Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all! The holiday season is something that we all seem to look forward to each year. It is a time that family, friends, and loved ones get together to share joy, peace, and love. The season is usually filled with holiday cheer, parties, gifts, and travel. It is that time above all times where you somehow put disappointments aside in order to enjoy the happiness associated with the season. The season also culminates your years’ journey, as you prepare to embark upon a new year, hoping to leave the negative in the past, as you declare newness and positivity in the upcoming year.
However, because of the loss of so many lives, job losses, the loss of homes, lost businesses, lost incomes, lost relationships, the lost of human touches, lost hope, and in some cases the loss of faith surrounding the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, many of you are still looking forward to the holiday season as a reprieve. However, to the over 268,000 families who have lost loved ones, and the more than 10 million people in the United States who have experienced the ravages of the virus, many of you are not looking forward to the holiday season.
I empathize and I sympathize with those of you whom have lost family members, friends, jobs, homes, income, businesses, faith, and hope. I am sure that Thanksgiving was very difficult for so many of you, because this was the first major holiday that you had to deal with an empty chair or empty chairs at the dining table. And even more difficult for so many of you, whether your loved one transitioned from this life to the next realm due to the COVID-19 coronavirus or because of some other malady, you and your family members were not able to physically visit your loved ones or say goodbye in person before they transitioned. As a matter of fact, your family traditions of saying goodbye have been shattered, causing even more pain on top of your pain of loss.
As a psychotherapist I help my clients to deal with various forms of loss and grief, recognizing that although loss can be an unexpected event, as has happened with many COVID-19 coronavirus deaths; grief is a process that has no timeframe. The difficulty about death is that it is never on your calendar, never documented in your daily appointments, and it cannot be predicted. And no matter how many times you are faced with death, you are never prepared; you want your loved ones with you for life. Sadly, the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic has shown that it is not only uncontrollable and unpredictable; the resulting losses have seemed insurmountable.
Yes, I know that the holiday season heightens your pain of loss and grief. You did not expect that you would have to bury your mother, your father, your sister, your brother, your grandparents, and especially your children. However, in the midst of your pain, there is the laughter, the love, and the light that was illuminated in the life of your loved one(s) and in your memories of him/her. Although your loss is difficult, it is important for you to remember that your loved one(s) left memories that will forever impact your life, as well as the lives of others with whom they came in contact. It seems easy to mourn the loss of your loved ones, but I challenge you to celebrate the life of your loved one(s) that have transitioned to the next realm.
If you are struggling with the loss of a loved one or loved ones for whatever reason, and especially if this is your first holiday season without him/her, here are a few suggestions that can help you to manage your loss and your grief.
1. Keep a daily journal of your feelings and your thoughts.
2. Cry and shed some tears, but not for a lifetime; cloudy and wet eyes have difficulty allowing the sun to once again shine into your eyes and into your life.
3. Share your feelings with family members and close friends.
4. Get up, open your blinds and your curtains, and get out, even in the midst of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic you can mask up and take a walk in your yard or your neighborhood.
5. Begin to take a journey of inner spirituality in order for you to begin to process the loss(es) of your loved one(s) as gains.
6. Reach out and check on others who share this loss with you.
7. If your grief becomes too unbearable, filled with increased depression and anxiety, seek help from a mental health professional either in person or during COVID-19 through telemental health processes.
8. Take stock of your life as it related to your relationship with/to the loved one(s) you lost.
9. Behold the blessings and lessons you can now count and cherish as a result of the life meeting that was not by happenstance.
10. Decide what you will do with the blessings and the lessons you gained from the relationship(s) with your loved one(s), in order to help yourself and others; make written plans to apply the blessings and lessons in real time.
11. Write the top five things you will miss most about your loved one(s) in your journal.
12. Write the most memorable events and occasions you shared with your loved one(s) and review them occasionally, with joy & laughter.
13. Find the most memorable photograph of the two of you and place it in a conspicuous place for you to look at every now and then with a smile.
14. Take time to reminisce about those great events and experiences in your mind in your heart, with others who share the same memories, holding your loved one(s) dearly, but deciding to let him/her go.
15. Write the top ten most humorous memories that you have about your loved one(s) and take some time to laugh about them from a gut level, until you cry tears of joy.
16. Leave a vacant chair at the dinner table for your loved one(s) during the holiday seasons and birthdays, allowing his/her spirit to visit, but allowing his/her spirit to return to his/her newly found home of peace.
17. Celebrate the life of your loved one(s) on his/her birthday, special occasions, and during the holidays with Zoom and phone contacts, in reality, by remembering the good times, celebrating his/her life and not mourning his/her loss.
18. Invite family members and friends to share a positive memory of your loved one(s), barring tears and sadness during your Zoom and telephone celebrations.
19. Salute the memory of your loved one(s) throughout the holiday season by speaking his/her name with love.
20. Don’t deny your hurt, your pain, and your loss; you will begin to heal with time.
21. Give yourself permission and time to grieve, remembering that your loved one(s) want you to live after his/her death and if he/she had a choice he/she would still be in this realm with you.
22. Write a letter to your loved one(s). Place it in your Bible or just read it aloud and tuck it in a safe place.
23. Periodically review photo albums, scrapbooks, and other memorabilia pertaining to your loved one(s) while you imagine and laugh.
24. Take care of yourself; relax, breathe, exercise, meditate, engage in yoga, and engage in your favorite hobbies.
25. Revisit the hobby you abandoned years prior; take out your old paint brushes and easel; dust off your piano keys or instrument; find new life in these hobbies and avocations
26. Pray for the soul of your loved one(s).
27. Give him/her permission to cross into the next realm.
28. Release your loved one(s) into the next realm, holding onto his/her memories.
29. Remember, death and life are processes, not necessarily events. Decide on paper, the process you will use to move forward in and with your life.
30. Donate your time, treasures, and talents to groups, charities, and/or organizations in which your loved one(s) invested.
31. Donate a meal or funds in the name of your loved one(s) to the hungry, the homeless, or other caused over the holidays.
32. Take time out of your busy schedule each and everyday to reach into your heart to love yourself and share a dose of love with someone else!
33. Take time out of your busy schedule to pick up the phone to check on a loved one while he/she still lives, remembering “DEATH IS DONE!”
34. Remember, there IS a light at the end of the tunnel; clear your eyes and your heart to see it!
35. Pray daily for your renewed strength, remembering, your loved one has only paid the debt that every human will have to pay at some point.
Although your loved one(s) are no longer with you in the physical realm of this life, know that his/her spirit is with you and he/she still lives within you. Also remember because he/she lives within you, what you do and what you show to others and to the world, as well as how you take care of yourself is a reflection of your loved one(s). Even though there might be an empty seat at the dinner table, and in some cases empty seats, the dinner which you will eat, as well as the table at which you will sit, the room in which you will eat, the house in which you reside, is filled with the love and not the loss of your loved one(s). Although your loved one(s) is/are gone from this physical realm, their love and memories still reside in your heart and you are still connected in the spiritual realm!
Keep the faith, keep praying and allow God to lead you and love you! Love abides in the midst of loss!!
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