Arjun Iyer

About

The lesson that has stayed with me longest is that people do not want to be cheered up. They want to be accompanied. Almost every clumsy thing ever said to someone in mourning comes from a person trying to fix a feeling that was never a malfunction. So I do not try to fix it. Bereavement work, done properly, is largely a matter of staying alongside someone while they say difficult things out loud, and knowing when a question helps and when it intrudes. That sounds simple and it is not, but it is what actually helps, and it is what I have spent my working life getting better at. I keep my caseload small on purpose, because this work asks for real attention and I would rather hold fewer people properly than more people partially. If you have been offered a lot of advice and very little company, company is what I have to offer.