So I was so excited to talk to a man whose open about grief and grieving, and what have you found in that realm?

Michael Cruz Kayne

I mean, I guess what I would say is, I don’t think that as a society, we encourage men to feel a wide range of emotions. And that’s not to say that I’m, I’m speaking not at all about what we encourage women to do, which is a separate and super interesting and you know, subject, but just speaking as a man, I don’t think that being sad, or feeling vulnerable, or being open about those feelings is something that we are necessarily encouraged to do. Even though every single person in my life has been wonderful, truly about what I’ve gone through. And you know, what my wife and I have gone through, I think that you’re socialized pretty quickly to be like, these feelings you keep in your pocket. And then as you said, they manifest themselves as some other thing, some other resentment or sadness or whatever other feeling. But yeah, like, you know, my dad is amazing. Like, I love him, I idolize him. And he’s, like, that’s a model of who I want to be as a father. I can’t remember ever seeing him crying my entire life. And that’s like, you know, that’s not a discredit to him. It’s just not what I grew up with. My mother also, like I don’t, I can’t think of besides watching the movie Beaches, when I did see her cry, I can’t remember her crying. So I just like, I didn’t have a model for what it was like, for a man to experience and or to express grief.

Claire  18:44

Yeah, yeah, we really don’t see a lot of it. And so I think it is so important. I see. So many men come to my office, and they don’t even know where to start, you know, and they haven’t had experience in their lives. And this is all general speak. But you know, they haven’t had a lot of experience just expressing emotions, or letting themselves feel fear and sadness, you know, these two things that men are always taught to turn to anger instead. And so I feel like there’s this added layer of work that I have to do with men that’s different from women.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yeah. And I think the discourse around masculinity, like on like, the liberal side of things is often around this toxicity. And how the way in which you’re socialized can sort of produce these people who are emotionally dysfunctional, and angry, and who assert themselves through violence and aggression. And I do think that what doesn’t get discussed very much is what you’re talking about, which is a lot of that and I’m totally speculating, but a lot of that is a result of taking every feeling you’re not supposed to have and pushing it into like this room in your soul and like once that room is full, those things just come shooting out in every direction.

Claire  20:24

I’ve worked with a lot of couples who’ve lost a child and lost anywhere from infants all the way up into adult children. And there’s, you know, this this really interesting added aspect of your grieving together so intensely, it’s different from other losses, I think, because you’re also partners in a way, you know, we’re even siblings grieving a parent, grieving the same person together, but they’re not necessarily reliant on each other in the way that parents are especially. What is that like to navigate?

Michael Cruz Kayne

Well, I would say that I think our experience was unusual, even, like within the sphere of people who have lost children, because Fisher’s brother Truman, so we sort of had a job to do, right, like, you know, Fisher died. And of course, we’re like, trying our best to process that in whatever way. But also, it’s like, there’s work to do right now. And Truman isn’t like, Okay, well, I’m gonna give you, let me give you guys a couple months before I need to be breastfed, and you know, have my diapers changed or whatever. So for us, I think that was something of not even something that was a tremendous blessing. I think if we had not had Truman, and we had left the hospital with no child, it would have been a whole different universe. But because it was immediately like the two of us at work on the same project effectively. I think we were, you know, like, utterly and completely forged together by the experience of it like there are, you know, I don’t want to cheap in war, but there are like feelings that we had, like in the trench of that, that no one else could ever understand, no matter how many times I told them, because you can only tell people words, and there aren’t enough words to get through that feeling.

Claire  22:22

Yeah, there’s a profound intimacy that occurs, they are within that, at that experience. But I also see some times you know, it can be so difficult to each be grieving, and taking care of each other, having space for each other’s grief, having space for your own grief. It is this very interesting kind of balance and partnership, when you’re when you’re going through that kind of grieve together. How has it changed you as a parent?

Michael Cruz Kayne 

I would like to think that it has made me a better parent, though, like, I sweat the small stuff less than I would. But I’m like, still a bad parent at least 20% of the time. I mean, like the number of times that I like that my wife will come home from work, and I’ll be like, oh, I did something so shitty today. Or like, you know, so I don’t know, if it made me better. It didn’t make me as better as high as I would like to be.

Claire 

Has it made you anxious?

Michael Cruz Kayne

There are, again, it’s hard for me to know how much that specifically affected my anxiety. But there are definitely things where, when I was a kid, my brother had cancer. He’s survived and is fine now. But he had an osteogenic sarcoma bone cancer in his knee. And, you know, periodically Truman will be like, Yeah, my legs kind of hurt me, which is just like a normal, like people’s legs are, that’s normal, he’ll have just played soccer for like two and a half hours straight, and played football before that. And you know, like, somebody shoved him into a gate or something. He’s like, my knees are hurting me. And there was like, one day, where I was like, oh, he definitely has cancer, like 100%. That’s happening. And my wife was like, very sympathetic to the feeling, but also trying to be like, it is very unlikely that that disease, like specifically his version of it, which is not hereditary, what have happened to him, and it just seems it’s very unlikely, but there are definitely times where my biggest fear of it is that he is also not meant to stay alive, that it’s like it wasn’t like they’re supposed to die. You know what I mean? And I don’t feel that all the time. But when the anxiety goes up to like, 12 that’s the you know, my wife and kids went to took a plane trip to Florida the other day and just like for 30 minutes, one day, I was like that planes gonna crash, like, for sure it is. And I don’t know how much if that’s only something that I think because this horrible thing happened to me or if that’s just like, parents normally think their kids are gonna die, which I think they might I think they go, you know, it’s normal people to be like my kids gonna get kidnapped even though your kid was never kidnapped before.

Claire 

I think it’s a combination, I think parents had been terrifying in general. My most recent book is called anxiety, the missing stage of grief. And I was really looking at the correlation between anxiety and grief, because I see a lot of this, you know, we start to put that catastrophic lens on everything. Once you’ve been through something catastrophic, it’s hard not to brace for the next thing or worry about the next thing or see the world through that kind of lens. So it would make sense that you would do that from time to time.

Michael Cruz Kayne 

Yes. Well, I do.

Claire

Sorry, you’re not alone. Not at all. Um, do you ever feel different around other parents who haven’t gone through something like this?

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yes, for sure. I do. I would say it’s less that I feel different. I’m around people who haven’t gone through this, then it is that I feel the same when I talk to someone who has Yeah, I don’t I mean, like, I don’t I mean, I don’t begrudge anyone their living kids, you know? Yeah, no, there’s and I don’t feel isolated from them. And I mean, I guess on the very rare occasions, I don’t want to say that I never do, I’m sure there are times that I do. But when I have conversations with people who have had someone they love die, it’s like a level of conversation that I can’t have with other people. It’s as if, like, you know, I’m Dutch. And all my friends are German. So it’s like we can speak, I understand everything. You’re saying, you understand what I’m saying. But you put me in a room with a Dutch person. And now like, now we’re talking Yeah, yeah, I got it. So like grief is, this is something that I didn’t, someone said this to me on my podcast, but the grief is like a language that you speak. And it’s very, it’s relaxing to speak it with somebody else who also speaks it.

Claire  26:55

Yeah, it really is. What do you think are some of the biggest myths about grief?

Michael Cruz Kayne

I mean, I think that there is there though, the stages of grief, you know, the stages, and I think that those have been like kind of widely misinterpreted. Like, there’s sort of an assumption that there’s like a neatness to it.

Claire

Yeah. Or that there’s just these five, and if you go through them in this order, you’ll be okay. Like, you know, I just have to do these five things. And then, you know, and then I’ll be good. Which I think is why they’ve stuck around. Yeah, I think we’ve clung to them, because it seems like Oh, my God, if there were just this formula that we could go through to get through this anguish. Great. Sign me up, you know,

Michael Cruz Kayne 

yeah, I think the other thing is that, I think people think of people who have experienced grief as the sad people, and aren’t aware of the fact that you remain a fully complex human being, even in the shadow of the most horrible thing happening to you that you will still feel other feelings that you know, won’t make you, it will make you something other than what you are. It’s like it’s a new territory on the map. But the map is still there. I just made that up. I don’t know.

Claire  28:20

I think that makes sense. I personally have found that people who know grief and death intimately, often, like really embraced life on a whole new level sometimes, too, you know, they, they’re some of the most fun, wild, outgoing, you know, adventurous people I’ve met. Not always, but I see a lot of it.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yeah, sure. I mean, I aspire to be fun and outgoing. I don’t know how much I nail it. But I’m trying.

Claire 

You’re fun and outgoing.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Okay, thank you.

Claire 

One of the things that I think is a myth around grief is how long it lasts. And just given that, you know, the 10-year mark, you are really starting to talk about it for the first time. What are your thoughts about how long grief lasts?

Michael Cruz Kayne

I mean, if I had to guess, I would guess forever. I mean, I don’t know. But my guess is forever. But I think that it changes like now. And this may also seem kind of perverse, but when I think about Fischer, and like, it lays me out, and I’m just like, so sad. I also love that feeling. I love like, like, you know, 15 minutes in a day where I’m brought, like, super close to that feeling. You know, I’m not like, I don’t think of myself as spiritual or religious or whatever. But it does make me feel close to him in some way. And it feels good to me, which is not what it was like in the beginning. I mean, at the beginning, it was, you know, falling to my knees in the doctor’s office that’s like, you know, totally overwhelming and as it’s gone on, there are times when I miss the feeling of sadness So that’s why the podcast is called a Good Cried. Because I do think like, you know, just having that feeling every once in a while now makes me feel good.

Claire  30:10

Yeah, absolutely. I think you’re right that I think the loss lasts forever and our lives, you know, I think there’s these periods of maybe active mourning or more acute grief that we go through, you know, on your knees in the doctor’s office, or even just bursts of acute grief that we go through years down the road, but it changes so much over time. That I think that that’s important to note, I think a lot of people feel pressure to move through it quickly, to be like, over and past it.

Michael Cruz Kayne 

I’m sorry, I can’t help but laugh because it seems like impossible to me. So, yeah, you know, I like to be like, Okay, well, the sad thing happened to me in January, I’m trying to kind of wrap it up emotionally by mid-March at the latest, just seems ridiculous. I think about when I was in college, I went to college for musical theater, Bragg. But in one of my classes, the teacher assigned me this monologue from a play called I never sang for my father. And there’s a line in it, that I remember to this day, even though college was many, many years ago, that is death ends of life, but it does not end a relationship, which struggles on and the survivors mind towards some resolution, which it never finds. And that’s, I feel, yeah, I think it also at the time, and maybe within the context of the play is a very, is a deeply sad sentence. But the struggle for the resolution now brings me comfort, it’s like in that reaching that I feel good. Whereas the struggle at the beginning was, you know, a grief for a connection that I can never possibly have in the way that I thought I was going to have it. And now the you know; the enigmatic nature of that relationship feels good.

Claire  32:29

We have a couple of listener questions. I was wondering if I could read to you and see.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yeah, let’s do it. Claire.

Claire

Somebody wanted to know, what is the most uplifting thing someone did or said to you following the loss of Fisher?

Michael Cruz Kayne 

I would say the most uplifting thing anyone did. Is my wife becoming a nurse. I think that’s like, the thing that happened that I was like, that was a thing that happened that I was like, fuck, man, can you believe this, that this is happening? And it is? Yeah. So that my answer to that is like, it’s inspiring. It feels like brave. And it wasn’t. It’s a process like she went to school to become an actor. Like she has a wish she and I have the two most worthless academic degrees like in the entire world. So she had to, like, go back to school and take like statistics classes. And you know, she’s also trying to be a stay-at-home mom at the same time. And then she’s got to go to nursing school like it’s a heavy burden to take on. Not to mention the job itself, which is rude. So hard. Yeah. So I think that’s the thing that uplifted me most, among many wonderful, nice things people did for us.

Claire

That really makes me teary. That’s amazing. For my own question, like, on that note, do you think it’s important to try to, like make meaning of a loss or create something out of it, or, you know, in this […] that you have created this podcast and are talking about it, and your wife has gone back to school, and is a nurse.

Michael Cruz Kayne  34:08

I’m very cautious about universalizing my own experience, but for me, it has helped a lot. And I think for my wife and I were both doing very different things. But I think that talking about him, and, you know, trying to make something out of his memory has made me feel good. So if you’re out there and thinking about doing it, I would say give it a shot. And if you don’t want to do it. Then don’t.

Claire 

Another question says, How do you comfort a child who lost a sibling at a young age?

Michael Cruz Kayne 

I think so. When my son died, my daughter wasn’t born yet. And his brother was, you know, 34 days old likewise. But as they get older and start to occasionally have moments where they get really sad about it, I don’t know what the right thing to do is, but what I try to do my wife does also is just be like, it is okay to feel this way. Like how sad you feel right now is okay and feel it for however much time you need to feel this way. And you know, don’t rush it like be easy on yourself when you feel sad. I don’t know if that’s how to do it. But that’s how I’m doing it.

Claire 

Yeah. I think children in grief. It’s I think it’s a really interesting world. Because what I see is that children have this kind of extended grief process, because they’re not developmentally mature enough to grieve in the same way that we do as adults. So they kind of continue grieving as they hit more milestones, as they continue to develop and mature, they understand the loss in any way they conceptualize it. They, they grieve in a richer way, you know, as they as they go along. So I think that there’s something about that about continuing to meet them as they come to understand it.

Michael Cruz Kayne  36:09

Yeah, I mean, that’s what we’re trying to do over here, Claire.

Claire

It sounds awesome. I’ve got any favorite grief books. I remember at one point; I was thinking about writing a grief book for kids. And I ordered like all the grief books from Amazon, and they all came at once and my kids, this big box of like kids’ books came they were like, Nah, look at all these books you got, can you read them to us.

Michael Cruz Kayne 

Six months of the saddest bed time stories.

Michael Cruz Kayne

Is there any that you love or you like at all?

Michael Cruz Kayne

I guess what I was, well, two things. One, I have thought about trying to, like create some kind of a children’s book around grief, like only because the thing that I think about a lot is like, you know, your dog’s gone to live upstate or whatever. Like, that idea is funny to me a book that’s like your dog’s not upstate, he’s dead. But what I would say about grief books is I haven’t really read very many grief books. I’ve read books that contain grief deliberately as a theme, like Lincoln in the Bardo. And if you’ve read that book, it’s a great book. It’s about Abraham Lincoln’s son, well, whatever. It’s George Saunders book, check it out. It’s great. But also, anything can be a grief. Now, like I just read this book about, I read a book about called when we cease to understand the world, that’s really about scientists, and about how a scientists and mathematicians and these people who like, you know what it took for them to come up with these incredible discoveries and some of the ramifications of them. And there is a bit about quantum physics, in which a scientist discovers that human beings, which we have thought of as like particles, like a physical thing that’s like in one location, that all matter is particles, but also waves. So you can be in one place, but you can also be sort of in multiple places at once, depending on the conditions. And I’m obsessed with that as an analogy for grief. The idea that, like I had always conceived of it as sort of like along these five stages, it’s kind of neat. It’s like, okay, we start here, and now it’s here. And now it’s here. And now it’s here. But really, it’s like it’s every place, and it’s constantly in motion. And you can only see it when you look for it. And it’s wherever, see when you look for it. And wherever you look for it. There it is. I don’t think the guy who wrote that book was thinking, this is how someone will interpret this. And I certainly don’t think the astrophysicists who are coming up with these theories were like, oh, but you know what, in 100 years, some guy’s son is gonna die. And he’s gonna think, but that is, that’s what has happened to me that anything, you know, I can watch a baseball game and back with the way he pitches, that’s actually grief.

Claire  38:55

I feel so close to you right now. Alright, last question. I can’t stop comparing where I am now. And where I thought I would be before I lost my child. I spent so much time dreaming of what life would be like with them, that now I’m constantly mourning the loss of those dreams, everyday experiences feel like they have a shadow hanging over them because I expected to have a child by my side. How do I stop looking at everything as a reflection of what I lost?

Michael Cruz Kayne

So I mean, that’s something that I have just started thinking about more fully, myself, like the grief of the life you could have had. And the only remedy I know for that is time. I still have those feelings where I’ll look at a picture of my family. And like there’s an empty chair at the table, you know, not that we have like we don’t keep a chair empty for him or anything but like, you know, at a restaurant or wherever, and I’ll be like, oh, you know what Fisher would be right there. That’s where he would be and my Mom has told me that her mother, my grandmother had a miscarriage, you know, many years ago, and that even into her later years that she would say that same kind of thing like they would, she would just say under her breath to her living children, he would be there, I want to be able to say that, like, it’ll just go away. But I also want to tell you that over time, if you’re like me, you won’t want it to go away. There’ll be a time where you think of that loss differently. And the sadness will bring you a sense of closeness. I hope that for you. I mean, I hear that question. And it just like breaks my heart, because I know what it’s like to be in the middle of that. And the only thing I can say is that it will change for you at some at some point.

Claire  40:50

I love that. I think that’s those are really good thoughts. I’ll add onto it to that, you know, I experienced this for myself, and I see this in a lot of people I work with, I feel like sometimes we kind of get a little stuck. And the idea of kind of living our lives without this person or not living the life that we were going to live feels so scary. You know, we don’t want to live that life. So we stay kind of stuck, or we don’t move forward. And I think we can do both, I think we can find, I think we can find ways to hold on to the person that we lost and the life that we lost and still be here and move forward and live a life that we love. And I think sometimes it’s about looking for different ways to hold on to them different ways to honor them, different ways to honor that sadness, you know?

Michael Cruz Kayne

Yeah, I think that is, you know, we talked about like trying to find meaning I don’t know this person who’s messaging you, but that helps me. And if it’s something that you feel comfortable trying, then I would try it.

Claire 

Oh my gosh, thank you so much, Michael, this has been such a good conversation. We could keep going all night, but your kids are gonna hate me, my kids are gonna hate you. Yeah, so we should have more conversations. I’ve really appreciated this.

Michael Cruz Kayne  42:09

Thank you, Claire.

Claire 

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for being so open.

Claire

Is it weird that this conversation made me happy, I have to admit that it did. It’s just that there is no escaping hard stuff in this life. And when you come across someone who’s been through something really hard, and they found a way to heal and make meaning and even help others, it’s a really beautiful thing. But I always want to be conscious of those of you out there who are newly in the throes of grief. It’s been over a decade since Michael went through the loss of his son. And more than two decades since I went through my first big loss. In those early days, months and even years, it was hard to even imagine being in the place I’m in now. So just know that it takes time and support and don’t put pressure on yourself to move too quickly through loss if you’re new to it. This week’s practice is about making meaning out of loss. But again, for those of you newly in it, that might be something that’s a ways out. I know that in those early periods of loss most of us don’t even want to make meaning. But keep it on your radar as part of your healing process down the road. How do we make meaning out of loss? For me it was reading books and becoming a therapist. For Michael It was creating a podcast for his wife it was becoming a pediatric intensive care nurse. But making meaning out of loss looks different for everyone and it can be done in big and small ways. Here are some ideas. Use creative outlets to express your grief, paint or sketch something. Write in a journal a social media post an article started book even. The goal here is to express your feelings instead of holding them in. honor your loved one by doing something in their name. Make a donation in their name, volunteer for an organization or cause that meant something to them, have their name put on a park bench or another place that keeps their remembrance alive.

Claire  44:00

Create new family and individual rituals and traditions. Keep up traditions, meals and holidays that were meaningful to them. Carry a remembrance item wherever you go. This can serve as a reminder of comfort. Talk to your family about them regularly. I like to teach my kids how to cook and I always use the recipes my mother’s so that they can feel close to her to find community. both Michael and I attribute a lot of healing to having conversations with others who’ve lost someone. Join an in person or online grief group where you can share about your story and journey. Get the support you need. Talk to a therapist or grief counselor. If you’re struggling to find a provider or honestly are just struggling to imagine going to an office and opening up. I also recommend our sponsor Talk Space. You can talk to someone who specializes in trauma and grief without ever having to leave your home. And if cost is a concern. We have a promo code right now. Use new day and get $100 off your first month at talkspace.com. For those of you who are supporting a person who is grieving, remember, there’s no right thing to say when someone’s grieving, but you can be a listening ear. You can’t fix someone’s grief, reassure them, remind them to take it easy on themselves. Check in on them beyond the appropriate time that we typically give people to grieve. For more on all this, please check out Michael’s podcast. A Good Cry. You could look at my book anxiety the missing stage of grief. David Kessler’s book, the sixth stage of grief making meaning Megan divines online grief writing workshops and her book, it’s okay that you’re not okay. Also, Marissa Lee Rene’s new book, grief is love. She is going to be an upcoming guest to. Above all, remember, there’s no specific timeframe for how long grief lasts, get support, sit with your feelings, honor them. Create meaning from them the best way you can. You can hold on to the person you’ve lost and still be here and move forward with a life that you love. As always, thanks for listening. And if you get a chance, send me a question through my new online forum at bit.ly/newdayask, it’s totally anonymous. You can literally ask me anything and you can find the link in the show notes. Or if you just want to tell me about one of your weekly practices, call and leave me a voicemail at 8334-LEMONADA, that’s 833-453-6662, or email me at newday@lemonadamedia.com

CREDITS

NEW DAY is a Lemonada Media Original. The show is produced by Jackie Danziger, Liliana Maria Percy Ruiz and Erianna Jiles. Kat Yore is our engineer. Music is by Hannis Brown. Executive producers are Stephanie Wittels Wachs, Jessica Cordova Kramer, Lily Cornell Silver and Claire Bidwell Smith. NEW DAY is produced in partnership with the Well Being Trust, The Jed Foundation and Education Development Center. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. Follow us at @LemonadaMedia across all social platforms, or find me at clairebidwellsmith.com. Join our Facebook group to connect with me and fellow NEW DAY listeners at facebook.com/groups/newdaypod. You can also get bonus content and behind the scenes material by subscribing to Lemonada Premium. You can subscribe right now on the Apple podcast app by clicking on our podcast logo and then the subscribe button. Thanks for listening. See you next week.