I know you are sitting alone at home every night, afraid.
The few places outside of the safety of your home you relied on after your loss to begin again are closing their doors.
Your local coffee shop where you made small talk with the person behind the counter each morning is more distant and wearing gloves.
The very few hugs you got from friends, are now being held back.
Even the pat on the back you felt here and there as you moved through your life is no longer happening.
Your life after loss became harder to understand.
It is as if the little air you could breathe in from the few life moments you were able to grab for yourself, are stolen from you.
The dinner plans you courageously made a couple of weeks ago with your friends for the first time in a while are being cancelled indefinitely.
And as you lean back on your arm chair to turn on the tv, you find yourself with the only companion that is allowed in your home.
A digital mastery that provides the illusion of companionship through sound and image only to bring more fear and panic in your life.
I write this letter for everyone who lost a person they loved and then this pandemic hit them.
An ugly monster with a voice of million journalists and tv presenters who have access to your only safe haven.
You feel like you have no choice but to let them in.
If you don’t, the silence will make your fear even bigger than the puppets on television.
You have no choice but to immerse yourself inside their world so your world is not lonely.
You see, loneliness kills faster than this pandemic.
If you are reading this letter and you feel all of the above I want you to keep reading as I have a few good things to tell you.
The hugs you miss from your friends will come back.
Your dinner plans will be remade.
You will have human visitors in your home again.
Until then, sleep as much as possible.
Make sure you take your daily vitamins.
And watch feel good movies on Netflix. (Click to tweet!)
Here are some of my favorites: Kate and Leopold, About Time, As Good as it Gets, if you have a good sense of humor you got to watch Groundhog day, and of course Mamma Mia.
And since we have some extra time in our hands I would recommend Love is Blind.
Even if this is not something you would have watched before, I would recommend anything that makes you laugh and even gossip a little so you can take your mind off the hard things.
In the next few weeks the sun will rise again.
Being with other human beings will one day feel as safe as it always did.
For now, make sure you mindfully choose the voices that come through your tv screen.
See them as your guests and don’t invite anyone who makes you feel afraid.
This is your house. Your life.
And you still have choices.
That tv remote control has your name all over it.
Be relentless with who you let speak to you. Especially now.
With many healthy and vibrant days ahead of us,
Christina
PS. And of course listen to some of these awesome guests on the Dear Life Podcast show: www.dearlifepodcast.com/episodes
Actually I’m not doing any of these things. As a mostly plant-based eater for the past 15 years, who takes vitamins and supplements, I’ve got a good immune system. As do most of my closest friends – and we’re almost all over 60. Just had lunch – at an Asian Restaurant – yesterday. We still hug and cheek kiss – but also practice good hand washing (and did long before this latest health care crisis started). I don’t get flu shots either. Haven’t for 20 years and not about to start now – and perhaps had the flu once for a few days in all that time.
I read yesterday that one of the US’s prime risks is that so many of our citizens are obese. This is not a risk factor that people can change overnight – but neither did they get that way overnight. So I’d suggest that folks work on acquiring good health via a healthy diet and lifestyle choices – starting now and continuing long past when this virus has subsided. It can be hard when one doesn’t care of they live or die. But I do note on the 2 Widows/Widowers Facebook groups I’m in that many of the folks who are most depressed or stuck in their grief (I’m at 10 months, sudden death/no warning, my soul-mate) do not eat very well and I believe that this contributes substantially to their inability to move forward on a positive path.
PS. I did program planning for healthcare organizations and programs for 15+ years as a consultant; as a result I have done substantial research on healthcare issues in this country.
Everyone grieves differently.