Lindsay Nicholson: How work helped me as I grieved

With such a brutal reminder of the really terrible things that happen in the world, you may even be better at your job than before. Photo / 123RF

Of all the memories that were seared into my brain around the time of my first husband's death, one I will never forget happened on the Monday morning after his funeral. I dropped our three-year-old, Ellie, at nursery, where she scampered off - grateful, no doubt, for uncomplicated little friends to play with after being cooped up at home surrounded by grieving adults. Then I collapsed into the car of a good friend who had volunteered to take me into work. I couldn't have driven myself - I was too busy wadding up tissues under my eyes to stop the tears streaking the mascara down my face.

My boss, who had been very decent throughout my husband John's illness, hugged me when I arrived; colleagues, many of whom had been at the funeral, looked weepy, but some avoided me altogether. To be honest, I couldn't blame them. Before it happened to me, I too might have been unable to know what to say to a new and, as I was then very obviously, pregnant widow.

Their reactions did make me wonder if I was doing the right thing. Back then I had no access to therapists or grief counsellors. I was 36 years old and had a living to earn and bills to pay - which made my decision much more straightforward. But what my gut instinct told me in no uncertain terms was that everyday life is precious and worth fighting for. My husband, the journalist John Merritt, worked up until just two days before he died of leukaemia. It's only when you confront imminent mortality that you appreciate the blessings of an ordinary day at the office.

So when I read that Sheryl Sandberg, on the advice of psychologists, had gone back to work as chief operating officer of Facebook just 10 days after her husband's death due to an accident in a gym, I mentally cheered her on, knowing that she was doing the very best thing for herself, her two young children and to honour her husband's memory.

Sandberg made no secret of the fact that the support of her husband, Dave Goldberg, had been crucial to her success. In her 2013 book, Lean In, she wrote that marriage is the "biggest career decision" a person can make and implored young women to choose a man who wants to do his share in the home.

While returning to her position as No 2 at Facebook, she has wisely announced that she won't travel on business for the time being and will work only during the hours her children are in school. But I hope that shortly after sitting down at her desk, she discovered - as I did back in 1992 - that there is a welcome relief in thinking about something other than your almost unbearable loss. I well remember that by lunchtime on my first day back, nearly everyone had given up treating me as if I was breakable, and by the end of that day they were shouting banter across the office as normal. Someone even said they felt "like death" due to a heavy weekend - people froze with embarrassment for an instant but I barely noticed. I had just lost my life partner, the father of my children: a misplaced comment wasn't about to upset me.

And that, I think, is the nub of the debate about how soon after a bereavement you should get back to work. The loss of someone you love is absolutely awful but it is not physically or mentally incapacitating. You can still think, reason, problem-solve. With such a brutal reminder of the really terrible things that happen in the world, you may even be better at your job than before. In fact, I really wonder whether the common belief that the bereaved should hide themselves away at home for weeks or even months is more to do with the discomfort their colleagues feel on seeing someone obviously unhappy. Not long after I returned to work I remember spotting an old friend, who just turned and fled, clearly unnerved by not knowing what to say to me. As lifespans thankfully increase and once-fatal illnesses respond to treatment, the contact that someone even in mid-life had with the newly bereaved is necessarily limited. We don't know how to behave any more. Mind you, there's no secret to it - a simple "How are you?' or "I'm sorry for your loss" is all that's required.

Under UK law, all employees are entitled to unpaid leave to deal with issues concerning dependants, which can include arranging and attending a funeral. And I certainly wouldn't advise anyone to try to work between the passing and the funeral of someone they were very close to. What we know now about the five stages of grief is that the first two - shock and denial - have the upper hand in the early days after a death, and the funeral - of whatever faith - provides an essential ritual for breaking through the brain fog and helping the bereaved come to terms with what has happened.

Someone in the early stages of shock and denial probably should not be under pressure or making decisions. But then, as reality sinks in, the next phases of grief - and these don't usually arrive in an orderly fashion - are anger and depression. Here's where I think work is beneficial, while staying at home, especially with small children, could actually be harmful to all concerned. As the brain tries to process what has happened, most people feel surges of anger at the unfairness of being deprived of their loved one, and then, as time passes, depression with the deepening realisation that nothing will bring them back. These are not good states to be in, either on your own or around small children.

In that first year after a death you have to sort out and give away your loved one's possessions and organise your new life as a single parent, all the while see-sawing between grief, anger and depression. And awful as it is to go through all those "firsts" - birthdays and holidays without Daddy... Christmas was especially painful - the second year is even worse, because you do it all over again but with an even heavier heart. The order and structure of the working day can provide a bedrock during this time and, in my experience, having a job gave me something else to think about and helped me stay on an even keel. Also, I strongly believe that, as my daughter found when she ran off to join her friends at nursery, time out from a distraught parent is vital for children, too.

Sheryl Sandberg is no doubt going home, as I did every night, to a house with what feels like a gaping hole where her partner should be. She will probably cry herself to sleep - if she can even sleep - and her children will possibly become very clingy for a while, terrified of losing her as well. My daughter slept in my bed with me, and when the new baby arrived - another girl, who I called Hope - we all cuddled up together. Even so, however sad you feel, you can only cry so much. Even weeping for two hours a day is draining and exhausting. Work became the place where my sadness didn't intrude. I did most of my crying in the car or the bath when everyone else had gone to sleep. But eventually you have to dry your tears and get on with life.

By the way, the fifth stage of grief, according to the ground-breaking research of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, is acceptance. Interestingly, modern grief counsellors agree that four years is typical before acceptance of a significant loss, with seven or more years if that loss is complicated (for instance, if the death is sudden, as it was in Dave Goldberg's case).

Sheryl Sandberg and her children, young as they are, have a great deal of grieving to do over not just the next few weeks but four to seven years to rebuild their lives. Lying on a beach for a month, or whatever it is some people expect her to do to in order to recover, really isn't the point. She has to fashion a new life for herself and her family, and the greatest tribute she can pay the husband whom she clearly adored is to re-shape the life they worked for together.

We know Dave Goldberg took enormous pride in his wife's success. I am sure that he would be even prouder of the way she is coping now.