I’ve been behind on my news feed review of grief and loss articles. So this will be a few with very brief ‘what they say’. These articles can help those of us in grief. And many of them should be shared with those we know who want to be better at supporting someone in bereavement. Or you could always send it to the idiot who complains cuz their spouse is away on business and they feel lonely.
Dealing With Grief, A Very Real Fear
This article is in Psychiatric Times written by Michael R. Mantell, PhD. It’s a short read and addresses the reality of COVID-19 and our collective fears. Which is anticipatory grief. Besides worrying that each time I touch something even in the house I worry and wash my hands. I am grieving for those I know and don’t know who will die.
Mental health professionals charged with compassionate care for those facing a radically changing world filled with loss have one narrow task. Helping those in emotional pain experience the control that flows from healthily airing anguish, staying focused on the here and now, and acquiring acceptance of the “proper sorrows of the soul.”
Added link Thoughts for Bein Ha’Mitzarim:
"There are two kinds of sorrow and two kinds of joy. When a man broods over the misfortunes that have come upon him, when he cowers in a corner and despairs of help – that is a bad kind of sorrow…The other kind is honest grief of a man who knows what he lacks."
Dealing with grief: 7 Practical Ways to Support A Loved One Who is Grieving
This longish read is by Amy Swales published in Stylist.
There are seven excellent tips here. Some of which can help those of us in our grief journey and work. Most def these tips can help others who want to help a loved on in grief. This piece is excellent help guide for others so they don’t struggle, abandon, or fuck up offering support.
Keep in mind some of these cannot be done in our current lockdown state.
Navigating ‘anticipatory grief’: How to Deal with Your Lost Year
This article written by Amelia Lester for the The Sydney Morning Herald. Lester is addressing the anticipatory grief our time under the confines of COVID-19. She puts it this way:
“I don’t know you, but I miss you” was how I heard it put, which seemed to describe perfectly my longing for the collective undertaking we call society.
The bigger take away for those of us on a grief journey is that anticipatory grief is real. I know when Donna was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer and I was her caregiver (willingly with love) for three years plus I began to grieve. Being her caregiver kept the roiling emotions of grief at bay. The single take away which I subscribe to in my life is David Kessler’s point:
“I do believe we find light in these times.”
For me, my grief wound allowed light to enter. I found knowledge and understood love better.
6 Ways to Help Loved Ones Grieving Deaths During the Coronavirus Pandemic.
This article in Mashable written by Siobhan Neela-Stock really hits on something I have been considering my entire grief exercise and life is now being disrupted by a pandemic. We are not with the loved one who die because of COVID-19. We are isolated from them. When loved ones die funeral and other services for the dead are interrupted. This is not what death and grieving was ever meant to be. I see a very severe and crippling wave of grief following this cluster f***.
Neela-Stock captures it well here:
Dwelling on a loved one dying alone can be a source of mental anguish for the remaining family members, Shear explains. "You can't stop thinking about how awful that is," she says.
My survivor grief after Donna died was off the charts and still is to a point but, imagine what it must for those who are separated from a death due to pandemic quarantine.
There are some great insights into ways to support those grieving in this pandemic world.