Elephants Truly Are More Intelligent Than Humans

It seems like every day I have to listen to a baby loss mommy tell me that someone has told her to "get over her loss" or asked her "are you still grieving?" with the sympathy of a brick. Why do we live in a culture where people are allowed to mourn Elvis almost 25 years after his death, but we are not allowed even a full year before the world wants us to just "get on with things".

We will never "move on". We will remember forever.

There's another animal who is said to remember forever...elephants. I ran across this quote:

"When a mother elephant loses her baby, they stand in a circle around her and allow her all the time she needs to grieve and mourn. They don't hurry her along, or push her to abandon the body. They stand in a circle and gently touch her with their trunks, a silent show of unwavering support.

Elephant mothers will stand with their babies for weeks, not eating or drinking, just holding them close and letting the reality that they are gone slowly settle in. And they are allowed that time by their family members."

As I sit here and constantly hear talk about how much smarter humans are than our other animal brethren, I have to disagree.

In our society, where getting everything done quickly and with a minimum of effort has become a norm, we've forgotten how to be there for each other in the way that we should be. We send a quick card and then we promptly forget each other's pain. How many of us have had someone give us the look of disbelief when we mention our lost one, no matter how many weeks they were when we lost them. "You're still grieving?"

Yes, yes I am.