Grief During the Holidays Podcast Episode Transcript

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Welcome to the Remembering a Life podcast. I'm your host, Holly Ignatowski, and today we are talking with Alex Mammadyarov, a writer and psychotherapist specializing in grief about the challenges of grieving during the holidays and how we can continue to move forward in our grief during a time when family and friends are gathering to celebrate. Welcome Alex, and thanks so much for joining me today.

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Thank you for having me.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Alex, what is it about the holidays that can heighten our grief and make it so much more challenging?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Well, when we think of holidays, we tend to think about gathering with our friends and family. And when we do this on the holidays, it ultimately highlights who is and isn't present. So the absence of someone who has died becomes even more heightened than on an average day, and even more logistically, how we spend the holidays can shift after a loss, maybe the person we lost typically hosted, for instance. So now we're adapting to a new tradition, not only grieving the person, but grieving that old tradition that we engaged in.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Alex, is it important that we acknowledge our deceased loved ones during the holidays? And if so, how can we do that without further deepening that sadness?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
As we move further away from the date that we lost a loved one, it can really feel as though the world is moving on without them in the sense that they're being forgotten. So this is why it's so important for others to acknowledge our deceased loved ones, especially around the holidays when we're gathering together. Just because they're no longer physically here, that doesn't mean that the relationship loses any significance. So some ways to incorporate them would be to make time as a family to share holiday memories about them. Something else that you could do is make a dish that they typically brought to the holidays, and you could even do something in their honor like donating or volunteering to an organization they liked or one that you feel they would've liked that supports the most vulnerable during the holidays.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
We all know family dynamics are a little bit challenging and perhaps even more so during the holidays, and we all grieve differently. Nobody grieves the same way. What advice do you have for us in terms of navigating the different styles of grieving when we all come together for that holiday?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yeah, the first step here is just acknowledging that we will all have varied grief experiences even in our shared losses. So the most straightforward way to remind yourself of this is to acknowledge how different our relationships are from each other. So we all bring our uniqueness, who we are and individuals into our relationships, and so if the relationships are unique, then the losses are going to feel unique so we can allow ourselves to feel how we feel and allow others to feel how they feel when we acknowledge this. This will likely impact how we incorporate the person we've lost into our holiday gathering. So I think that communication around this and what each person feels comfortable with is absolutely key.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Inevitably, someone's going to want to talk about it. Let's reminisce. Let's talk through our grief, and then someone else is not going to want to talk about it. They're going to want to put it behind them. So how do we reconcile that?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yeah. Every family dynamic is so unique, including how communication typically plays out, but it is so important to address this in a way that feels safe, perhaps bringing it up to one person in the family who you feel comfortable with. There's always a chance that other family members avoid the subject out of a fear of upsetting others. So the best thing we can do as individuals within a family unit is to communicate our feelings on it and work together on finding a way that we can bring the person we lost into our gatherings in a way that works for everyone.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Many people are so affected by their grief and their loss that they choose to not celebrate the holidays at all, particularly after losing someone during that time. I have a friend who won't put up a Christmas tree. She lost her sister at that time, and you're always marking that anniversary. So how does that person find joy in the holidays again?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yeah, it makes sense that we wouldn't feel up to celebrating the holidays or anything really, especially in the specific way that we celebrated with someone who is no longer here. I think that because it can be really grounding and healing to spend time with our support people, especially around difficult seasons like the holidays, I would recommend considering keeping in mind that everyone is unique and has different needs. If there's room to shift how you gather and with whom, maybe rather than calling it off altogether, finding something new that you can do just to get that support, even if it's not celebrating the actual holiday, how you would have.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
And what do you say to the people who actually do want to join in the festivities, but they feel guilty or they feel like someone's missing, I shouldn't be celebrating because they're gone. How do you help them reengage?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Guilt is such a common part of the grief experience, and the way that I like to frame this is considering self-compassion so that after everything you've been through, of course, you should feel entitled to enjoy yourself, to have some joy. One fear that tends to come up is that if we have recently gone through a loss and we have a moment of joy, others who witness this might assume that we're somehow no longer grieving. So I think it's important to know that we can experience both and communicate that this is the reality of our experience. By saying something like, some days are so hard that I can still smile from time to time doesn't mean my grief is over.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Alex, you hold a commitment to lifelong learning and advocacy around bereavement that opens up a space, as you say in your bio, for people to grieve authentically. Can you explain what that means to grieve authentically?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yeah. Grieving authentically is something that I think is very much tied into what I just shared about acknowledging that grief and joy can exist together. It's being most authentic to yourself in your experience, rather than conforming to whatever you think it is that you're supposed to look like or seem like while you're grieving. So for instance, that is, if it feels most authentic to you to not celebrate a holiday this year, then that's what you do. If it feels like the best thing for you to do and the most authentic thing for you to do is to enjoy yourself, that's what you do. That's really what it comes down to is acknowledging that there's no exact framework or model that you have to follow. You just have to do it feels right for you.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Is there any danger in continuing to avoid holidays, avoid any happy feelings that we might feel guilty about? Is there at some point that we have to move beyond that and find a way to do that?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yeah. I think when it comes to holidays and talking about avoiding them, what that makes me think about is avoiding being around people and leaning into support. I think at some point it's absolutely necessary to do that. And if you're finding it incredibly difficult to enjoy anything in life after a long period of time, it's definitely important to seek support.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
In your approach to counseling, you say that you allow space to explore the possibility that your grief may not dramatically shrink, though you may continue to grow and even thrive, and that's the key to the grieving process, not a rigid timeline. Can you talk about that?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yes. Holding ourselves to a rigid timeline can actually do more harm than good because then it creates the sensation that we're doing something wrong. Not only are we grieving, which is an immensely heavy thing to carry, it's such a complex collection of emotions, and on top of that, we're feeling badly about how we're grieving and that we're somehow not getting it right when in truth, there is no way to get it right. Most people will tell you that after they experience significant loss, the grief never fully goes away. This doesn't mean that you can't enjoy life again. This doesn't mean that you can't have a very fulfilling life, but that grief will always be there. And I think the more that we make friends with that, the better off we are in the long run.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
You also have a social media platform called Grief Uncovered. How can a grieving person use this tool? Where do we find it? Can you talk about that?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Sure. Yeah. So I actually initially named it Grief Uncovered, and now the handle is just my first and last name, Alex Mammadyarov. I sort of have stepped out of the shadows of that title before with grief uncovered, but I called it that because I wanted to shine a light on this subject in a way that I think that people need to see. I think people tend to grieve in an isolated way anyway, and feel that they're very much alone in their experience, and again, like I said, wondering if they're getting it right or wrong, as if there's any way to do that. And so, yeah, on Instagram, I share just brief writings about experiences of grief that I've had or that I've had come up in conversation with others that I've seen in my work, and I think that it can be a helpful tool to engage with just to know that you're not alone and to read something that feels resonant for you.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
I did go to your Instagram page and one particular post caught my interest, and the message was, take care to validate the heaviness of the pain and loss you've experienced and not attach your whole self-concept to it. What does that mean?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
That means that sometimes when we go through traumatic events or very heavy experiences like loss, we can sort of boil our whole lives down to that and feel that that is what our lives are all about now. And it takes a lot of time, and it takes a lot of effort to get out there and keep living our lives for us to feel that that's not who we are. Sometimes people even sort of become bogged down in the sense of bad things happen to me. I'm someone who bad things happen to. And once you've experienced a loss, you're sort of opened up to this reality of, oh my gosh, I could lose more people. And that can really limit our self-concept and our view of our lives. So I think it's important to, on one hand, validate and give credit to what we have gone through and what we've survived, and also not create a whole self-concept around that and know that there will be joy in our lives and there will be more than loss that we go through and experience.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
So it's important for us to remember that the loss does not define us. It's just a part of us. And that's what you help your clients do in your counseling, correct?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Yes. Yeah, that is definitely part of it, as well as making sense of what the relationship meant to them, how they want to move forward, and how they want to carry the relationship with the person that they lost into their lives going forward.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
And you mentioned also in your bio that you've had a lot of personal loss experience since your childhood. I would imagine that's where all of your knowledge comes from. So I'm going to ask you, Alex, which I ask all my guests, who are you remembering today?

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Oh, I'm remembering today who I'm always remembering. Those are my parents, Karen and Billy. I lost them when I was a child and teenager. I lost my mother, Karen when I was 14, and my dad Billy when I was just eight years old. And yeah, I'm always remembering them, and they're such a huge part of the work that I do.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
Sounds like they're always with you. Thank you for joining me today, Alex, and for your unique approach to helping people get through difficult times, particularly during the holidays.

ALEX MAMMADYAROV:
Thank you so much for having me.

HOLLY IGNATOWSKI:
To learn more about moving in your grief visit RememberingALife.com.