When a best friend loses a family member you can't just act normal with them.

Tweet

You can over do it or under do it. If you express too much sympathy to the grief stricken best friend, it can backfire. Recently I was told of a death of a brother to one of our best friends of many years and he told me "I can't return to work right now. Everyone will be talking to me and showing sympathy and this will be just too much for me and it will bring my spirits way down." - so our best friend is unable to return to work because grief is in only the first stage and it's been only a few days since his brother passed. So, to act like nothing has happened is the other side of the extreme. If I try to engage in casual conversation I know that will only suggest that I seem not to care much about their personal loss. It is a catch 22 situation if you know what I'm getting at. I think its very difficult to be there for a good friend in their grief of a loss of a family member. And what it all comes down to, if the shoe were on the other foot, how would you like to be treated? I had a hard time dealing with the expressions of sympathy to me by a sister in law about the death of my mother years ago. I walked away into the bathroom and shut the door and tried to actually ignore them. I was so withdrawn that I was poor company for a long time and this I know, must have hurt their feelings but I was then at that time, in the first stage of grief and it took me longer than the average person to get over my mother's death. So, there is no exact best way to handle another person's sorrow and loss when THEY are on the other end of a major loss of a loved one.