The holiday season is intended to be a happy, joyous time spent with those you hold dear. But for some this time of year can highlight a loss in their lives that causes pain and longing. If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone. Let’s explore the difficulty of loss over the holidays and how to deal with it.
There are lots of things that can cause a feeling of grief. The most known is grief over a loved one dying, but you can also experience grief over a relationship ending, facing terminal illness, loss of a loved home and similar significant changes to your life. In this article we’ll mostly explore grief as it relates to loss or death but many of the ideas below can be adjusted to match the specific grief you are experiencing.
Grief looks different for everyone and their journey with it is sometimes unique. For some it brings mostly depression, heartache and sadness. Others experience more anger, anxiety or fear. For some it creates numbness and a feeling of being disconnected to normal life. These of course can come in waves; suddenly shift and the intensity can change over time. Learning to incorporate the loss into your life and continue on can be a huge challenge, especially around special occasions.
Dealing with grief is difficult over special events like birthday’s and holidays because it often sharpens our focus on their absence. We often can’t help but picture our big day if that particular person were still around. It can bring up difficult emotions and responses including:
- Depression: their absence can trigger deep feelings of sadness and low mood.
- Anger: feelings of unfairness that this person is no longer in your life can create a sense of anger.
- Avoidance: you may feel the urge to avoid major events or traditions that you once enjoyed.
- Emptiness: you may feel a numbness or emptiness where excitement once was.
- Anxiety: there can be a nervous feeling approaching a big event like Christmas. The fear of facing a big family event without a special person can be unsettling.
There are many feelings and reactions that can come up. But how can we respond to these emotions as they arise?
Here are some ways to manage the Christmas period if you are also dealing with a grief of sorts:
- Take it one day at a time: sometimes it can feel like the festive season lasts for months with decorations and reminders everywhere. This can be overwhelming. Focus simply on the day ahead and don’t panic about the rest.
- Find small things that make it feel easier: whether it’s outsourcing the planning or changing your holiday routine, small shifts can create less pressure. This is imperative when you’re already feeling overwhelmed by it all.
- Connect with loved ones: it may be tempting to isolate when you’re feeling lost in grief, but this makes connecting to other loved ones even more important. Even for small amounts of time, be around others and connect.
- Remember your loved one in a meaningful way: a powerful way to help with the grief is to incorporate your loved one with some kind of gesture. Whether something small like writing a card to them, lighting a candle or making their favourite dish – they can still be a part of our lives.
- Allow yourself the room to grieve: whether it’s having a cry, talking to a close friend about it or simply quiet time. Give yourself the room to have your feelings without judgement. If it feels like the emotions are taking over it’s best to reach out for help.
- Plan ahead if you can: we know that special occasions can be difficult, if possible make your plans for these big days ahead of time. Whether it’s being with particular people or going away on a holiday, knowing we have a plan in place helps.
- Focus on happy memories: anger, sadness and hurt around your loss can trigger a cycle of never-ending painful memories or thoughts. We can sometimes forget the happy moments, the funny memories and this makes it even harder to get through. Try talk to friends and family about the happier memories you had together.
Grief and loss is something we carry with us through our lives, as time passes it does get easier to do this but special events can throw us off. We can suddenly feel very raw and vulnerable; this is totally normal and happens to everyone. The sudden pang of grief can feel scary and painful, but trust that it will pass. Your loved one will always be remembered on these big days, which shows the impact that they made on our lives. Reach out for help if you feel overwhelmed and know that you’re not alone in this journey.
This article was written by Lauren Hall, pre-accredited and fully qualified Psychotherapist at The DMC Clinic. If you would like to discuss how any of the topics mentioned above are impacting your mental health, please contact The DMC Clinic to arrange an appointment.