New ways in strange days

This weekly column seeks to help educate our community about emotional healing through grief. People may write questions to Golden Willow Retreat and they will be answered privately to you and possibly as a future article for others. Please list a first name that grants permission for printing.

Dear Dr. Ted:

I am watching people pour gasoline on the house of fire called COVID-19. As Thanksgiving arrives, I see on the news airports full, families gathering and other festivities that seem to be just a bonfire of COVID carrying sickness and death. Why is this happening and why can’t people stay at home so we can get past these strange days of a pandemic?

Thanks, Panic Attack

Dear Panic:

This will not be published until after Thanksgiving but there are plenty more holidays arriving and you will probably see similar social and spiritual activities happening all over the world, in which human activities may go against science and possibly, common sense. Panic is a state of urgency for safety, to allow health and avoid death within the brain. It shows this issue is real for you and causes your system to acknowledge this is deadly.

To help decrease panic in myself, I try to look at the big picture and then shrink it down to what it is that I can do to make a difference, rather than be overwhelmed and paralyzed by the enormity of the situation.

I’m sorry that safety and health became a political gesture and a statement of freedom, rather than discernment of the choice to work towards the safety and wellness of all.

Impulsivity, irritability and lack of self-control are all impacted as you become exhausted from the pandemic. Trauma and COVID fatigue are real issues, and as that exhaustion and suppression increases, more and more people are making impulsive decisions. Others are choosing to honor their rituals and ceremonies for familial and spiritual reasons. You are correct, we will see another spike on top of the present COVID spike due to small and large gatherings, in other words, anywhere you have shared air with others. Yet finding ways to honor family, ceremony, and ritual are very important and healing.

During these very strange times, you can use your imagination to step out of the box of the “usual” way of doing things, as the box of normalcy has been crushed for the time being. New ways of connecting and finding ritual is what is being presented to each of us in our own ways.

Online connection, oldfashioned letters, social media, coordinated events such as vigils, prayer, candle lighting, Shabbat, cooking, and any way to still help relinquish the hunger to commune with one another, is being demanded of each of us in these strange times. Being conscious of your own exhaustion and feelings of futility can be diluted by finding what you can do rather than what you should not be doing.

My hope is that each of us find ways to celebrate the holidays in new and creative ways so that we can get on the other side of the curve of COVID-19, healthy and safe. You may not be able to change other people’s behaviors but you can make conscious and creative choices in your actions during this time in which a pandemic is demanding we step out of the old and honor the present times with new rituals and celebrations.

I wish you well. Until next week, take care.