Grieving loss of past lives, Manitobans reflect on 5 years since COVID-19 pandemic

Suzy Pinnick knew something was wrong when she spotted her dog Zibby laying on the garage floor.

It’s something her faithful companion in isolation had never done before.

Zibby got sick months into lockdown, developing lesions that were initially deemed not overly serious. So moments of strange behaviour were not completely out of the ordinary.

Pinnick was making regular visits to the veterinarian – though she was never allowed inside the clinic due to COVID restrictions – to make sure her pet was getting the right care.

“Not being able to go in with her, even at the visits, was very difficult. Very difficult,” said Pinnick, who is a general physician.

On the morning Pinnick found Zibby on the garage floor, her dog was more energetic than her sickness previously allowed her to be. So Pinnick could not have known that hours later, she would be laying eyes on her dog for the very last time.

“She was so weak, she couldn’t get into the back seat,” Pinnick recounted. “And I knew in my heart, I said, ‘my dog is dying.’

“And so when we got to the emergency vet place, they came out and they took her. And, last look I got was her looking back at me.

“To lose her at that point in time as extremely difficult,” added Pinnick, who described the passage from diagnosis to death as extremely quick.

“They’re not just animals, they’re your companion.”

On March 20, 2020, Manitoba declared a state of emergency as COVID-19 swept across the globe. The world changed quickly, and people’s lives changed with it.

Exactly five years later, Manitobans are reflecting on those changes, and in some cases, the ongoing loss.

Clinical psychologist Dr. Jay Greenfeld says Pinnick’s case is one many people were faced with – of having to say goodbye without being able to say goodbye. He says for anyone who went through that, it’s now about finding a way to grieve the loss of not having that final interaction.

“If I couldn’t do that, what is another way that I can still grieve that loss – of that moment as well as that person or pet that was so close to us. Whether that’s through art or whether that’s through drawing or that’s through talking it over or whether that’s through writing out feelings and thoughts and the reflections of what that person meant.

“And more important, in the end, you still want to focus a big amount of time to, ‘what did I take from that relationship with that person?’ – again whether that’s person or pet. What did I take from that relationship, and how am I going to use those same attributes in life moving forward?’

“‘What are the things that they brought to my life that I want to make sure I remember, regardless of the moment that I may not have had access to.’”

Focusing on good memories is certainly something Pinnick is trying to do, even if the road has been long and hard.

“There are positive thoughts now that come when I think of her,” she said.

“Her attitude. Which was sometimes not good, but I loved it,” she added, laughing.

Loss of home disrupts stability

Winnipeg’s Katrina Greer is also grieving – the loss of stability, security and even a sense of purpose.

Greer, who previously worked for the Manitoba government under Brian Pallister, was laid off right before the pandemic hit.

Her plan to move to Costa Rica and teach online immediately fell through.

She couldn’t find work – that lasted for a couple of years – and was forced to sell her home. Eager to be a homeowner once again, Greer could not get a mortgage without a job. She bounced around Winnipeg from place to place.

The pandemic “wiped us out,” Greer told CityNews.

“It was very, very difficult. We are still climbing out of the hole.”

She says the loss of her home disrupted the stable identity she had built for herself and triggered mental-health issues linked with financial uncertainty.

“There’s been a lot of loss – financially, stability wise, feeling like we have a sense of purpose, that there’s something waiting for us at the end of the day, that it’s not just survival every single day,” said Greer, who was helped by her community and is now a mutual aid advocate.

And although Greer is celebrating moving into a new house – as a tenant, not buyer – her family is still grieving the loss of the life they had before.

“I still grieve, not just the physical home itself, not just the stability or the employment itself, but the stability of having that place. Having that job.”

She says the entire landscape of her world has changed, and she finds it hard to imagine every having that sense of stability again.

“I think people associate grief and loss with death and dying,” said Dr. Greenfeld. “And that’s a limited sort of scope. Because the reality is, any time there’s a significant change for a loss of, for example, a lifestyle or a life pattern or a trend, there’s grief with that, for sure. And you know, I think it’s important that people recognize that they might not climb out of whatever they think they need to climb out of and get back to the way it was for them.

“What’s important is to recognize that it’s going to look different, and it needs to look different, and our society looks different, and the way that we approach things is different. And so what we want to look at a little bit more is knowing what the circumstances are in our world. How can I adjust to that accordingly?”

‘Accept the sadness, accept the difference’

Greenfeld says in the example of losing a home, and having to rent a place instead of owning one, it’s all about changing mindsets.

“Maybe owning a home right now is just not what’s going to happen, because whether you’re paying X amount of dollars for mortgage or you’re paying X amount of dollars for rent, it’s all going to the same kind of living concept,” he explained. “You want to isolate that variable and recognize, ‘OK, that lifestyle was a loss, but I’m not going to hyper focus on certain aspects. If I have what I need, if I have a place to live, how I’m paying for that is less important, as opposed to not having a place.’

“But if I don’t have the lifestyle that I used to have, there is grief with that, and it is important to talk about that. It is important to let go of that world in order to embrace the current world.

“And that also means leading to the next phase of ‘OK, I probably need to set smaller, attainable goals, starting now, even if those goals are different from what I wanted them to be a number of years ago, I need to accept the sadness. I need to accept the difference. I need to then focus my energy and my effort on the things that are in front of me.’”

For artist Eric Rae, the COVID-19 pandemic was linked to an inability to get back into the artistic space doing what he loved.

Rae was away for two years doing a Master’s in theatre directing. When they came back to Winnipeg, they found the local theatre landscape had changed, and it was much harder to break into.

“It just shook everything up,” said Rae, who says they like to engage with spaces and audience in their plays. “People I knew left the industry, and my contacts changed. I had been gone for two years and I wasn’t fresh in people’s minds.”

Fast forward a few years and Rae says they’re feeling “disillusioned with the theatre industry.”

Greenfeld says it’s too easy to hyper-focus on things out of our control.

“What we have control over here is recognizing that this is a phase of life, and we’re gonna have to find a different way to grieve that loss,” he said.

The clinical psychologist concluded with general advice for anyone still struggling in a post-pandemic world: connect with others.

“There is nothing better for you psychologically than to put yourself out there with other people, be engaging with other people, and even if it’s work related, there is a pattern, there is a theme, and there is a degree of excitement that comes from engaging with others when you’re around work-related tasks or just connecting with people,” he said.

“And if we continue that trend (towards isolation), we’re decreasing the value of what it can feel like to be in a community, either at work, community in your neighbourhood, or community within different cultures. And it is extremely valuable to be able to do that.”