The COVID-19 pandemic has brought multiple changes to our lives, for many of us have lost loved ones, jobs, and familiar routines. According to family psychologist Pauline Boss, PhD, we’ve suffered the “the ultimate loss: the loss of trust in the world as a safe and predictable place”(2022, p. 4).

What we’re experiencing, Dr. Boss says, is “ambiguous loss, an unclear loss of not knowing” which produces “high anxiety and confusion and feelings of helplessness” (2023). After COVID-19, we’re suffering from what she calls “abstract loss, a loss that can’t be quantified.” We’re constantly on edge because we don’t know what to expect.

Dr. Boss, who identified the concept of ambiguous loss (2000), is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Minnesota, and the author of The Myth of Closure: Ambiguous Loss in a Time of Pandemic and Change (2022). She now trains therapists around the world about how to deal with ambiguous loss from wars and natural disasters in Ukraine, Turkey, Syria and more, wherever families have loved ones that are missing.

After the epic losses, ambiguous and clear, from COVID-19, she says, we will never be the same. “We will not have closure. Loss has left its mark on us and changed the ways we think and live” (2022, p. 68). Yet, there are steps we can take to deal with ambiguous loss.

1. Cultivate Community. The COVID-19 pandemic undermined our sense of community, the circle of relationships vital to our well-being. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, MD, reports (2023) that we’re experiencing an epidemic of loneliness. As he explains, our nervous system is much the same as in early hunter-gatherer times when group membership was essential for survival: “That’s why we see such an impact of loneliness and disconnection on........

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