Most of my blog articles are geared towards couples. This one’s different because we’re going through a world-wide pandemic, and it is important to address things that are affecting almost everyone in the world. I’ll loop back to how this applies to couples at the end.
I was talking to some colleagues and tried to get to the root of what we’re all feeling during the Covid-19 pandemic. The term “ambiguous loss” came up. When we’ve experienced something that’s easily identifiable, we can point to it and say,”I just lost my father,” or,”I lost my job.” But we’re not experiencing that. Instead, we’re seeing death tolls, seeing eerily empty streets and being told some version of you may/will/have lost your job.
So some of the energy-sapping effects of loss come to you - you still feel anxious, you still feel a depressive blanket, you feel loss, but you can’t quite put a finger on it. Have you lost someone? No, but people are dying. Have you lost your job? Maybe not, but your friends have gotten furloughed, and there’s this notion that if this goes on for too long, you will lose your job. Are people leaving you? No, but social distancing signals like empty streets tell you that you’re alone in this.
So there’s no bucket to put this in. You can’t see what your family does with this kind of loss and place it there. There’s no grounding activity or ritual that people use to deal with this loss. No funerals when there’s no one close who’s died. No support group for people who aren’t sure they’ve lost something.
What may start helping
But if you can name what’s happening, even just to say that it’s an ambiguous loss, the underlying emotions can have less control over how you conduct your life. The feelings aren’t the same for everyone. Some people can feel a real dampening in their emotional life, a depression of sorts. Some people can experience an increased anxiety around the ambiguous loss. For some people, the anxiety can increase to the point of panic.
What are you doing in reaction to your ambiguous loss? Are you disconnecting from loved ones? Are you reacting irritably to your kids? Are you being critical to your spouse?
It can feel like you’re being driven into a vortex or whirlpool of sorts. Like a cartoon character being sucked into a whirlpool, we flail and scream and the people around us can bear the brunt of that flailing and screaming. The good news is that there are things you can do, starting with simply recognizing what is happening. You can produce a counter-vortex of sorts.
Something you can do in relationship
The counter vortex is the thing you do in the world to move against the chaos that initially traps you. Recognizing your feelings of loss is part of creating that counter-vortex. As you recognize that ambiguous loss is driving your behaviors, you can start naming it to yourself, then to others who love you. Telling your partner that you’re experiencing ambiguous loss can help alleviate some of the stress that you both feel. It can help you start taking action to stop reflexive actions and it can help your loved ones extend grace to you instead of fighting against you.
If you want to know more about marriage counseling, stop by my marriage counseling page to find out more. If you’re overwhelmed by sadness or anxiety around this ambiguous loss and you need to talk, I’m available by video or phone. You can email me on my contact page here. You can also call 612.230.7171, or you can just book a short 15 miinute phone session with me to see if I’m a match by clicking on the button below.
Take good care.