A friend texted me recently:
“I found a pile of mail next to my father’s chair. Dad hadn’t opened any mail after mom died.”
Her parents had died within seven months of each other.
For many people, receiving mail addressed to someone who has died is jarring. The first envelope is hard. You see their name and everything feels off.
People react in different ways. Some people set the mail aside and never open it. Some call a sibling and cry. Some throw it away.
Sam, my friend’s father, had never been the same after his wife died. It was a true love story. From 1968-1976, Sam lived his best bachelor life in San Francisco, New York and Chicago.  He was a scientist who at 30 believed he always would live as a bachelor. Then Sam met the woman who would become his wife—the older sister of one of his colleagues. Within three months, they were married at City Hall.
They were married for nearly 50 years.
My friend’s mother, his wife, died the day before their 50th anniversary. She went to bed and never woke up.  The family had already gathered to celebrate. Instead, they spent that time together remembering her life.
When everyone returned home, Sam woke up alone for the first time in his life. He had gone from his parents’ home to a college dorm, to shared apartments, and then into a life with his wife. There had always been someone there.
Until there wasn’t.
Then the mail started arriving for his dead wife.
At first, Sam set the mail aside in a basket next to his chair. First, only the envelopes addressed to his wife, then joint statements, then all the mail went into the basket next to the chair. Over time, even the act of checking the mailbox became a burden for Sam.  He started neglecting the mailbox for days and, eventually, weeks. Sam began taking the mail from the mailbox and immediately throwing all the mail away.
But the mail carrier doesn’t stop delivering mail.
Day after day, it arrives. Credit card statements. Medical bills. Mortgage notices. Letters that look unimportant until they aren’t.
The envelopes go unopened, but the consequences do not.
When bills are missed and accounts fall behind, those mailed notices turn into collections demands. 
By the time my friend became involved, the situation had grown beyond a stack of envelopes. A grandson’s car had been repossessed. The family home—where holidays had been celebrated and generations had gathered—was almost in foreclosure proceedings, even though only two mortgage payments remained.
All of it started quietly and innocently, with a pile of mail next to Sam’s chair.
When someone dies, we expect grief, sadness, loss and memories.
What we don’t expect is how much of that grief gets tangled up in ordinary things. A trip to the mailbox, or a name on an envelope or a stack of papers that no one has the energy to face.
The mail keeps coming.
And sooner or later, someone must open the mail.

John Kohlhepp is the owner of A Secure Plan, LLC, an End-of-Life Planning and Death AfterCare company. After the death of his mother, John chose a new career path to help people and families making end-of-life plans and completing the paperwork after a loved one dies. Previously, John worked in progressive politics for labor unions, immigrant rights, and marriage equality.