Military families who faced war deaths help COVID mourners with loss without goodbye
As Memorial Day approaches, military families who have faced the loss of a service member have noticed that their cycle of grief is strikingly similar to what Americans who lost a family member to the coronavirus are now facing.
They know very well the sense of unfairness from not being able to say goodbye in person. The feeling of isolation as they mourn. The shock over having someone be healthy and then suddenly they are gone.
Janice Chance knows those feelings all too well. She wasn’t with her son, Marine Corps Capt. Jesse Melton III, in his final moments as the 29-year-old died on Sept. 9, 2008, supporting combat operations in Afghanistan.
“I wish I could have been there when my son actually passed, to be by his side,” Chance said in a phone interview with McClatchy.
More than 93,000 people in the United States who contracted COVID-19 have died. Many of their families were also unable to be by their sides in hospitals or nursing homes during the pandemic lockdown. They were left to grieve in isolation, unable to even be surrounded by other family members due to the fear of spreading the virus.
Usually on Memorial Day, thousands of family members who have lost military spouses and children gather in Washington, D.C., for the annual conference of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, or TAPS. Coronavirus restrictions have pushed that annual gathering online and more than 1,600 have signed up to attend this weekend’s virtual conference and support meetings.
This year it includes a new forum: Support for the American public facing coronavirus deaths.
“Today we turn our attention to you - our first responders, healthcare workers and all of our fellow citizens who have been affected,” Bonnie Carroll, TAPS founder, wrote on the website. “As survivors of military death, we are no strangers to isolation, fear and loss; we have many lessons learned and tools for coping.”
Carroll said the outreach to families of those who died from the coronavirus is to let them know they are not alone.
“We have so much in common,” Carroll said in a phone interview with McClatchy. “Military families and military survivors have really learned so much over the past, now, 20 years coping with loss and complicating factors such as isolation, being apart from loved ones, having anxiety about risk. With our military families it’s going off to war, but now with civilians, it’s just going to the grocery store.”
The group has also published a “mourner’s bill of rights” to help those processing a coronavirus death know that all of the emotions they may face, or needs they may have, such as creating a ritual, are valid.
The guidance emphasizes “that we are not alone,” Carroll said. “That we have a right to talk about our loved ones. And that the moment of their death does not define their life.”
Last month, Chance’s family was also hit by the coronavirus. Her uncle, Korean War veteran Army Private First Class Kenneth Mathews, 91, died in a Baltimore nursing home. The death shocked their family because he had been in steady health. His family was not with him when he died, and Chance had to watch his memorial services over Facebook.
Chance has used the same strength she found while grieving her son and guiding other Gold Star mothers to help her family process having to say goodbye from a distance for her uncle.
“I wasn’t there with my son. But God was,” Chance said. “So he was not alone.”
This story was originally published May 21, 2020 at 3:37 PM.
