It’s Summertime and the livin’s easy … Unless You’re Grieving a Loved One
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What’s Grief Like in the Summertime?
Here we are in the midst of summertime. The days are long and from sunrise to sunset, there is an emphasis on enjoying the fun of the summer season, wearing a cheerful smile on your face. After all, it’s summer time and the livin’s easy,” as Ella Fitzgerald’s classic song goes.
But what if you were just hit with the most awful experience of a lifetime?
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Your loved one has died. Grief can be more intense in the summertime, because it may seem to you as if everyone else is out there having a great time. Especially in the first summer after a loss, the absence of that summer joy can be felt very acutely.
Wintertime grieving somehow feels easier for people, since their mood matches the darkness of the days, the bitter cold temperatures (depending upon where you live) and the “indoors” mentality during the season.
Whether you want it or not, summer is here.
Here are some thoughts that might give you some perspective as you navigate the next few sunny months.
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UNDERSTAND that it’s okay to not want to spend the months feeling sunny and celebratory.
UNDERSTAND that it’s okay to indulge in your favorite summertime activities, even though you are grieving.
Enjoying yourself does NOT mean you are not grieving. It does NOT mean that you stopped loving or missing your loved one. It means that you are willing to still try to do what you enjoying. After all, you are still alive.UNDERSTAND that healing begins with taking care of yourself too. That includes getting fresh air as well as vitamin D from the sun, taking advantage of the nice weather to take a walk and get moving a little.
Fresh air and outdoors can sometimes clear your head too, and make you feel a little lighter during tough times.BE CREATIVE. On a good day, you might want to take a favorite activity and do it in a special way to honor your loved one. If you spend some playing tennis with him or her, try to play a game or two and do it in their honor.
If the summer included at least one lobster roll meal or a soft ice cream cone, treat yourself to whatever it is that helps you remember and be comforted by that special memory. It’s perfectly okay to enjoy something even if your loved one can no longer do so. Remember, you’re still alive.TRY SOMETHING NEW. Decide to start a new summer ritual. Make new memories with new people. If you feel up to it, take a trip. Meet new people. Take up a new activity. It will help lift your spirits in a healthy way.
REMEMBER that summers will get better. Grief feels like it will ever end, but it will ease up and become less painful as time goes by.
MOST IMPORTANTLY, let yourself do whatever makes you feel as okay as you can feel.
If you need to be reminded of your rights as a mourner, click here for the Mourner’s Bill of Rights.
Photo by Dimitar Kazakov on Unsplash
One of the renowned experts in the field of grief, the late Darcie Sims, writes beautifully about handling summertime while grieving, in her piece, “A Breath of Summer - Anytime.” Click here to read her article.
One smart move might be to look for a support group with a group of like-minded people going through the summer grief experience too.
And it might be a good time to seek out a grief counselor too. My clients have told me that it is helpful to have support as they try to navigate their “new normal” and have a space to vent the “un-sunny” side of themselves as they grieve.
