******Actually, that child died, it wasn’t lost.*****
On 20 March 1991, Clapton’s four-year-old son, Conor, died after falling from the 53rd-floor window of his mother’s friend’s New York City apartment at 117 East 57th Street. Conor’s funeral took place on 28 March at St Mary Magdalene’s Church in Clapton’s home village in Ripley, Surrey.
I consider all deaths ‘losses’.[
Yeah, me too: I have a little girl waiting for me to come to her someday. there is no sorrow on earth like losing a child.
Yes but there is a similarity between
“I’m sorry you lost your child”
and
“I’m sorry you lost your car keys”.
Losing something implies a type of guilt. You should have been paying more attention to it so you wouldn’t misplace it. When you say to someone “You lost this”, you are implying they responsible for the loss. Not only that, saying something was lost implies that, with some effort, it can be found.
It really comes into play when a parent feels responsible for the death. There is a difference between “I’m sorry for your loss” which is fine and “I sorry YOU lost your child” or “They lost their child”.
And yes I was an English major
The story of Conor’s needless death is heart-rending.
He and his mom lived in a high-rise......Conor loved to jump up on the low floor radiator to look out the big expanse of window overlooking NYC.
That fateful day.....workmen had removed the window and warned his nanny not to let Conor into the room.
His mom was in the shower, came out, and momentarily looked through the mail on the hall desk......later blaming herself for not being there when Conor ran into the room, hopped up on the radiator and fell through the open window.
Speaking only for myself, I could not survive such a tragedy. I cannot comprehend how Eric Clapton did.