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Helpful Hints for Navigating the Holidays 

The holiday season can be particularly difficult for anyone who has experienced a loss during the year. The Neal Center for Griefwork and Healing provides some practical tips on getting through this time of year:

Recognize and acknowledge that you are grieving.

• Be gentle with yourself.
• Understand that your energies are naturally directed toward your loss and your healing. So you may not have the energy you’re accustomed to having this year.
• Avoid caustic people; you don’t need the aggravation.
• Let people know it’s okay to talk about the deceased if it really is.
• Otherwise direct them away from the topic by telling them your want to catch up on what is going on in their lives.

Anticipate the day.

• If it’s too soon or too painful, don’t go or don’t participate. Send your regrets; people who care about you will understand.
• Remember that sometimes the anticipation is far worse than the actual day.
• How have you observed this day in the past?
• Recall this day in the past when you shared it with your loved one and acknowledge the ways in which it will be different this year.
• Identify the people, traditions, and activities that are important to you in regard to this day.
• Consider creating some new traditions.

Make a plan you can be comfortable with.

• Eliminate the unnecessary and the too painful.
• Don’t over commit or overextend; don’t expect too much from yourself; be realistic and kind to yourself.
• Find a way to honor your relationship and your memories, a way to include your loved one in the spirit of this day.
• If doing this will impact others, it‘s best to talk it over with them beforehand so they are not taken by surprise; if necessary, compromise to come to a comfortable conclusion.

Provide a cushion or buffer for yourself on this day.

• Tell your best friend or confidante how you are feeling about this day, as well as how you are going to get through it. Ask him/her to stay close for support throughout the day.
• Build in some alone-time, quiet-time or time when the expectations your or others have for you can be suspended in order to give you time to tend solely to your emotional needs.

Keep your options open.

• Sit in the back or near a door.
• Have an escape route planned along with a get away car (ride home) and driver in case things get to be more than you can handle.
• Make it known that your will leave if you need to; give yourself permission to do this without recrimination if you find it necessary.

Remember that it probably won’t be this hard next year.

Thanks to the the Neal Center for Griefwork & Healing in Bloomingdale, Illinois