Pandemic Grief
Updated: Mar 5, 2025
As we approach yet another anniversary of the COVID pandemic, I've been thinking a lot about grief. Often when we think of grief we think of losing a loved one, or maybe you think about the popular concept of "the five stages of grief." While no grief is ever easy, pandemic grief feels especially complex.
Pandemic grief is layered and multifaceted. It's not just one loss, but many different losses both big and small. We are grieving people, places, experiences, opportunities, hobbies, careers, passions, and even our own identities. There is grief for the past, for people that are no longer part of our lives, for milestones we couldn't celebrate, for events we had to skip, for opportunities we had to pass up on, and for places that were no longer safe to go. There is grief for the present, for limited opportunities to connect with likeminded people, for the shaming and dismissive attitudes of loved ones and medical professionals, for professional opportunities that are inaccessible, or feeling like you aren't where you imagined you'd be at this point in your life. There is grief for the uncertainty of the future, for not knowing if or when we might be able to safely access medical care, share a meal with loved ones, travel, find a partner, start a family, and many more.
One of the hardest parts of pandemic grief, and pandemic trauma, is that it is ongoing. This is not a distinct event from the past that we can integrate and move on from. It's hard to heal in an environment that continues to traumatize us. If you're struggling with pandemic grief you're not alone. I see you, I hear you, I validate you, I'm sending warmth and compassion to you.
If you're looking for a community space to compassionately witness our pandemic grief, my wonderful colleague Liz Fitzgerald LCSW and I are facilitating an event on Tuesday March 25th at 5:15-6:45 PST. While Liz and I are both COVID conscious therapists, this is not a therapy group, so all are welcome to join regardless of your location. You can RSVP here through 3/21/25: bit.ly/COVIDwitnessing
If you're in California looking to process pandemic grief with a COVID conscious therapist, please feel free to reach out to me.
Useful read, thanks for sharing. I edit a lot of photos for my own posts and cleaning up distractions is always the slowest part, so Remove Objects has been handy for that.
https://removeobjects.video/
This really resonates with me. The idea that pandemic grief is ongoing and not a single event hits home. I also found best ai tools helpful for organizing my thoughts. Thanks for sharing this.
If “all are welcome regardless of location” is true, how does the March 25th, 5:15–6:45 PST witnessing space handle the 3:15 a.m. caregiving hour and the 3/21/25 RSVP cutoff? I keep a grief-load calculator for overlapping losses, not a single event, and that one-off Liz Fitzgerald LCSW room still asks people to be in two places at once.
March 25th at 5:15–6:45 PST lands at 3:15 a.m. here, and I’m the only one awake with an immunocompromised partner, so “all are welcome regardless of location” doesn’t cover caregiving hours. Liz Fitzgerald LCSW’s non-therapy space sounds close to what I need, but I can’t RSVP by 3/21/25 for a time I can’t attend. I keep a private pandemic grief journaling log instead, though it’s thin substitute for witnessing.
The point about pandemic grief being ongoing rather than a distinct event stuck with me. I keep a journal for losses I can't name, and using a cursive handwriting worksheet generator for grief journaling helps me slow down enough to actually feel them. Last week I wrote to a friend I drifted from and admitted how much the missed milestones still ache. We're not fixed yet, and that's okay.