This pandemic erased my grief!

We’re hearing from lots of grieving folks who are feeling frustrated by all the attention that the virus is receiving and feeling like their grief has been erased by the COVID-19 pandemic.

What they’re feeling – what you might also be feeling – is absolutely valid.

Here’s what’s happening in the world right now:

Individual, personal loss has been consumed by wider, global loss.

EVERYONE is shouting their fears, their losses, their grief.

It’s rather a bit how I feel – I’ve been working hard for years to teach the world better ways to come to grief. It’s been hard and lonely and annoying, almost as much as it’s been beautiful and heartening. And now, all of a sudden, EVERYONE is talking about grief. Articles are springing up everywhere.

In my more stressed out, tired moments, I feel erased. I feel irritated and angry. How DARE you people start talking about grief as though I haven’t been trying to do this work for ten years? And y’all are just going to skip over my work and say “we need to do something new,” as if I haven’t been working my ass off to get y’all to do something new.

So I very much relate to everyone who is voicing their frustration right now.

And. I can let myself stay in that frustrated place (which does not feel good at all) or I can try to shift my gaze to compassion. I can make myself reframe the story in my head that says I will be ignored, that there will not be enough for me, etc.

Instead, I can say – I wanted this. Not the pandemic itself, of course. But I wanted more people to talk about grief. That time is here, now. Not in the ways I wanted, but it is here, now. The work I’ve done has helped make new conversations happen. I will be part of this new wave of grief, too. I can only keep moving forward, doing what I can to add to the emerging narrative, guiding folks who are interested in what grief really is, and how we respond to it.

I can work towards the world I want – where there are beautiful and useful resources available to help us – ALL OF US – navigate grief in all its forms, and where my work – with our communities’ voices behind it – helps change the world that is to come.

How about you? How has all of the attention devoted to the coronavirus pandemic affected 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. When your friends have their own sh*t to deal with and you can’t lean on them, your WYG family is there. I mean it folks, this community is unlike any other place – online or IRL. The April session is open now and we’ve got room for you. Follow this link to join us, and pass it on.