Christmas is a difficult time for those who are grieving. Our Couples Therapist, Dianna Giles, shares her insights into this struggle:
Why can the end of the year be a tricky time for couples to navigate their grief?
When it comes to the Christmas holiday season, couples become more aware that the loss of a pregnancy, baby or child does not just create a single hole in ones’ life. It can create multiple losses or a secondary loss, such as the loss of their ‘normal’. This can include how they interact within this period; their loss of hope, a sense of emptiness that someone is missing, and a loss of joy and celebration. These multiple and secondary losses can create anticipatory anxiety or distress about how they will manage this challenging time and what it will look like as it brings up competing emotions. Couples wonder how they will they navigate the holiday period with a mix of their own and others’ ideals and expectations about this festive season.
Often couples feel a sense of disconnection between themselves and others in their social network, particularly when the couple may be overwhelmed by grief & loss, and others lives appear unchanged or uninterrupted. Couples may also struggle with life slowing down and becoming quiet at the end of year. As they head out on annual leave or are expected to have time with family over the public holidays, it is often at this time when couples become more aware of the real impact of all these primary and secondary losses.
Are there things that can make this time of year even more difficult for a grieving couple?
As this time of the year approaches couples are already anxiously aware of the increased pressures and expectations associated with traditions and celebrations. Often couples in the lead up to this time, struggle with the lack of acknowledgement of their grief and loss by others, and the very real pressure that despite their loss, this Christmas season will be business as usual. This does not give much space for the couple to navigate their own way through the unchartered territory of grief and loss. There is this real pressure to ‘push on’, ‘mask it’ and ‘not upset other people’. Couples struggle with an increased sense of guilt at their level of fatigue, disconnection, exhaustion and distress during this period which limits their capacity to set boundaries with their extended family or friendship network.
Couples with living children may also report struggling with increased guilt associated with their lack of joy and festivity as they attempt to create a Christmas spirit for the benefit of their children. They will feel pressure to celebrate through various childcare and school concerts, break up’s & final assemblies, when in fact, these events magnify their sense of loss.
What suggestions can you make to help couples to reduce their distress over the Christmas and New Year period?
Acknowledge that grief may mean that the Christmas and New Year period will look and feel different. It may include acknowledging that a particular date, time, week, or month may be particularly difficult.
Set gentle boundaries around your immediate family to allow some separation from the expectation and pressures of extended family and friends. Give yourself permission to separate from unconscious or conscious pressures, expectations, guilt, or a fear of upsetting other people. Provide yourself with an ‘out’ if you do attend an event and it becomes overwhelming or challenging.
It is ok with not being ok. Expect that this Christmas and New Year Period may include competing emotions. Grief can show up at any time and it is ok to make space for it when it presents itself.
Create new traditions for your family. This may include new ways of doing things and new ways of continuing bonds with those that are not present.
Factor in quiet time, time out, time away or time in with your partner / children only.
Check in with our partner various times during this period. Remembering that you are both grieving, even though you may be grieving in different ways, check in with each other regularly to validate, provide comfort, connection, safety, and containment.
How can couples therapy help those who have lost a pregnancy, baby or child?
Therapeutic counselling provides a couple who have struggled with infertility, who have experienced a pregnancy loss or loss of a baby or child with a safe space and the scaffolding to hold them as they navigate both grief & loss and exposure to traumatic events within this context.
Working with a couple in this space allows an opportunity both members of the couple to put words around their experiences, their perspective, and their different ways of grieving. Even though a couple has a shared experience of loss with the same outcome, their perspectives, exposure and recovery time are very different. This can mean that couples are often isolated in their grief; they often struggle with a sense of disconnection, abandonment and rejection. Individuals can often feel a sense of confusion at their partners grief responses and may miscue each other when they are support seeking. By supporting a couple to understand each other’s perspectives, their different level of exposure to traumatic events, and their different ways of grieving, it allows a couple to soften and be better able to cue each other in to their support needs during a vulnerable time. Couples often struggle with sitting in each other’s distress as there is a desire to ‘fix it’, ‘avoid it’, or to protect their partner from further pain. In therapy there is a safe space to create strategies to encourage and enhance their capacity to sit in each other’s distress however it shows up with compassion and kindness.
When would you recommend couples counselling?
I am always an advocate for couples seeking counselling support, and in my experience, when we are talking about grief & loss and exposure to traumatic events, it is incredibly valuable. Navigating Grief & Loss can be a complex and complicated place for couples to be and can intrude into other areas of a couple’s life. Counselling support can provide an opportunity for a couple to navigate Grief & Loss following the immediate loss or after multiple losses. It creates insight and awareness about how this event impacts them directly and of their triggers generally within the couple relationship.
Dianna offers both Telehealth consultations and In-Person sessions at Restored Wellbeing, Ashgrove Brisbane. You can book an appointment with her here:
You can read more about Dianna Giles, Couples Therapy and our other services here: