Kirsty reacts to the killing with kindness

How long have we all wanted someone to tell Lynda to mind her own business? years, isn’t it? possibly decades?

And I can’t help feeling that Kirsty was entirely within her rights to point out to Roy that he’s not exactly the best-qualified person to lay down the law about how to run one’s life, too.

I suppose the baying hordes of moaners will now descend rejoicing that yet again a woman has been written as being frail and unable to cope, and they will be gleefully saying "I told you she ought to have stayed in bed for a year to get over it " and similar stuff. My reply to that would tend to be “How could she afford to? She has rent to pay and food to buy, she can’t just sit around feeling sorry for herself while everyone else tells her not to go in to work until she feels like it.” Tom can afford the luxury of his vicarious mourning; Kirsty can’t.

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I thought it was in character to snap at Lynda, yes, how to resist telling her to mind her own business? But the remark to Roy was unbelievably cruel and I don’t think that was in character for Kirsty. Snap at him, yes, but not go that far.

Agree with your points about people shaking their heads sadly and saying, ‘Knew it, she wasn’t ready to go back to work’. Kirsty as I’ve heard her would have managed to keep it together professionally and snapped at her friends and people she could trust. That’s what a lot of us do, save our worst for our loved ones because we know or hope they will understand and forgive.

I so wish she had turned her ire on Tom and Helen who have both been unbelievably selfish and unhelpful to her.

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It was deeply satisfying to hear both Lynda and Roy getting it in the neck. Lynda because she deserved it - nosy auld besom - and Roy because, well, it was true. And he was intruding when it was quite obvious that Kirsty was in the mood to pull the feathers out of an archangel. He is dim as well as dull.

But I hope that Miranda’s complaint is taken seriously and Kirsty taken to task. ‘Dealing with entitled ****holes’ is at least 50% of the job description. But then I want Kirsty to have buggered off without leaving a forwarding address while Little Tommy Snivel is in Brazil, you see.

Miranda’s Right. There’s a joke there somewhere…

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The signposting that despite her bravado she’s going to have a little break down and need the support of those around her has been as subtle as a brick. Up there with an upcoming car accident and the Grundy’s getting into bother for their renting scam.

Was it always so ham-fisted in its writing ?

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I’m inclined to think not. This may be the rosy spectacles of retrospect, but I recall being surprised when things happened, back in the bad old days (™ OMT), rather than having had them as dreary inevitabilities for days or even weeks in advance.

This dreary inevitability in particular pisses me off, because I don’t want the Author’s Message to be “women who have miscarriages are Frail and Weak and need Big Strong Men to Support Them” – it is demeaning to every woman who has ever had a miscarriage without the luxury of being able to take months off work. It seems to me to be a male projection: having no experience of being a woman or having a miscarriage, he writes it (plots it) as being terrible. He has the fear of the unknown motivating him. Women, who have been used to the idea of miscarriage all along, are not so knocked back by the whole thing.

Sort of like man-flu; if a man had a miscarriage it would wreck his life forever and he would at least need counselling for months after it as well as medical treatment for the physical after-effects, but often if a woman has one (or even five) she shrugs her shoulders and carries on, because there is no real point in doing otherwise.

Not all women, obviously; but it may be that the reason men don’t know about miscarriages is that women have had them and not told anyone but the man immediately involved, if they have even told him, and it has not been obvious to everyone what has happened because it has had no obvious effect.

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If only they would get out of the mind-set of ‘doing an issue’, I think the writing would ring more true. As it is, the dialogue sounds as though they’ve digested a leaflet on grieving and are having Kirsty go through the Stages one by one. She 's done Shock and Denial and we’re now in Anger.

Very clunky and as you say has the - I presume unintended - effect of showing her as a Frail and Weak Woman who should have listened to Saint Helen and done her grieving properly.

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Yes, I agree: that is exactly how it is coming across, as issue-led. Issue Led Drama is all too often poor; I think it was Heinlein who described it as “selling the story for a pot of message” – and say what one may about his politics, his stories are always pretty good and not overtly preaching about anything much.

There is only a limited number of Issues available, though, and perhaps when they have done them all we might be lucky enough to get the old character-led Archers back again. I keep on hoping.

(How many more Stages of Grieving are there to get through, do you happen to know?)

[quote=“Fanta, post:7, topic:48, full:true”](How many more Stages of Grieving are there to get through, do you happen to know?)[/quote]Kübler-Ross, which is the standard one people have heard of even though it’s not anything like universally applicable, has five (examples are in the context of terminally-ill patients):

  • Denial – The first reaction is denial. In this stage individuals believe the diagnosis is somehow mistaken, and cling to a false, preferable reality.
  • Anger – When the individual recognizes that denial cannot continue, they become frustrated, especially at proximate individuals. Certain psychological responses of a person undergoing this phase would be: “Why me? It’s not fair!”; “How can this happen to me?”; “Who is to blame?”; “Why would this happen?”.
  • Bargaining – The third stage involves the hope that the individual can avoid a cause of grief. Usually, the negotiation for an extended life is made in exchange for a reformed lifestyle. People facing less serious trauma can bargain or seek compromise. For instance: “I’d give anything to have him back.” Or: “If only he’d come back to life, I’d promise to be a better person!”
  • Depression – “I’m so sad, why bother with anything?”; “I’m going to die soon, so what’s the point?”; “I miss my loved one, why go on?” During the fourth stage, the individual despairs at the recognition of their mortality. In this state, the individual may become silent, refuse visitors and spend much of the time mournful and sullen.
  • Acceptance – “It’s going to be okay.”; “I can’t fight it; I may as well prepare for it.” In this last stage, individuals embrace mortality or inevitable future, or that of a loved one, or other tragic event. People dying may precede the survivors in this state, which typically comes with a calm, retrospective view for the individual, and a stable condition of emotions.
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Depends on who you read. In the “classic” Kübler-Ross model, there are five stages in total:

  1. Denial
  2. Anger
  3. Bargaining
  4. Depression
  5. Acceptance


Other models have seven stages:

  1. Shock & Denial
  2. Pain & Guilt
  3. Anger & Bargaining
  4. “Depression”, Reflection, Loneliness
  5. The Upward Turn
  6. Reconstruction & Working Through
  7. Acceptance & Hope

Something tells me this is going to be a long haul…

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At least Tom jumped over the early ones, going straight to Depression without passing go or collecting £200.

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True, Joe, 'tis pity and pity 'tis ‘tis true. Don’t know if there are any Jam and Jerusalem fans, but the way everyone keeps going up to Kirsty and telling her how to grieve reminds me of this hilarious scene - start at about 15’ 30" if you’re interested. Sue Johnston’s character’s husband has died, the funeral is over and she’s slumping on the sofa when the doorbell rings …

I’m from the Grieving Group

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Just so long as she does not return to that loser, self-pitying tosser, Tom.

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Thanks for the link Janie. Watched the whole thing - wonderful! Been there done that…

I remember having to “be there” for a distraught cousin who went into complete meltdown when a doctor brought her the news that her uncle hadn’t survived his most recent stroke. Of course, it was understandable that she was upset; she was always very close to her Uncle John - or as I always called him, “Dad”.

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Kirsty as near as dammit ended up comforting Tom for her having had a miscarriage, at one point…

Guess what the cousin’s name was…!

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Helen?

(Apparently a post must be at least 20 characters)

Oh, dear, Joe, we have some like that in my family.

My mum’s sister made us all giggle at my dad’s funeral. She was in deep mourning, unrelieved black, complete with hat with little veil. My mum wore a black velvet blazer and grey skirt, no hat. Youngest sister nudged me and said, ‘Guess which one is the widow’.

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That was wonderful, Janie, thank-you

There are a couple of people I could send that to

Carinthia.xx

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Got it in one! Totally unlike TC in every other respect, though. No - I tell a lie; she’s very slim.

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When my father died (without drama on the tenth day of of the Liverpool Care Way being applied to him, without water), I ended up having to comfort two of the nurses, who in spite of it being routine for any hospital at that time were in tears over it. I felt faintly absurd, and had trouble not bursting into giggles – which I am sure they would not have appreciated. In order to deal with my own immediate feelings, I slipped out into the hospital grounds for a cigarette, and the other nurses were desperately worried because they were sure I ought not to be alone but they couldn’t find me.

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