Grief, Loss, and Dying During COVID-19

Syllabus

• Week 1

  Death and dying: What’s the same and what’s new about Covid 19?

  • Introduction to the course

    A short introduction to the course

  • The fear of death

    A reading summarising some important research about our fear of dying, and a reflective task.

  • A short quiz about Coronavirus

    An informative quiz to help get you started.

  • Introducing Sharna, a hospital social worker

    A first meeting with Sharna as she talks about some of the ways her job changed during the pandemic. Later she speaks about the emotional impact of the work in this period.

  • Thinking about loss, dying and death

    This activity introduces you to some established theories and concepts for thinking about the impact of loss, death and grief. You will find three short readings accompanied by some questions and exercises in the following steps.

  • The socio-economic landscape: how we're not "all in it together"

    How COVID-19 is impacting black people disproportionately, and the financial impact of the pandemic.

• Week 2

  The Workers

  • Welcome to Week 2

    An introduction to Week 2, where we focus on front-line staff and other workers.

  • Working with loss, death and dying

    We apply learning from Week 1 to real world care settings. Sharna talks about the pressures of her job during the crisis, loss at work, the importance of trust, and how the most important things often emerge unexpectedly.

  • The Drive Home - poem and reflection

    Read this short poem, and reflect on the meaning of having a 'conscience'

  • Discharge, discharge discharge...

    During the crisis in the UK hospitals needed maximum bed capacity, so there was a pressure to discharge patients quickly. Sharna describes the impact on her of this policy.

  • Moral Injury: a hidden kind of trauma?

    This activity looks at some of the painful professional and psychological dilemmas faced by staff at the peak of the crisis.

  • The Heroic and the Stoical: two ways of 'caring'

    Tim Dartington summarises his ides about 'heroic' and 'stoical' forms of care, and links these to the way we think and treat the long term ill or disabled, or those at the end of life

• Week 3

  The Families

  • Welcome to Week 3

    This week we will be thinking about the way the pandemic has affected families. There will be opportunities to reflect on your own experience and explore some of the challenges involved for different generations.

  • Families and the pandemic

    The following extracts describe how different families have experienced the pandemic.

  • Thinking about the experience of older vulnerable people.

    The following activity encourages you to engage with the experience of older vulnerable people as family members.

  • Hard times

    Sharna talks about what has been particularly hard for patients and their families, and Dr Scanlan describes what matters to patients nearing the end of life.

  • Thinking about the way the pandemic has changed the experience of death and dying.

    The following steps will support you in thinking about the impact of the pandemic on death and dying and those who are bereaved.

  • Love in the time of coronavirus

    Final thoughts and reading for week 4

• Week 4

  Managing the Crisis and Moving on

  • Managing the crisis and moving on

    Welcome to week 4

  • Wobble Rooms and Pauses - how front line staff cope with death

    Two ways in which staff at the front line manage the impact of working intensively with death and dying.

  • The stadium: Sharna describes the 'refuge' that was set up for her and her colleagues

    Another example of a safe space that emerged to help workers during the crisis.

  • Reflective groups as a way to help

    The activity introduce ideas about how 'reflective practice' and groups can help people manage their experiences in a crisis.

  • Sharna's reflective practice

    Sharna reflects on the way she makes room for the feelings brought about by her work.

  • Learning from experience

    As we have learned over the weeks the losses involved have been extensive. From disruption to the fabric of daily life to the death of loved ones, each loss will have an impact on the internal world of the individuals concerned.

  • Ritual, adaptation and creativity

    We think about how rituals have been affected during the pandemic, and how people are coping with the change.

  • Will Covid change how we think about death?

    This reading suggests we may not change that much. Rather than accepting mortality more easily, the author thinks we may renew our efforts to 'defeat death' by medical advances.

  • Thinking about death and its impact

    In this video Sharna discusses some of her continuing struggles with thinking about death and dying.

  • Taking Stock

    The following steps complete the course and provide you with some simple but important principles for helping others cope with stress and grief.

Who will you learn with?