GRIEF Bridge Support

Grief Education and Validation

Moving from Perception to Perspective

If we want to truly understand a bereaved parent, and if we desire to offer a safe and meaningful place to walk alongside them, we must learn to move from perception to perspective.

While these two words are often used interchangeably, they carry very different meanings, especially when we are seeking to understand someone who is grieving.

Perception is how we see and interpret the world through our own experiences, beliefs, and understanding. It is personal and limited. It is shaped by our life story. Without realizing it, we often try to help others from within our own perception, offering what makes sense to us rather than what is truly needed.

Perception answers the question:
“What do I think is happening?”

Example:
You may perceive that a bereaved parent is “doing better” because they are smiling or attending church again.

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Perspective is the intentional act of stepping outside of ourselves and gently stepping into their shoes to understand how someone else is experiencing the world.

It invites us to enter into their sorrow, to pause, lean in, and ask:

* What is it like to be them right now?
* What might this feel like for them?
* What are they carrying that I cannot see?
* What does their day feel like from the moment they wake up to the moment they try to fall asleep?

Perspective requires an open heart, empathy, curiosity, and humility. It stretches us beyond our own experience.

Example:
You begin to understand that the bereaved parent’s smile may be a form of protection, and that attending church may still feel incredibly difficult.

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The Key Difference

Perception is about your view.
Perspective is about their lived reality.

Perception says, “This is how I see it.”
Perspective says, “Help me understand how you are living it.”

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Why This Matters in Grief

When we choose perspective over perception, we begin to respond differently.

We become slower to speak and quicker to listen.
We replace assumptions with understanding.
We offer presence instead of pressure.

This shift is powerful.

It can change how we lead.
It can change how we serve.
It can change how we love.

And for the bereaved parent, it can mean the difference between feeling alone and feeling seen.

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Walking in Their Shoes

To understand a bereaved parent, we must gently step into their world, their shoes, not to claim we know their pain, but to honor it.

Grief does not end when the funeral is over.
After the funeral is when it truly begins.
That’s when the silence sets in.

Each morning, bereaved parents wake up to a reality they never chose, a life overshadowed by absence.

There is a now a hole in their heart shaped exactly like their child, and nothing can replace it or fill it.

The smile you see is often a form of protection.
It is not a reflection of how they are truly doing.

If you ask a bereaved parent, “How are you?” they may say, “I’m fine,” not because it is true, but because it feels easier than trying to explain the depth of their pain.

It is a way of guarding their heart from well-meaning but painful words, from clichés that minimize their grief, and from expectations that tell them it is time to return to who they once were.

Beneath the surface, many bereaved parents are carrying more than words can express.

They cry in private, where no one can see.
They struggle to function, to sleep, or to focus.
They may sit in silence, staring into space, overwhelmed by the weight of their reality.

And yet, they continue.

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An Invitation

I personally invite you into a sacred practice:

Step out of your own perception.
Step gently into the perspective of a bereaved parent.

Enter into their sorrow, just as Jesus entered into the sorrow of Mary and Martha.

“Jesus wept.” (John 11:35)

This simple verse reveals His deep empathy, His humanity, and His love. Even knowing what He would do next, He chose first to be present, to feel, and to grieve alongside them.

This is our model.

We enter into someone’s sorrow
not to fix,
not to explain,
but to understand and to walk beside.

This shift can transform how we lead.
It can transform how we serve.
It can transform how we love.

And for the bereaved parent, it can mean the difference between feeling alone
and feeling truly seen.

Because when we begin to see through their eyes,
we begin to love the way Christ calls us to love.

Dr. Cali Anderson
Bereaved Mother
Bereaved Parents Advocate
Grief Educator
Compassionate Friend

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MOTHERS DAY AND BEREAVED MOTHERS DAY

Mother’s Day carries a deeper story than many realize.

In 1908, Anna Jarvis established the first official Mother’s Day to honor her own bereaved mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis. Ann had given birth to over 12 children, yet only four lived to adulthood.

From its very beginning, Mother’s Day was rooted not only in love, but in loss… in honoring a mother who had carried both.

Over time, that sacred origin has quietly faded. What was once a day that held space for grief and remembrance has largely become a celebration centered on those whose children are still physically present. In that shift, many bereaved mothers find themselves standing on the outside—unseen, unacknowledged, and carrying a love that still longs to be recognized.

Out of that very gap, something meaningful was created. After the stillbirth of her son in 2007, Carly Marie Dudley recognized the need for a day that would gently hold space for grieving mothers. In 2010, she established International Bereaved Mother’s Day, observed on the first Sunday in May. A day set apart to honor, validate, and remember.

This day does more than mark a date—it speaks a truth that grieving mothers live every day:
Motherhood does not end with loss.

Some mothers hold their children in their arms…
and some hold their children in their hearts.
Both are mothers. Both deserve to be seen.

International Bereaved Mother’s Day raises awareness of the lifelong impact of child loss and offers something many grieving mothers rarely receive—acknowledgment without expectation, presence without pressure, and compassion without conditions.

As Paul Harvey would say, “Now you know the rest of the story.

Dr. Cali
Bereaved Mother
Bereaved Parents Advocate
Grief Educator
Compassionate Friend

THE SILENCE AFTER “I MISS MY CHILD”

One of the ways our culture reveals its discomfort with grief is in the way conversations suddenly stop when a bereaved parent mentions their child.

Think about how naturally people respond in other situations.

When a parent says their child is away at college and they miss them, people understand—even if they have never had a child leave for college themselves.

People immediately lean in with interest.
They ask questions.
What is your son studying?
What activities is she involved in?
Is he enjoying campus life?

The same thing happens when a child lives in another city. Even if the person listening does not have children, or has never experienced that situation, when a parent says, “I miss my daughter,” people understand instantly.

They respond easily and begin asking about the child’s life—work, interests, family or daily experiences.

But when a bereaved parent says, “I miss my child,” something very different often happens.

Silence.

The silence can be deafening.

Those few seconds of silence can feel like an eternity.

There is often a deep discomfort in the moment,
and typically this is when people withdraw from the conversation or the topic quickly shifts away.

People simply do not know how to enter into a conversation about a child who has died. They find themselves at a loss for words because the loss is so horrific that they cannot imagine it.

Yet for bereaved parents, that silence can feel as though their child has died all over again.

In that moment, it can feel as if the child’s life does not matter because people are afraid to acknowledge or speak about.

One simple way we can begin to change this is through the language we use. Instead of withdrawing from the conversation, we can gently enter into it with compassion.

A person might begin by acknowledging the pain and then invite the parent to share:

“That must be incredibly hard. What is his/her name? Would you share something you love about your child.”

“I can’t imagine the depth of that loss. What is his/her name? Can you share a memory with me that makes you smile?”

“That is so unfair. What is his/her name? I would love to hear one of your favorite things about your child?”

In this way, we begin to create a language of grief that helps set the bereaved parent at ease. Rather than closing the conversation, we open a door for the parent to speak their child’s name and share a moment of their child’s life.

Questions like these do something very important. They keep the child present in the conversation. They allow the parent to remember, to honor, and to speak about the life that continues to live in their heart.

This is part of what I call grief literacy—learning how to communicate with compassion and understanding with a bereaved parent.

Changing the culture of grief begins with simple acts of presence, listening, and the courage to keep the child’s story part of the conversation.

Let’s begin this culture shift today!

Dr. Cali
Bereaved Mother
Bereaved Parents Advocate

When God Seems Silent

There are seasons in grief when heaven feels quiet.

You pray… and it feels like your words rise only as far as the ceiling.
You open your Bible… and the pages feel quiet.
You ask for direction… and hear nothing.

If you have ever felt that way, you are not alone.

Grief is loud.
Pain is loud.
Questions are loud.

Sometimes it is not that God is absent.
Sometimes it is that sorrow is so loud it fills every space inside us.

Prayer is how we speak to God.
Scripture is one of the ways He speaks to us.

But hearing often requires something grief makes difficult:

Stillness.

Not perfect stillness.
Not dry eyes.
Just a gentle, willing posture of the heart.

“Be still, and know that I am God.” — Psalm 46:10

Stillness is a posture of trust.
It is not striving.
It is not forcing.
It is simply making space.

You can sit before Him and whisper,
“Lord, I don’t understand. I’m hurting. I’m confused. But I am here. Please help me.”

You do not have to silence your anger.
You do not have to clean up your questions.
The Psalms are filled with lament, and God chose to preserve those words. That tells us something beautiful: He is not intimidated by our grief.

In Gospel of Luke 11, Jesus teaches about prayer. He tells a story of a person who keeps knocking — even when the door does not open right away. He describes a kind of bold persistence, specifically, “shameless persistence.”

“For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” — Luke 11:10

This does not mean we always receive the outcome we longed for.

It means we are invited to keep coming.

Jesus was showing us that we have access to the Father — steady, ongoing access — even when the answer unfolds differently than we hoped.

Sometimes the answer is not a changed circumstance, but a changed capacity within us.

Sometimes it is not removal, but reinforcement.
Sometimes it is not escape, but endurance wrapped in grace.

Jesus Himself, in the Garden of Gethsemane, asked for the cup to pass from Him — yet surrendered to the Father’s will. And Paul pleaded three times for his “thorn in the flesh” to be removed. The thorn remained, but the Lord answered him with this:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”

The circumstance did not shift.
But sustaining grace was given.

Many of us asked for healing.
We asked for protection.
We asked for rescue.

And we are still grieving.

That does not mean prayer failed.
It means prayer is deeper than outcomes.

Prayer keeps us connected.
Prayer anchors us in relationship.
Prayer allows us to receive strength we did not know we would need.

In John 5:14–15, we read:

“This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us — whatever we ask — we know that we have what we asked of Him.”

This is a promise of being heard.

When the answer looks different than we expected, it does not mean He was silent. Sometimes He is answering in ways that steady us rather than shield us.

When God seems quiet, it may be invitation.

An invitation to remain.
To ask again.
To knock again — even with trembling hands.

In the book of Ruth, Naomi could not see what God was doing. Yet behind the ordinary details of daily life, providence was unfolding. Redemption was quietly taking shape.

This has been my own experience of learning to pray with shameless persistence — not because I understood everything, but because I refused to walk away.

Stay.
Ask again.
Sit again.
Open the Word again.

Often, before we receive clear direction,
we begin to sense His nearness.

And sometimes His presence — not the answer we longed for — is what gently carries us through.

There is power in praying with shameless persistence.

— Dr. Cali
Bereaved Mother
Bereaved Parents Advocate
Founder, Grief Bridge