April 14, 2021

COVID Grief: A Tangled Mess Of Feelings

Central, Life@Work

By: Carolyn Pflibsen, MDiv. | Chaplain
Spiritual Care | St. Cloud Hospital

It’s been a year – maybe somewhat longer for some.

A year since we entered the journey of living with the coronavirus pandemic.

A year of wondering what will happen and when will there be relief, security, a sense of hope.

A year of longing for a return to what we once knew as “normal.”

A year of a tangle of emotions: dread, fear, denial, anger, sadness, rising and falling hopes and so many more.

We know now – despite our deepest longings – this isn’t going to go away anytime soon.

Headlines tell us what some of us have feared and wondered all along: that this pandemic will permanently change our way of life, as have other major world events in history.

In the power it has to affect the course of history, some rank this pandemic with WWI, the Great Depression, WWII, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

Most of us don’t want to hear that.

Most of us are still longing for a “return to normal.”

This pandemic has revealed what some have been trying to say for decades, maybe even centuries – about social and economic disparities, racial and gender inequalities that some among us would still like to cover up again and deny.

Whether we know it or not, whether we have identified it or not, we are grieving.

We need to grieve the loss of the familiar.

We need to grieve the loss of comfortable routines.

We need to grieve the loss of rituals that marked even our most casual relationships – a handshake, a high-five, the comfort of a hand on a shoulder.

We need to grieve the loss of those more intimate practices that cemented our closer interpersonal relationships – a hug from friends and relatives; hands clasped in friendship, support, or prayer.

We need to grieve the loss of a sense of identity – who are we when half of our face is covered by a mask and the other half partially obscured by goggles and/or face shields? Who are we when we cannot gather for sports and entertainment? Who are we when we cannot be together for celebrations of life events, religious services, ceremonies and practices? Who are we when we are isolated from those we love? Who are we when we fear even the most mundane activities like grocery shopping and mall walking?

As with other grief, it will take time and effort for us to move through this grief.

Each of us will grieve differently – will feel different emotions at different times.

Perhaps some of us are still in shock and denial. How can this be happening? How can it be real?

Others are angry – angry at the loss of freedoms, angry with others who don’t seem take it seriously, angry with those who seem to take it too seriously, angry that nothing was done more quickly, angry that too much has been/is being done.

Some of us are wallowing in depression, focused on the losses, stuck in sadness, and wishing it would all just go away so we can get back to “normal” – whatever that means, whatever that was.

Some of us are shifting toward recognizing that even this turbulence, is a “new normal.” We’re starting to adjust and even test this emerging reality.

A few of us may have even begun to invest ourselves, our time and our energies into living into our “new normal.”

Grief, however, is not a straight line. It’s a tangled mess of feelings and also has physical, cognitive, behavioral, social, cultural, spiritual and philosophical dimensions. 

Grief is like a ball of yarn that a litter of enthusiastic kittens have unrolled, and then played with for hours on end.

The feelings and all that go with them appear, merge, mingle, reemerge, shift, change in intensity and tone.

We will not get over this grief. It will be with us for the rest of our lives. It will change us, shape us, and continue to be with us.

Yet, we can get through it – time and time again.

As we recognize this grief, as we identify it, as we work through it with intentionality, we will also change it, shape it, and give it space in our lives.

We will learn to give ourselves and others grace – grace to feel, grace to be.

In accepting that we are each grieving – that we grieve in different ways, at different times, and that it affects us differently – we can embrace this grief, support one another in it, and through it, gain new possibilities for joy, hope, and peace.