I am so excited for the feature we have today on the subject of loss. A friend and former sorority sister of mine, Margot is an expert in the mental health field and is here to help give us some tools to deal with loss… Whether you’re grieving the loss of a job, loved one, or relationship, we have some tools here to help you cope.
Margot Rittenhouse is a mental health therapist, writer, and yoga instructor. Rittenhouse has earned a Bachelor’s in Psychology from American University and a Master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Johns Hopkins University and currently works as an outpatient therapist at community behavioral health clinic. Rittenhouse is also a writer, support group leader, and yoga instructor for Eating Disorder Hope and Addiction Hope. She runs an Instagram account focused on making mental health information and skills accessible. Follow her @mentalhealthmargot for more.
Without judgment, grab a piece of paper and pen and consider the following questions. Let your mind flow consciously onto the paper for 1 minute, not stopping until that minute is up.
- What does the word “loss” mean to you?
- What losses have you been grieving this past month?
- How do you cope with loss?
How we answer these questions teaches us a lot about our current feelings of grief and loss. How we are identifying them, feeling them, suppressing with them, and coping with them.
The COVID-19 outbreak has turned our entire world upside-down. There is not one person around the globe that hasn’t been impacted by this illness and the changes it has brought for humanity.
There are so many losses.
The most obvious is lives. COVID-19 has cost humanity over one-hundred thousand lives. Precious, irreplaceable, unique souls that lived and loved, gone from this world. This is, perhaps, the most understandable grief. To lose someone this way is devastating and the grief overwhelming.
Even so, it is not the only type of loss the world is experiencing right now.
When therapists consider recent losses, we do not only ask our clients about losses through death. So many areas of our lives feel like losses and we grieve for these in a similar manner to loss of life.
Loss of jobs. Loss of social interaction. Loss of milestone events like graduation, prom, or a wedding. Loss of money. Loss of structure. Loss of control. Loss of worldview. And, yes, loss of life.
Most people have heard of the “7 Stages of Grief” – shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, testing, and acceptance. These stages are not linear and we have all experienced them at one point or another. In fact, many of us are experiencing them right now.
But, we often feel like we can’t express our losses, judging ourselves because “someone else has it way worse.” This is especially true now, when so many are losing lives and loved ones. We think, “I have no job, but, I’m still alive so who am I to complain?” This can be a beautiful practice of gratitude but it’s also unfair.
Yes, we could argue that death is the ultimate devastating loss, but, it does not make other losses less impactful or important to your story.
Loss is not a competition because no one wins.
Considering this, would you answer question number 2 differently? Could you allow yourself to acknowledge your losses, whether they’re “better” or “worse” than someone else’s?
This is where healing begins.
When we shove our losses under the rug, telling ourselves that others have it worse or pushing ourselves to white-knuckle it through the pain, we turn pain into suffering.
We can only release this pain through acceptance, and we cannot accept what we refuse to face.
Acknowledge that you have lost the pinnacle life events of your senior year of high school and, whether they can be scheduled later or not, that sucks.
Acknowledge that you lost your job and, even if you feel you can find another, that sucks.
Acknowledge that you have missed out on interactions with your friends and that, while you can Facetime them and will see them again, that sucks.
Acceptance is not an end-game. It is not an apex that you reach and never come down from. Some days, I am accepting of the reality of the COVID-19 outbreak and how it is impacting my daily life. Other days, I am bargaining, begging reality for it to be over, for things to be different, for life to return to “normal.”
Be compassionate with yourself in your grieving.
We have to fight through many emotions to come to acceptance and all of these emotions are okay. It is okay to be angry that your wedding is cancelled. It is okay to try to bargain in your mind. It is okay to pretend this isn’t happening at times.
Don’t judge what stage you are at in any given moment. Allow yourself to process this reality in whatever way your mind and body need to.
But, know that allowing yourself to engage in the process of grieving doesn’t mean we release ourselves into a dark hole.
We can tell ourselves “this isn’t fair” and experience anger, but, we cannot live in that place.
We can sit in denial in certain moments, taking a vacation from reality and pretending that we have chosen a night in binge-watching Netflix. We cannot live in that denial 24/7.
Acceptance isn’t saying everything that is happening is awesome and it also isn’t allowing the despair of it all to consume us.
Acceptance means looking at the present moment for what it truly is, warts and all, and allowing yourself to work within that reality to the best of your ability.
Now, I know you likely want some practical skills to move toward acceptance and I will give you some, but, know that many of them are going to be things you will roll your eyes at. You’ve seen these suggested already on social media or from your therapist. Even so, let the broken-record play, because these skills are important.
Let yourself feel what you are feeling at any given moment. Don’t push yourself to be happy all the time or sad all the time or busy all the time. Recognize where you are in that moment and work within that.
Have some good distract skills for when uncomfortable or negative emotions become too much. Distract skills should not be used as a permanent coping skill because we can’t live in distraction from reality. But, in moments where everything is crashing around us, it doesn’t hurt to go for a walk or run, watch an engrossing show or movie, or engage in a project that takes your complete focus.
Also, get comfortable with touchy-feely emotional things like painting or writing in a journal. My clients constantly sigh at this and roll their eyes, but, I cheer when they admit “it actually really does help!” When you journal, don’t consider yourself a genius writing a memoir. When you paint, don’t consider yourself Van Gogh. The point is not to look back on these entries or paintings and remark on how poetic and meaningful they are. The point is to get those fears and anxieties and losses and negative emotions out of your head and onto paper.
The key is always non-judgment.
Release your judgment of your own grief and the grief of others.
Finally, remember that you are not alone, even in isolation.
—
What did you guys think? Please let us know if this read was helpful, we would love to hear from you! And if you don’t already follow Margot – give her a follow here!
(If you’d like more reading on health and wellness from us, you can find some here!)