Being Thankful that You Have a Government Mandated Reason to Avoid Your Dysfunctional Family

 

          

 

It is Thanksgiving Day of what has been something of a surreal world filled with drudgery and suffering that has probably not been shared by more people at the same time in this world than any time in human history.   

Yes, there have been world wars but never have so many people across all seven continents have had to take isolation and quarantine precautions due to the pandemic of Covid-19.  According to the World Health Organization, there have been 57.8 million cases of Covid-19 and 1.3 million deaths from it since they started keeping score. (https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/weekly-epidemiological-update---24-november-2020)

We have been strongly encouraged by government officials to practice “social distancing,” which means we are to stay about six feet apart from each other.   The “steps” taken by government officials also has meant shutting down sectors of the economy, which has meant economic hardship for many people who have not worked in “essential” jobs. 

So, many people have been isolated, not being able to go anywhere and stuck in their thoughts about how they are going to make it. Children have been kept home from school and not being allowed to go out and play with friends.  

This blog is more slanted to the United States and North America, but our societal traditions and calendars have been disrupted.  Where I live in Louisville, Kentucky, the Kentucky Derby is normally a rite of the Month of May where the best thoroughbred horses race, and Covid forced that race to run the first week of September on Labor Day.  The National Hockey League played for the Stanley Cup in September.   As I write, the Macys Thanksgiving Parade is going on right now and it just does not seem the same without crowds of people (they hinted that they taped portions earlier in the week in the name of Covid precautions).   Many of our lives go with the rhythm of the calendar and the seasons that Covid has made us feel out of sorts as a society.

That brings us to the holiday season which is supposed to start today.   I debated whether or not to write this year for the few people who have read this including my aunt by marriage. I thought as I was loading the turkey breast into the smoker . . . absolutely, I should write.  This could be the year people read this stuff.

So, it’s Thanksgiving, It’s Covid.  What can you say about a day like this: Why not be thankful you don’t have to see the dysfunctional family today, and put up with their political speeches and awkward questions you don’t want to answer, and unsolicited suggestions?   

I was thinking about that as I was recalling a phone conversation with a family member a few months ago and the family member (probably after a few glasses of wine) was repetitively telling me that my choice for president was a piece of $%*!.  Mind you, I will probably call the family member today and hopefully, the conversation will be polite and end with “We love you.” However, there are people out there who have such a deep-seated painful family history that there is no desire to talk let alone see them on Zoom.

Covid gives people a government-mandated excuse not to see those people, have a controlled conversation and then hang up and go back to binge-watching Netflix, some other streaming video or You Tube.     Maybe that is something to be thankful for?  

Anyway, if this is the first time you have seen this blog, and you are looking for coping or survivng the holidays, feel free to scoll back.  I have written 105 previous posts about many different topics.

I plan to explore grief and loss and loneliness in the next few weeks on this blog.  I would like to encourage you to help me make this viral.  This is not a monetized blog (or at least I don’t think it is) and I am interested in helping as many people as possible in getting through the holidays.

Anxiety about It not Being the Same Again and Maybe Other Stuff.

Much of the material I have seen and heard about grief and loss at the holidays is that they will never be the same again.  Holidays are very much about traditions.  Traditions make up some of the glue that bind our relationships. 

Family traditions in and of themselves mean nothing outside of our relationships. They have a role in the identity we have as families. Traditions have an implicit role in the intimacy (degree of closeness) we have with family.  Identity and intimacy play much into our emotional security as individuals.

When we do not have the emotional security from families we feel a kind of anxiety called insecurity.  We do not feel safe and we may feel some form of abandonment.  We want to belong and fit in but it is not there.  Maybe the parents did not really comprehend that they were supposed to create traditions to create security for their children, and maybe some of us were those children.

When the loved one dies who had a part of the tradition, or led in carrying on the tradition, things can feel loose and shaky.    The grief and loss means the security of the tradition does not necessarily exist or at least to the degree it used to exist.

If the death of the family member of loved one shook enough people in the family, there is a change in the emotional state of all family members.  Other than depression, words that may be appropriate descriptors of the feelings are insecurity, weirdness and discomfort—which are all synonyms for anxiety.   These feelings can change the color of things where a white cloudy sky seems gray or the blue sky feels darker.   This collective and individual state of emotions clearly is not good.

If there was not the family tradition that we shared with others, then we have what seems to be other forms of anxiety that include loneliness, abandonment or even envy or jealousy.  The loneliness means we are by ourselves and we have unmet needs for security.  The abandonment is a strange form of anxiety that can make adults act like children even if they are highly educated or erudite in their speech.  The envy or jealousy (feel the same but different in substance) is a strange brew of anger and anxiety where we are both angry and anxious that we do not have what others have.  Again, having any of these emotions does not feel good. 

It serves to add that negative emotions are extremely powerful forces.  They affect our behavior. People do incredible, irrational things because they have strong feelings.  Feelings can intoxicate people and affect good judgment; when people are anxious or angry impulses rule.   Hopefully we can cope through the feelings and show good judgment and keep our heads on straight

Turning the Corner: Coping

As we are looking to cope and survive through these times, it probably helps to at least admit that we are not feeling good.  Admitting our emotional state is the start of taking steps to improve it.

It also probably helps to admit in the face of a death of a family member that some of our fellow surviving family members are not going to be any good in actually helping us to get through the time depending on their functioning and credibility; they may be crazy and they may not be people who respect us as individuals with their stupidity and patronizing.     

These are the times where we sometimes have to take responsibility for our own anxiety.

If we dwell on negatives we will continue to feel negative and anxious.  We don’t know how things are going to be in the future, but we are capable of handling it.  If we can get our mind on something positive or something different we may be able to change our feeling in the moment. 

The holidays have just saturated many of us with negative feelings that coping is not a magical experience: it does not make the negative feelings away.  It makes them manageable. 

In the end, we have to admit that managing our anxiety in whatever feeling grief brings is hard work. Anxiety has a way of making us feel like the frog in the kettle--it raises the temperature of the water slowly and can overtake us without us having the insight we are feeling it.  

Admittedly, just thinking good thoughts by themselves doesn't necessarily do the job.  Sometimes we need to get busy and get our whole selves into it; we must do things that generate better feelings or at least reduce our negative feelings.

At least the holidays do not last forever; they end and we can get back to our normal selves--whatever that truly is.

I hope that this helped you.  If you liked it, please re-post and pass it on and help someone else.