On Friday, RCSE hosted its last meeting of 2020. President Laura Lane McKinnon announced that the club would be taking a break from meetings in January due to COVID-19 and was hopeful to resume hybrid meetings in February. Once all Rotary business items were discussed, Laura Lane introduced our speaker - fellow Rotarian Jamey Espina with Hospice Savannah.
Jamey has worked at Hospice Savannah for 18 years and spoke to the club about grief. He said holidays are especially hard since we grieve through our senses and there are many sensory experiences during the holidays. This year might prove to be even more difficult due the unique circumstances we find ourselves in due to COVID-19 and not being able to go through our normal process of mourning.
Jamey said we grieve because we love. We are wired to love which also means we are wired to grieve. Grief is the pain of losing a person who is most significant in our life. It is about a relationship or bond not a title (Mom, Dad, etc) and has a physical and emotional response. The first thing people do when dealing with grief is to find their safe zone which could be another person, a place or God. People tend to become numb at first which protects them from their feelings. Numbness usually wears off within 3 months and that is when the grief hits.
The goal of the mourner is to make sense of the loss. The greatest way to make sense of the loss it to tell your story. This is why people are encouraged to attend grief counseling. Some scenarios will never make sense and some people have such strong spirituality that they are able to let go of the loss.
He then said we do a disservice to those in grief when we say 1. I know they are in a better place and 2. Let me know what I can do to help. The best thing we can do for someone is to allow them to tell their story uninterrupted and if we want to help, we need to be specific and say "I'm bringing you food - is Tuesday or Wednesday better?"
Men and women also grieve differently. Women are more likely to tell stories and to experience all of their emotions. Women know that not all things can be solved. Men are conditioned to solve, fix and cure a problem and tend to always say they are doing great. Children tend to grieve naturally. Two effective tools when dealing with grief are 30 minutes of walking and journaling daily. All bereavement services at Hospice Savannah are free. Through the Full Circle Grief and Loss Center, Hospice Savannah provides a team of qualified and experienced bereavement staff to deal with the emotional and psychological consequences of a loss. To learn more about these services, please visit https://www.hospicesavannah.org/fullcircle