Grieving is Self-Care

Grieving is hard in normal times, and during a pandemic, you’d think it would be worse. Truth is, it is and it isn’t; and I’d like to focus on the latter. By now, we know how hard losing a loved one is while lockdowns and restrictions are in place. We know there’s no shoulder to cry on but your own, and there’s certainly no lox and cream cheese buffet to dodge small talk.

There is no noise. There is no distraction. There is no shoving your feelings under a rug.

That’s why it feels harder, but in my opinion, it’s the ultimate rip-off-the-bandaid cure. It’s a shiva on steroids. It’s mourning to the max.

You may even fully overcome the initial shocking humps of the loss of a loved one when you aren’t distracted.

In Judaism, it’s a mourners tradition to cover up all the mirrors in your house so that you don’t think about anyone but the deceased; and in a sense, isolation is akin to that tradition — bottled up at home without anything else to do but mourn your losses — the good and the bad.

With all the self-care you’re doing from home now, like yoga or reconnecting with old hobbies, why leave grieving out of the picture. Again.

I would look out for what comes up when that uncomfortable pain pang pops.

Notice what erupts — like a swelled up pimple, and you can’t unsee it, and you can’t look away. It’s all there. No distractions to keep you from your past pain bubbling up.

You. Are. Alone. And I have news for you, it’s okay. It’s actually a good thing.

There is a positive spin here in that there’s no emotional space to shove your sorrow under the rug, only to find its way back when another loss presents itself — and I assure you, another one will.

So, how can we let this moment of grief in isolation heal us? Grieving alone, especially now, can be therapeutic and a form of self-care; it’s like scrubbing the dead skin off your body and letting go; but in this case, it’s a gentle, compassionate reflection of what was lost — a way to find softness in the harder moments to honour what is gone.