How to Manage the Holidays When You’re Grieving

Making space for pain can make room for moments of joy.

The year after my brother died the holidays were grim. Even though I hadn’t spent a Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, or New Year’s Eve with him for a long time, grief made it hard to feel the joy I usually get from the holidays. I couldn’t imagine a celebration of any sort. As a client told me after losing her wife to a brief battle with cancer, “It’s as though everything is gray. You keep moving through your life, but with a film over everything.”

That same client, as well as numerous others who have mourned losses in therapy with me, taught me some important lessons about grieving, which helped me through my difficult days. Sharing those lessons with you is important to me, and, I hope, helpful to you as well, so here they are, in no particular order.

1-    The pain is there. Make space for it. Be sad, cry, hurt, or angry at different times, and maybe sometimes all at once. If it’s any comfort, know that you’re not alone. In a recent article in the NY Times Dina Gachman wrote about how the 40 year old movie Terms of Endearment helped her mourn her mother by bringing together feelings of joy, humor, pain, and sadness.

2-    You will not hurt or be sad every moment. Make space for other feelings as well. It’s not an insult to your loved one’s memory to go to a movie, dinner with friends, or even a party if you’d like, and to have a good time. Laugh, enjoy good music, have fun in the moments when you feel like it.

3-    Don’t feel that everything must be the same as always. If you want to decorate your house or make a big meal, if you think that will lift your spirits or you simply want to do it as a gift to others who are also suffering the loss, go right ahead and do it! But if that effort feels overwhelming, if you feel that you don’t have the energy or the desire, don’t berate yourself. Give yourself permission to celebrate in other ways. Maybe make a quieter or smaller meal this year. If you have always been the host, let someone else take over that role this year. Or if you can’t stand to give that job away, turn the holiday meal into potluck, with everyone bringing different dishes ; or have everyone come to your house early and prepare it together. Who knows? This could be the beginning of a new family tradition.

4-    Do something special in your loved one’s honor. My brother’s amazing memorial service, prepared and carried out on one of his favorite rivers by his children, wife, and close friends, was planned for early December the year he died. It was a beautiful antidote to the pain, and whenever I felt less than enthusiastic about the holidays that year, I thought of that service and my spirits lifted a little. But something smaller and more personal can be equally meaningful. One aspect of getting older is the loss of more and more loved ones along the way. I’ve started my own tradition of making a charitable contribution every December in the name of each of my friends and family who are gone. I put their name on the “in memory of” section of the contributions, but I don’t send notification to anyone. The contribution is just between me and the organization and the Cloud. But making that donation connects me to my loved ones in a unique way.

5-    Remember that no two people mourn in the same way. There is no one right or wrong way to grieve, as another recent article in the NY Times clarifies.  

6-    And finally, know that many things do get better over time.

This year, the second after my brother’s passing, I am looking forward to the holidays. My husband and I spent a quiet Thanksgiving at home alone, a tradition we have enjoyed for some years. I will admit that I got a little discombobulated with the meal this year, though. I’m a vegetarian, but I love the smell of turkey cooking on Thanksgiving Day, so I always make a small turkey breast for him. (Don’t ask.) This year, I somehow forgot to buy cranberry sauce and yams, so we didn’t have some of the traditional foods we both love. And I got so caught up in other things during the day that I forgot to make my traditional pumpkin pie. Ah well. We survived and had a good time together anyway!

The rest of the holidays will bring visits to and from friends and family; two trips to “night sky” light shows at local historical homes; meals cooked in tandem with loved ones, at least one take-out meal, and maybe a trip to a local restaurant.

The holiday season still brings moments of sadness. I miss a dear friend who died earlier this year. The other day I wanted to talk to my brother about something that was happening. Another time I had a question for my mother, and one for her beloved brother, my uncle. I miss my daily phone chats with my dad and his sister. And as always, I find myself missing a good friend with whom we spent many of our holidays, who died years ago.

One of the benefits of this aging business, however, is knowing, in a way I could never understand when I was younger, that no set of feelings is pure. Good and bad come together. Sadness and happiness coexist. Loneliness and connection can happen in tandem. It may be, as the psychoanalyst D.W. Winnicott taught, that we need both sides of the emotional coin to keep growing. Or as the old saying has it, dark skies make us appreciate the sunshine. We might wish it weren’t so, but those of us who have reached the Third Age know that it’s how the world works.

So this holiday season, if you are grieving, whether it is a raw new pain or an old throbbing one, remind yourself to honor your loved one, make space for the grief, and also allow yourself moments of joy. And if there are very few moments of pleasure this year, know that there will be more over time, as the healing continues.

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