How Can I Handle My Grief During the Holidays?

Special thanks to Susan Brockerman from Rockland, MD for sending this article to be posted on our blog.. Susan said it was given to her a few months after her 26 year old son Jason died in an auto accident in the spring of 2009, shortly before Easter - a very big holiday celebration time in their family. Since then, each year before Easter and again for Thanksgiving thru New Years, she pulls it out and reads it almost daily; she hopes it might help another mom going through the same heartache at this difficult time of the year … Cherie Houston

How Can I Handle My Grief During the Holidays?

By Jennifer LaRue Huget, Oct. 24, 2008

It's easy to feel isolated during the holiday season when you've lost a loved one. Everyone else seems so happy when you feel so sad.

"It's a tough situation for people" says Dale G. Larson, professor of counseling psychology at Santa Clara University in California. "The key is to acknowledge that you have changed and that the holidays aren't going to be the same. It's important to know that from the outset."

David Kessler, a Los Angeles-based expert on grief and loss who maintains a Web site called grief.com and has collaborated with the late Elisabeth Kubler-Ross on books about death and dying, explains that "Grief is the internal feelings we have, while mourning is an external process. One of the ways we help work through our grief is to externalize it."

Looking for ways to openly acknowledge your grief during the holidays may help you weather them, and perhaps even find joy. (Kessler is an advisor to Tributes.com, a Web site at which people can set up memorials to those they've lost free of charge, access resources about coping with grief, and connect with others who are grieving.)

Here are some suggestions from Larson and Kessler for managing grief during these emotion-filled holiday weeks:

·         Give yourself permission to have pleasure. "That's a tough assignment sometimes," Larson says. "Some people feel guilty to have joy or pleasure" when they're mourning. "But you should honor your loved one by allowing joy. They would want that. It doesn't weaken your connection."

·         Include the deceased in your conversations and other activities. "Look for excuses to talk about this person you've lost, in ways that honor them. Show people you're okay talking about him if you want to. Go through photos, videos. Have a stocking for him if that's in keeping with your tradition," Larson suggests. "It's a matter of having your loved one involved in ritual. You have to embrace that that's how it's going to be from now on."

·         Share your sentiments: "At Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, ask 'Can we start with a prayer for the one who died?'" Kessler suggests. ""Light a candle. Go around the table and have everyone share a favorite memory." If folks at the table aren't so inclined, find a private moment to say that prayer or otherwise honor that memory.

·         Develop a Plan A and Plan B: "Let Plan A be 'I'm going to go to Thanksgiving dinner,'" Kessler offers. "Plan B can say that, 'If it's too rough, too hard to be with everyone, I'm going to stay home and watch his favorite movie, take a walk through a favorite place of ours. I'm going to give in to grief if it overwhelms me.'" Kessler says that when people go into holiday events with a Plan A and a Plan B, "They usually make it through dinner. Without Plan B, they feel only emptiness. With Plan B, they feel sadness but not emptiness."

·         Cancel Hanukkah or Christmas: "Many find comfort in the holidays, the routine, the deep spiritual connection," Kessler says. "But if it's too hard for you this year, it's really okay to cancel a holiday." Kessler cites the experience of the actor Anthony Perkins's family after Perkins died. "The first Hanukkah or Christmas, they decided to go on with their holiday, no matter what," he says. "But the following year they looked back on that and felt it had been painful and mechanical and hadn't allowed for their grief. So they canceled Christmas the second year." Taking a year off, Kessler explains, lets you and your family "go through your feelings without pressure to be joyful and fun." Starting the third year after Hopkins's death, Kessler adds, his family was able to "create a new Christmas."

·         Seek a sympathetic ear: "If you feel you're not able to function, to find balance, to find any distance from the pain, seek help," Larson advises. "Find a grief support group, where you'll find instant empathy from people who have suffered similar losses." Don't like groups? Look for an individual counselor. Or, he suggests, "call your local hospice program and see if they have a support program that you can just drop in on for the holidays."