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6 Ways to Deal With COVID-19 Grief and Loss

You’re not alone.
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When COVID-19 lockdowns began in the United States, I promised my 97-year-old grandmother one thing: When this was over, I’d visit her in Geneva, New York. I told her we’d throw a big party. But as much as I hoped it would happen, I never fulfilled my word. My grandmother died of COVID-19 in January. I never got to see her in person, and toward the end of her life, hefty doses of morphine put her into a deep sleep. I couldn’t talk to her at all. My grandmother’s death left me with the same question that millions of grievers are grappling with: How can we find closure when we can’t say goodbye?

Talking openly about grief can be vulnerable, but it’s no secret that death and loss are wildly disruptive. “Research shows that one person’s death affects at least nine people,” Natalia Skritskaya, Ph.D., associate research scientist at Columbia University and founder of the Complicated Grief Center of New York, tells SELF. To date, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that over 500,000 people have died of COVID-19 in the United States, which means over 4 million people in this country have lost a partner, friend, family member, or other loved one.

As if the COVID-19 deaths weren’t devastating enough, “loss and race-related trauma have complicated the grieving process for many BIPOC individuals and families,” Orson Morrison, Psy.D., clinical psychologist and director of DePaul University Family and Community Services, tells SELF. Not only have many communities of color had higher rates of COVID-19 deaths, but they’ve continued to endure systemic racism, which compounds their trauma, Dr. Morrison explains.

“My family lost a beloved aunt and uncle to COVID, and it was devastating because they both died within a week from each other,” Cindy Lamothe, a writer who lives in Guatemala, tells SELF. Loss has become an unwelcome companion for so many, and with that comes a deep need for healing.

Grief is a physical and emotional experience.

If you’re wrestling with grief, you’ve probably noticed your emotions are all over the map. What we typically describe as grief can feel like a giant bruise that’s tender to touch, and a bundle of thorny emotions like sadness, longing, and anxiety often follows in its shadow. These emotions can feel like a punch in the gut, but they’re also “a healthy expression of our humanity,” Anna Roth, Ph.D., clinical psychologist, tells SELF.

Grief’s emotional aspects might be well-known territory, but bereavement is a full-body experience, which means it can upset your physical health too. You may experience insomnia, high blood pressure, or heartburn. Lamothe says her losses did a number on her body. “Because so many people have lost loved ones from COVID, I didn’t feel entitled to talk about my grief, and within one week of these losses, my back went out,” she says, adding that she suspects her physical pain resulted from being unable to express her emotional distress.

COVID-19 grief and loss can be particularly challenging.

You’ve probably heard about psychiatrist Elizabeth Kübler-Ross’s five stages of grief—denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance—but grief therapists caution that mourning is rarely this linear. Instead it’s helpful to think about grief as having two distinct phases: acute and integrated, according to the Center for Complicated Grief at Columbia University.

During the acute phase, you feel all of the thorny emotions we mentioned above. It might even be hard to do things like getting out of bed, and you might have trouble thinking about the future. As time passes, however, you figure out how grief fits into your life. The sadness doesn’t disappear (and you have bad days and triggers), but during grief’s integrated phase, “ideally, you’re also starting to regain your own sense of well-being,” M. Katherine Shear, M.D., director of the Center for Complicated Grief, previously told SELF. “And hopefully you’re starting to see pathways forward in your life that have some potential for joy, satisfaction, and continued purpose.”

Sometimes, however, acute grief lingers. For instance, if your loved one’s death was sudden and social support is in short supply, you may be more vulnerable to something called prolonged grief disorder or complicated grief, which is when acute grief symptoms persist for at least six months. “For prolonged grievers, the shock and shattering emotional pain doesn’t recede,” Dr. Skritskaya explains. Even after time passes, the loss still feels raw. Upsetting emotions like anger, guilt, and regret also continue to feel overwhelming. “You tend to feel stuck in time, and it affects your day-to-day life,” Dr. Skritskaya explains. “Even if you manage to get out of bed and go to work, you feel suspended in suffering.”

No one knows exactly why some people develop prolonged grief while others don’t. It’s estimated that 10% to 15% of mourners might be dealing with the condition, SELF previously reported. There are risk factors like depression, separation anxiety, or post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as abuse or neglect, according to the Mayo Clinic. If you’re grieving for someone who died unexpectedly or violently, you are at risk for dealing with complicated grief. And factors like the death of a child, social isolation, and life stressors like financial troubles can impact your grieving process too.

Is your pandemic grief automatically prolonged grief disorder? Not necessarily. “Researchers are just starting to study the connection between the pandemic and prolonged grief disorder,” Dr. Skritskaya says, and since we’re still in the pandemic, there’s also a strong chance that you’re grappling with acute grief. In short: If you’ve lost someone in this time, the complicated and uncomfortable emotions you’re feeling are likely expected, but knowing that grief during a pandemic brings risk factors can inform how you process your feelings.

There are things you can do to support yourself as you grieve.

There’s no easy route through grief—and it might seem that all of your coping strategies are inaccessible to use right now—but processing your loss can help you get closure. Below, you’ll find a few things you can do to support yourself through this experience, whether you’re mourning the death of a loved one, grappling with the grief that comes from experiencing the world as a person of color, or dealing with any other type of grief.

1. Name your feelings.

When a larger-than-life wound opens up, your hair-trigger reaction might be to turn off the pain. To avoid sadness, anger, or any other prickly feeling, you may find yourself hibernating in bed, tunneling into Netflix, or ignoring text messages from family and friends. As comforting as these behaviors can be, tuning out your emotions only makes them roar. Your feelings are likely waiting for you to finish your Netflix session before emerging again.

Dr. Morrison explains that chronic traumas and stressors like anti-Asian and anti-Black violence and racial discrimination can further impact the grieving process and cause grief on their own. It’s not irrational if you’re feeling grief in light of these events. “As a result of these losses, you may compartmentalize your overwhelming emotions,” he explains, adding that it can be therapeutic to find small ways to notice and name those emotions.

In a 2017 meta-analysis published in Perspectives on Psychological Science, social psychologist James W. Pennebaker, Ph.D., points out that stuffing down your emotions can be just as stressful as keeping a painful secret, but feelings tend to shrink once you express them. So naming your feelings is one way to manage pain. You can also try writing down your feelings and a few coping strategies that might help in the moment, the American Psychological Association recommends. These can range from things like crying to going for a walk. Ultimately, naming your feelings can help you think through ways to soothe yourself.

2. Lean into community support.

“Everyone’s path with grief and loss differs,” Abigail Levinson Marks, Ph.D., a psychotherapist in San Francisco, tells SELF. While each person’s experience is unique, threads of similarity exist. For starters, Dr. Marks says we can’t mourn alone. Whether it’s attending a funeral, sitting shiva, or holding a celebration of life ceremony, gathering with loved ones is one way to support each other through communal grief. For many grievers, this is one step toward closure. “We have a time and place to share answers to questions like, ‘Who was this person to you?’ and ‘What will you miss about them?’” Dr. Marks explains. Without those rituals, the loss can linger like an unanswered question, which is why it’s vital to find support even when IRL gatherings aren’t possible.

Knowing you’re not alone can take some of the sting out of suffering, and even beyond funeral services, there are myriad ways to build community. Grief Unravelled is an Instagram community meant to normalize grief. The account shares quotes from fellow grievers, as well as tips on how to cope with loss. On Clubhouse, grief survivor Barri Grant offers peer grief support via her club, The Memory Circle. Grant’s club seeks to “make the grief cycle a shared experience and bring healing to others.” If you want to share a message with someone you’ve lost, artist and musician Oliver Blank hosts a podcast on Twitch called The One Who Got Away; grievers can call the podcast and answer this question: “What would you say to the one who got away?” Author Nora McInerny also hosts a podcast, Terrible, Thanks for Asking, that demystifies listeners’ grieving process.

If your grief involves race-related trauma, it’s imperative to find safe, supportive communities where your pain and loss can be “explored and healed through conversation and ritual,” Dr. Morrison says. Examples might include spending time with loved ones facing similar challenges or joining an affinity group specifically for people of color going through grief or similar circumstances to yours. For instance, if you’re looking for online community support, The Sad Girls Club provides a safe space for women of color to connect with others about what they’re feeling.

3. Watch out for regret.

Grief plays tricks on your mind, and it’s common to get stuck in “if only” types of thinking, Dr. Skritskaya tells SELF. Misguided thoughts like, “If only I had told my beloved how much they mean to me, I wouldn’t feel guilty,” or “If we weren’t in a pandemic, I could have said goodbye,” can feed feelings of self-blame and regret. These thoughts are natural, but they make grief trickier to untangle, Irvin Yalom, M.D., professor emeritus of psychiatry at Stanford University and author of A Matter of Death and Life, tells SELF: “It causes you to focus on all that you didn’t do or didn’t say.”

Instead of getting weighed down by regret, Dr. Yalom recommends turning grief into action. “One way to come to terms with what you haven’t done is to change the way you’re living,” he says. Even though no magic wand can erase the past, you can impact the future. You can tell loved ones how much you adore them or decide to fulfill your life in a new way.

4. Practice self-compassion as you move through emotions.

When your self-critical narrative keeps spinning, try flipping the script by extending yourself compassion. “If I’m feeling down, I alter my self-talk by reminding myself that I’m grieving and that it’s okay to not be happy,” Lamothe tells SELF. Psychologist and self-compassion researcher Kristin Neff, Ph.D., also recommends taking a “self-compassion break.” Essentially, this mini break is a chance to notice your suffering and acknowledge that it’s not self-inflicted—it’s part of the human condition. Dr. Neff also suggests  asking yourself: “What do I need to hear right now to express kindness to myself?” Perhaps there’s a phrase, such as “May I forgive myself,” that captures the sentiment you need to hear.

5. Reach out to a therapist.

Grief is a roller-coaster, and some days are more challenging than others. If you find that you’ve reached the end of your ability to cope on your own, consider reaching out to a mental health professional for support, Rachel L. Goldman, Ph.D., clinical professor of psychiatry at NYU Langone Health, previously told SELF. Regardless of how much time has passed, take a look at the impact grief has on your well-being. Overwhelming grief (even when it’s not complicated grief) can make it harder to function day-to-day. If your grief feels like a heavy emotional fog that weighs you down and makes it hard to see beyond the loss, therapy could help. It can provide a set place and time to express your emotions and talk about your loss. If you want to find a therapist but don’t know where to start, check out sites like Betterhelp or Psychology Today for resources. Physicians and hospital social workers can also provide referrals for grief support groups and counselors.

6. Remember that grief never goes away.

“Grief doesn’t exist on a stopwatch,” Dr. Roth explains. Knowing there’s no predictable path through grief permits us to weather the process. Part of this process is learning to live with the loss. While grief never vanishes, the pain doesn’t always feel so sharp, and moments of joy return. “Some days are filled with inexplicable pain, but sometimes I still find delight laughing at a silly cat meme,” Lamothe says. “Both joy and sadness can coexist; I’m learning that it’s all okay.”

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