Grieving Parents: Let’s Share “Vilomah”

Grieving Parents: Let’s Share “Vilomah”

By Kerry J. Bickford, VOICES Editor

Something that comes up often for parents who have suffered the loss of a child is the lack of a word for their new, yet permanent status.  It is just one more blow to parents whose lives have been forever changed and yet have no way to identify this change. A child without parents is an orphan, so what is a parent who has lost a child?

I decided to do some research, and it didn’t take too long to find this beautifully written piece that suggests vilomah could be such a word. Karla Holloway, a professor of English and Law, said the following, after losing her 22-year-old son:

The word we are looking for, she says, “must be a quiet word, like our grief, but clear in its claim.” The word “widow,” which means “empty” in Sanskrit, is such a word, and that same language, she suggests, provides another for us to borrow: “vilomah.” This means “against a natural order,” she writes. “As in, the gray-haired should not bury those with black hair. As in, our children should not precede us in death.”

I was shocked upon the realization that Describing Grief by Lisa Belkin was printed in 2010 and this was the first time I have heard of it. It makes so much sense and it’s perfect … against a natural order. If that doesn’t describe what happens to every parent who has lost a child to overdose, or any other tragedy, then I don’t know what does. Belkin eloquently suggests the word we are looking for could very well be vilomah and provides moving testimony as to why.