Holidays Without Your Loved One: How to Cope

We know that you are going to rise up from this. We know that you can move forward without leaving behind your loved one. Because love, my friend, transcends death.

Happy Thanksgiving.

I am so happy it's finally Thanksgiving week. This is my favorite holiday all year long, and I just have so much gratitude in my heart. And gratitude is such a strong value. I think you know that if you've heard the podcast of this month. But I want to dedicate this podcast to you. If you or someone you love has experienced a recent loss or a great adversity that prevents you from feeling thankful and from really like enjoying and being excited about the anticipation of holidays in general, not just Thanksgiving. Right. Because Thanksgiving, in a way, begins the holidays of Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's. So this podcast is for you if you are struggling with tapping into gratitude. If you have recently lost someone and you can't imagine doing holidays or living life without him or her.

I want to be of support to you, and I hope and trust that this episode will serve you. I love Thanksgiving, but it hasn't always been that way. In 2013, after I lost my daughter, she went to heaven on August 25th of that year, and three months later, we're traveling to my brothers and reuniting with the entire family to celebrate my favorite holiday. And I was a turkey. You can imagine that turkeys are not happy during Thanksgiving because we're trying to kill them to eat them. I felt like a turkey. I was in a dark place. I was not connecting with gratitude. I was with the people I loved the most, and I was really excited to be with them and see them. And at the same time, I felt like a stranger, like, out of place. I remember that was the first time we were all getting together after the funeral, and I felt like they were looking at me to see how I was doing. I felt, like, observed and judged and pitied and all the things I felt out of whack. I remember that particular year I was sleeping in my brother's basement in Georgia. And the basement room didn't have any windows. It was very dark. So I spent a lot of time there. Like, I slept there, I took naps there. I would go and hang out whenever I needed a little escape or a little break. And I remember feeling so at home in the darkness of that room. Like, my heart was dark, the outside was dark. It felt aligned. And I think we all have a right to experience grief, to experience darkness, to be in a funk, to be down, to be sad, to be depressed. It's okay. It's okay to have those moments. And yes, the holidays are supposed to be to celebrate and to be jolly and to be grateful and other things, but sometimes it's just not that way. And I think the first step to having, like, getting through the holidays in a graceful, peaceful way is acceptance. Accept that this holiday may not be what you want it to be, and it's okay. This is the season of life you're in, and you get to feel the fields. The only way around pain is through. So in order to heal this pain that you're experiencing now, you get to sit with it. You get to feel it. So let's talk a little bit about how to prepare for the holidays, how to celebrate them and how to heal from them, right? Like how to heal through them so that no painful experience is wasted because the idea of pain is to be healed. You know, they, you know, we talk about healing, emotional healing. And what is that feeling? Feeling is healing. The more you feel, the more you heal. And the only way around pain is through. And pain is only the path, never the destination, my friend. So if you're in pain right now, you are en route to healing, to joy. You are, you're on your way. Something is happening inside of you. So honor this process. You are. You're not just doomed. You're not just in darkness, because that's where you're where you belong or where you're going to be forever. You're not a griever. Don't, please don't identify with any of those titles. You are experiencing grief, but it's not who you are. So let's feel the pain with hope, understanding that this is just the path, but not the destination. And while you feel that hope in the middle of the pain.

You get to release a little bit of the suffering, the heartache, because you know that this pain is just. It's just healing you. It's taking you somewhere. It's not what you're meant to experience for the rest of your life. So I am going to give you permission to. To feel the feels and not be happy. Go lucky these holidays if that's not what you feel like experiencing, but do so with hope. Allow yourself to grieve and to feel with hope. Because again, pain is only the path, never the destination. El Dolores, El Camino, Nun, Cal Destino. And it's the path where. The path to healing and joy. So honoring where you're at right now, I would like to give you some pointers that I wish somebody would have told me so that that Thanksgiving wouldn't have been as dark as it was. And so I could have seen the light and the hope in the middle of the darkness that I was in. I really, really pray and hope it blesses you. And if there's someone that you feel must listen to this because you want. You love them and you want to support them, because please share the episode or share the tools that I share with you here. Okay, Deal. All right. Well, thank you for that. I want to begin with a quote that I think is true for so much, not just this process so much. You know, when you're, like, scared of having a difficult conversation with someone, or you have to give constructive feedback to someone you love. Like, you're like. Or. Or you're gonna be on a big stage or you have a big competition or a tournament or a big event, and you're nervous and scared about it.

Always the anticipation is harder than the actual experience. Typically, you're freaking out before. And when the time comes, you're like, oh, it wasn't that bad. Well, Seneca has a similar quote that says, we suffer more in imagination than in reality. So the anticipation of the holidays is always going to be more painful, harder than the actual experience. And there are things that you can do to make this so. So that, like, even the pre. Like the pre. The preparing for is not as excruciating as it often is. Right? Like, we're so scared of how we're going to feel when our person is not sitting at the table and is not exchanging gifts and Christmas and is not their present with us, because typically, they had a really important role in anything that we do that is. That matters. So remember that we suffer more in imagination than in reality. And today, my purpose is to give tools for your imagination to serve you as opposed to hurt you and create more of that suffering. How do we prepare for Thanksgiving? How do we prepare for the holidays in general? I want to say there's, like, three main steps. Number one, we are going to welcome pain. We're going to accept it. We're going to embrace it. We're going to allow it. Many times the people who love us are like, don't cry. Please don't cry. Like, no, it's okay. Okay, let's go shopping in Black Friday so you don't have to think about this, or, no, allow the pain. If you understand that pain. Feeling is healing, that pain is the path. Why are we going to want to get rid of it? Allow it. If your loved one is going through this grief, let them cry. Let Them feel, let them be in a funk. Let them have moments where they go into that dark room in the basement. It's okay. And if you are the one going through it, allow it, embrace it. Like, feel how it's healing. You don't fight pain. Pain is your friend. And if you want to learn more about this, go to the third episode where I talk about the process through which you overcome the faith method, which is the process through which you overcome any adversity and any grieving experience. So, number two, you're going to become aware. You're going to allow this moment to give you the opportunity and the container to experience, like, clarity, awareness, and understand what is the hardest part of this. What are your thoughts? Become an observer, a loving observer, not a judgmental one. Become an observer of your thoughts. Become an observer of your feelings. Become an observer of your triggers. Like what? Like what guns goes through your mind? Like, are you thinking like, I'm never going to be happy again without him or her? Are you thinking like, oh, look at these people acting as if nothing happened? Or are you thinking maybe like, the world has gone on, like, holidays are in and people are so happy and I'm miserable. Like, why are they so insensible and not stop life for a second? What are your thoughts? Just pay attention to them. Pay attention to how you feel and how those thoughts make you feel. Like, are you in a funk? Do you feel down? Do you feel exhausted? Are you sad? Do you feel like crying all the time? Are you angry? Are you irritable? Are you, like, talking back at everybody who says anything to you because you're so angry and, you know, irritable, upset at reality. Like, notice, notice your thoughts, notice your feelings, notice the people, like, how they respond. And, like, see if maybe there's something that the people around you, your family members, your loved ones are doing that bother you. Become aware of that and take notes. When you create awareness, you gain clarity on what is perpetuating the pain, what is feeding the pain. There's a story about.

I think it was a grandfather who was talking to his grandkids and he's telling him, like, you know, there's two wolves in your mind. There's the good wolf and the bad wolf. The good wolf is the one that gives you, like, the positive thoughts and you got this and let's go. You're capable of it. Like, the one that's feeding you positive feeling, feelings, experiences, and encouraging you. And then there's the bad wolf, which is the one saying, like, you ain't got this. You suck at this. Like, you're never gonna get over this. You're, you know, you're never gonna be happy again. And the kid asked the grandpa, like, hey, grandpa, like, who. You know, these two wolves, they're always fighting. He was saying, like, two wolves that are. That are fighting, they're like on a battle. And the kid was curious and asked like, hey, grandpa, like, who wins? Who wins? Who wins this battle? And the grandpa said, the one you feed. So if you're aware of what your good wolf is doing, saying, encouraging you to do, and the. And the bad wolf is, you know, like, what he is trying to prevent you from doing and how it's trying to prevent you from moving forward and how it's bringing upon yourself that. That feeling of hopelessness. And when you create awareness of what, who, how, then you can choose to feed the good wolf and still acknowledge and accept that the bad wolf is also there to help you heal. Help you heal. That's it. You and I were created for greatness. We were created to rise. You know, talking about holidays, a holiday that's coming on later on is Easter. And we know from the 40 days of Lent that season does not end on Good Friday. It does not end on death. It doesn't end on grief, on fear, on pain. Lent ends on Good Friday. Resurrection, on life, on joy. We know the ending to this story. We know that you are going to rise up from this. We know that you can move forward without leaving behind your loved one. Because love, my friend, transcends death. I love my daughter. I adore my daughter now more than ever. And she's not here to earn that love. She doesn't do cute things and gets good grades and, And. And hugs me and, and. And helps me around the house to like for me to love her. And yet my love continues to grow for her. In fact, she's the reason I'm here today speaking to you. Love transcends death. So I was able to move forward and rise up without leaving my Fofi behind. She's part of my life. She's part of me. I continue to be her mom, although I think she has more things to teach me than I have to teach her. And I love her. You can move forward without leaving behind. You can experience and enjoy holidays while still honoring her or him, like I did. So, number one, accept welcome. Embrace that pain as a healer with hope. Number two, create awareness. What are your thoughts? What are your feelings? What bothers you? What do you like? And then, number three, take Action. Change the paradigm. Choose. And that's in your control. So when you've already allowed yourself to feel and you already know what triggers the pain, what are the thoughts that you have that you're engaging with and believing? Because that's ultimately why we feel a certain way. It's because we believe our thoughts, but our thoughts are not who we are. Our thoughts are a part of us, but it's not who we are. We are the loving observer, the spirit, the soul that God created to listen to those thoughts in this human experience. So you create that awareness. And now you choose. What thoughts are you going to believe? Which ones are you going to reframe? Are you going to change the perspective with which you're looking at it? Which ones are you going to allow? Because you recognize that you need to feel it in order to heal it. What conversations are you gonna have with who? Because what they're doing is triggering you. Let's say, like, if someone were to tell me, don't cry, or don't get into the room or don't, you know, like, get out of bed. And what I need, I know in my heart, is to just feel I need to have a conversation with that person and be like, I know you're wanting to protect me. I know you love me and you don't wanna see me suffering. But what I need from you right now, Mom. What I need from you right now, brother, sister, dad, grandma, is for you to hold space. Let me be sad. Let me be sad. Soon we'll be in a holiday and I'll be happy. Go lucky like I used to. But what I need right now is for you to not be selfish and give me the space and sit with me in the space of me being sad so that I have this time to heal. Educate the people around you. Teach them how they can support you. They don't know. They don't know. Especially if you've never been in these shoes.

I never understood pain and grief more than I did when I felt it, when I experienced it, in my core. So, number one, welcome the pain as a healer with hope. Number two, become a loving observer, not a judgmental one. Oh, my gosh. I shouldn't be sad because my poor family, they haven't seen me in so long, or my kids are going to. I need to protect them. Like, give yourself permission and just observe them. They're not who you are. And then take action. Choose, decide. What are you going to believe in terms of your thoughts or the people, the things that people tell you and who do you need to talk to? Who do you want to educate? What do you Just get real and take action to support yourself and teach others how to be there for you as well. So now that we know how to prepare for the holiday, we get to talk about how do we celebrate. Number one, we celebrate the way it feels right to us. I know that when planning for holidays, this is something that many of my clients went through. They were like, but I have to tell them if it's going to be in our house, as usually, or if I'm going to go or not going to go. And I just don't know. I don't know what I'm going to want that day. It's okay to say just that. I don't know. Can I tell you the day before or the day off? Can we have a plan B just in case it's okay to not know? I wouldn't know either. I don't know how I'm gonna feel. I don't know if I'm gonna wanna host because maybe on the one hand, like, I wanna honor my husband by continuing to host the thing that we did together, or I wanna honor my daughter by continuing the traditions that we did with her. Maybe that's a thought, right? Like, oh, that would be nice. But what if I really don't feel like honoring, hosting, doing anything? Like, what if I just want to lock myself in the basement dark room and be in darkness? I get it. So if you can't plan ahead, that's part of the number three, the step number three of preparing for the holidays, like taking action and making choices. Maybe one of those choices or actions is talking to your family and saying, like, I don't know, can we have plan A and plan B? And can we have someone in charge of informing the rest of the family whenever I finally make my mind up of what feels right and in peace. So when you're celebrating, you celebrate the way it feels, right? There are some people who will set the table and put a place for the person you're missing. And others may think that's crazy. Oh, my gosh, she's in denial. What is wrong with this person? This cannot be healthy. Says who? Maybe it is. What matters is that you feel peace. You may not be happy about it, but do you have peace with setting that? Leaving an empty chair with the plate set up and everything for your person? I'm not saying you should do this, but some people may feel like they want to do that. And I want to let you know you're not crazy. If you want to do that, that's okay. There's other people who want to, you know, want to continue the tradition to honor. There's others who want to do something completely different so that the tradition doesn't remind them even more of what they're missing. What. What feels right for you. I don't think there's a right answer. Maybe you don't want to mention your person. I'm the kind of person who loves to mention Fofi wherever I go. And I wanted it to be, like, open. I wanted any everybody to know it's okay. I want to hear about her. I don't want you to, like, not talk about it because you're scared of how I'm going to feel. Because then that makes me feel like, are we, like, trying to, like, ignore what's happening here? Like, that would be worse for me. However, my husband, it didn't serve him to look at pictures having her be mentioned all the time. Like, so we're different people. What feels right and what is in alignment with your peace? Peace is the path. And if you listened to the podcast two weeks ago, you. You know how to discern the voice of God from your own. And the voice of God comes with peace. That's the magic. That's the secret. So what feels like peace in terms of how you celebrate this and follow that? That's number one. Celebrate the way it feels peaceful and right in your heart. Number two is acknowledge and honor your loved one the way it feels right for you. Meaning I wanted to mention her. So when we prayed, I mentioned her. It was probably in the light of something sad, and we were all crying in our thanksgiving prayer, and. But.

I just cannot not mention her. So it felt right to me. I wanted her to be named. I wanted her to be talked about. That was my way of keeping her memory alive, keeping her presence at a time that I so desperately needed to feel her. So honor your loved one the way it feels, right? Maybe it's by cooking something that he or she really loved or saying a prayer that he or she would always say. Or having a tradition, right, like, honor your loved one.

That's the secret of moving forward. Moving forward without leaving behind. The secret of moving forward is bringing that being with you. Because love transcends death and because we are not just the physical body. The physical body may be gone, but the spirit remains. The relationship is. Is probably stronger than ever. So honor that person. Keep their memory alive. Allow for.

For him or her to be here. Ph spiritually Present since he or she cannot be physically present. And then number three, there's an opportunity to create new traditions. Do you want to do something in him, his or her honor? Do you want to, maybe you want to go to the cemetery first thing in the morning with your family or maybe you want to go to mass. That was a tradition we. Or to church. That was a tradition that we, we started with in my case, like I would, in every anniversary of her passing, my husband and I would go to the morning mass at church. And it was so healing and rewarding and beautiful. And it's been 12 years since the passing of Fofi. And in every anniversary, like in her birthday, we also, we always go to mass first thing in the morning. It's part of what brings comfort to us. And then, you know, we instead of going some, instead of going to the cemetery on her birthday, we go visit the priest who baptized her and who's really close to us. If you've heard episode number one, you know a little bit about him because it's his birthday too. He shares a birthday with my daughter. So we go and we're. It's a way of thanking him and loving on him. We'll go visit him or you know, we've created new traditions that like that are light and love filled and bring joy and it's like, they're like caresses to our hearts. What works for you? Is it going to the funeral? Is it doing a prayer in her memory? Is it going to church? Is it going out to feed the homeless? Is it running a 5k a turkey in one of those turkey trots that, that they have out there? What, what can you do to create a new tradition that, that keeps that the memory alive? You can get creative with that. And then lastly, we are going to talk about how to heal through the celebrations of these holidays. I would say number one, we, we can redirect our pain to service. I believe that service and suffering cannot coexist.

When you're serving someone, when you're doing for others, you're shifting your focus to doing good for someone else. So the focus that you had with a spotlight on you, which is suffering, suffering and pain are self centered. They're all encompassing. When you have a toothache or a back pain that doesn't let you walk, you know, you can't think about anything else. All you think about is how it hurts. It's hard to like focus on someone else. So when you shift your focus to doing good to someone else in need, to someone else who's also suffering or maybe is less fortunate than you are. You are redirecting focus from pain to purpose. You are redirecting focus or the experience from suffering to service. So that's a way of healing. That doesn't mean that we're not going to allow ourselves to feel. But don't stay in the feeling. The feeling is just to heal. If you want to be intentional about leveraging this pain, about not wasting it, then find a way to heal with it with more intention, even more intention. So, number one, redirect your pain to purpose, your suffering to service, and find something that you can do for others. So again, maybe this is handing out food to the homeless. Maybe it's raising funds for that turkey truck and offering it to a charity that you feel connected to. Maybe it's cooking for the people in Thanksgiving and that's your way of serving your family and your loved ones.

Maybe it's volunteering somewhere, I don't know. Right. Like, you get to be creative with that, but redirect your pain to purpose so that your. Your suffering is not wasted, so that it means something. And in the process, you'll be healed. I promise.

Number two, in the process of healing, you get to take the time to look back and process the whole experience of that holiday. So when I was on my way back home from Georgia, which is where I spent Thanksgiving with my brothers and my sister and my parents and my entire family.

I was just replaying the whole week, just thinking about what was the experience like. That's when I realized, oh, my gosh, that room felt like home because it was as dark as I felt inside. Going back, hindsight is 20 20. So going back to create more of that awareness. But now in hindsight, rather than in the present moment, real time, like in step one, the anticipation, when I looked back and I started processing everything, I was like, oh, wow. Like, it was hard to find something to be grateful for. I usually have a very grateful heart. And I remember thinking, like, what is there to be thankful for, God? Like, that was my prayer. My prayer to God, instead of thank you, Lord, for being so good to me, was like, what is there to be thankful for? I could not see it. I could not see. See that I was surrounded by love and family. I couldn't see that I. I was blessed with so many opportunities, people, resources. I couldn't see any of that. And I. And I realized that when I replayed my. My experience of that holiday and I. And I realized that it was very healing to go through that. It Was very healing to give myself permission to have a very crappy weekend to look at my nephews and feel like she was supposed to be there with them. They were really close even though they were little and maybe even feel a little jealous that they were there and she wasn't. I don't know. Right. There was so much that I felt and I also realized like, man, it was hard for me to reframe, it was hard for me to get out of the funk. It was hard for me to embrace the blessings. I was self centered. I was stuck in my pain. And that's okay, it worked. It was what I needed. I needed the support of my family. I needed to be held, I needed to feel and you know, know it was a good opportunity because there were so many people there that they could take care of my kids and I could just slip away into darkness and take a moment there to just get it done and over with. So looking back and seeing what it was and acknowledging the power that it could have had on my healing and realizing that I never want to be there again, all of that, all that processing healed me. Never ever, ever after that have I had a worse holiday. Never. Not Christmas. On Christmas I already had this experience to learn from. So I prepared for it. I set an intention which is the third one of preparing, like choose, make decisions, have conversations. It's also another way of saying it is set an intention. So I had set the intention that Christmas was going to be about my kids and I was going to my surviving kids and I was going to be present for them and love on them and enjoy them. I was going to make it about them and not about my grief. And I woke up.

With lightness and peace and ready to honor Gordie and Chi Chi who were there celebrating Christmas and needed mom to, to be there, right? Like during Christmas I don't have all the family at home to take care of them like I did in Thanksgiving. So it worked out. It worked out. So number one, redirect pain to purpose, suffering to service. Do something for other people because when you change your focus to highlight others, you remove the spotlight from your suffering which is self centered and all encompassing and you're focused on the other person which allows you to not waste pain. Number two, process your experience, look back, feel the feels, create more awareness and.

Just have grace. It's okay. And then number three, share the lessons. Never ever stay with what you learned just for yourself.

Share what worked for you, share what you realized, what served you. Like tell the world you have no idea how many people listen to me and they're like.

I get it, Betsy. I understand. I understand what you're saying, Betsy. Like, someone sees me, they feel seen, they feel understood. They feel loved. They feel like they have permission to feel the feels. They gain meaning. They are able to give meaning to what they're going through. They receive hope.

When you share your pain, when you share what worked, when you share your process, when you share your story, you help heal humanity and you bring hope. It is your duty and your responsibility. And, my friend, it is also a great privilege.

Your pain is not to be wasted. Your pain is meant only to help you rise into your greatness. So from the bottom of my heart, I am sorry. I am deeply sorry that you're going through this. And I feel you and I hear you, and my heart is with you. And just thinking about it, I can imagine how hard and painful the anticipation of being without your person must feel like I know. But this is only meant to heal you, to strengthen you and to help you reach your greatness and your purpose. And I am here to. To help you and guide you all along. So if there's anything I can do to support you, please send me a message. Leave a review DM me. Email me betsyetterwithbetsy.com let me know how I can support you. If you have not read my book or want to read it again, I have it in audiobook. Hurt to Hope is the title. Hurt the Number two Hope. I think that will be an amazing resource for you. I also have the Hurt To Hope program. Hurt number two, Hope.com is the website for that, and they're all very inexpensive. It's my way of honoring my daughter, and it's my way of continuing her legacy. There's also the Better With Betsy app, which has a Betsy Bot. And you can ask questions. It's literally like talking to me. So if you're in the middle of the holiday and you don't know what to do or say or feel, or you're overwhelmed, go to the Better with Betsy app. Go to the Betsy Bot and talk to me. It's literally like talking to me. I want to support you. I want to remind you that pain is only the path, never the destination, and it's the path to healing and joy. So I hope this has served you. I pray that you feel peace in this journey, that you feel the caress of God in your heart and that you know that you're not alone and that this is temporary. This is not who you are. This is not how it's always going to be. There's meaning and purpose in this. And now you have the recipe to not waste your pain. I'm sorry you're going through this. I love you. I send you a big fat hug and a whole lot of peace your way so that you may get through the holidays with grace and healing. And use it. Use it to support yourself and serve others.

I love you. Happy Thanksgiving. Bye.