The Year of Postponed Grief

So many people have had to postpone funerals and memorial services because of the pandemic, leaving many feeling like their grief is in limbo. Are you one of them?

This piece by Elaine Godfrey in The Atlantic is an intimate look at why, once you are able to safely gather, it’s never too late to honor your person and support each other.

“…for many people who have lost a friend or a relative during the pandemic, the experience has been disorienting. “The last 18 months have been a time of unreality. All the physical touchstones have disappeared or been altered,” Megan Devine, a psychotherapist and the author of the book It’s OK That You’re Not OK, told me.

Funerals bring a kind of reality to the experience of death that some people need. “Loss is a place beyond language, and when you gather in person, you can convey things without needing to rely on words,” Devine said. Zoom services have been meaningful for many people, but they haven’t really been the same: During a funeral, you can offer a gentle hand squeeze or pat someone’s back. You can share the same meal and meet the people who loved your loved one too. Deaths create vacancies in our lives; those rituals and quiet interactions are how we acknowledge the empty space.” ​

Click here to read the entire piece.

Wishing for some company inside your grief? Now, as always, the very best place I know to connect YOU with other grieving folks is inside the Writing Your Grief community. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, there is always someone there: when you feel invisible inside your grief, these folks see you. Follow this link to find out all about it. We’ve got room for you. Come see…