Tips on Mourning for the Death during the Pandemic
Source: Reforma
By: Eugenio Torres
At any moment, the death of our loved ones is painful. But nowadays, in times of pandemic, it has been even sadder and more frustrating for those who have not been able to say goodbye, with their usual rituals, to their relatives or close friends who have died.
That’s the way the psychologist Gina Tarditi explains it and addresses the subject in her most recent book Mourning in the Middle of the Pandemic.
“During the pandemic, mourning is experienced in a very sad way, even in those cases of people not dying of Covid, but who die in this context. It is being tremendously difficult because they cannot carry out the usual rituals: funerals must comply with the healthy distance, and, with all the measures we are taking to control the pandemic, people are left with the feeling ‘I couldn’t do what he/she wanted’, the hug, the physical cuddling to which we are accustomed.”
This specialist from the National Cancer Institute, who has dedicated herself to the area of palliative care and the care of terminally ill patients and their families, stresses the importance of performing certain rituals, even during the contingency.
“You must be flexible enough so that they can say goodbye to their loved one, in some other way, but one equally valid for both the person who passed away and the one who stays here. Each person, together with his/her closest circle, will have to reach an agreement on how to say goodbye to their deceased loved one,” also recommends the thanatologist.
Another of the effects that Tarditi has noticed during the current health emergency is a great anxiety in the elderly, or in those who have comorbidities, because, although they are taking care of themselves, they feel a hint of sadness because they were not able to be with their loved ones and they don’t know when normality will return. All this causes them fear and uncertainty.
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Tips on Mourning for the Death during the Pandemic
Reforma – Eugenio Torres
At any moment, the death of our loved ones is painful. But nowadays, in times of pandemic, it has been even sadder and more frustrating for those who have not been able to say goodbye, with their usual rituals, to their relatives or close friends who have died. That’s the way the psychologist Gina Tarditi explains it and addresses the subject in her most recent book Mourning in the Middle of the Pandemic….
Dignity and Death
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What is palliative care?
It is the branch of medicine defined as the integral and interdisciplinary care that is provided to the patient and his family when a life-threatening condition is diagnosed, regardless of the outcome.
In the case of the patient’s death, the palliative caregivers keep helping the family through the grieving process.
What is its purpose
Palliative care purpose is to improve the quality of life of patients and their loved ones when they face the challenges typical of a life-threatening diagnosis. It prevents and alleviates suffering through the early identification, evaluation and correct treatment of pain and other problems, whether physical, psychosocial or spiritual.
What do the palliative caregivers do?
- They provide a comprehensive and interdisciplinary care to the patient and his family, when there is a condition endangering life.
- They contain, accompany, listen, translate the language of the healing team to the patients and their loved ones; they advise them to making decisions; they coordinate the logistics of the patient’s care; and they are intermediaries between patients and their loved ones.
- They eliminate the taboos of the patient and his family as to the disease, the pain, the death, the farewell and the grieving, thus allowing to create a loving end of life.
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Glossary
Advance Will
It is a way allowing a competent person to put in writing his will concerning the treatments he would want or he would not want to receive if he were to find himself in a situation where he could not express his will himself. The advance directive comes into force when the person becomes unable to make those decisions.
Assisted Suicide
It is the help that a doctor gives to a patient in response to his request, and it consists in providing him with the means to put an end to his life. The help may be to give him a prescription for a lethal dose of a drug or the drug itself. The patient himself executes the final action that causes death.
Euthanasia
Etymologically it means “good death”, and it refers to the action that a doctor performs to induce the death of a patient who has freely requested it because he is enduring an intolerable suffering for which there is no relief, and that is caused by a disease or a medical condition for which there are no healing options.
Palliative Care
It is the active and total care of those patients who do not respond to a healing treatment, in which it is a priority to provide relief through the treatment of pain and other symptoms, as well as to care for the psychological, social and spiritual aspects.
