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Health & Fitness

Feeling Blue at the holidays – When in hole stop digging.

Sadly the holidays can also be a difficult time for folks who have suffered a personal loss in recent years. Especially if that personal loss occurred in the past year… Fortunately there are many resources in the community that are available to help

By Kevin Dayhoff, November 25, 2013 – December 14, 2013

This past week marked the beginning of the Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, and New Year holidays. It is a time to celebrate the past year with our friends and family and look forward to new beginnings.

However, sadly the holidays can also be a difficult time for folks who have suffered a personal loss in recent years. Especially if that personal loss occurred in the past year…

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This is the time of the year when we when often nostalgically reflect about Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays in the past - when we celebrated with family members, loved-ones, friends and colleagues that are no longer with us.

Fortunately there are many resources in the community that are available to help cope. Although Carroll Hospice has already had a “coping with the holidays” workshop, many local churches have a “Blue Christmas” service including Taylorsville United Methodist Church. (And of course, there is always “Retail Therapy - All signs point to shopping locally in Carroll County this Christmas season.”)

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The service at Taylorsville will take place on December 19, 2013 at 7 p.m. at 4356 Ridge Road, Mt Airy, MD 21771.

Pastor Sarah B. Dorrance serves as the pastor at Taylorsville and writes, Blue Christmas “is a time to be celebrating the birth of our Savior even in the midst of changed circumstances that might be hard for us. It is a time to remember that Jesus changes everything, even the hurts and the pains we might be experiencing today, and the birth of our Lord is something special to be celebrated.”

It has been said that the only things in life of which we may be assured are death and taxes. Now whether or not the ever-increasing tax burden that is being placed upon us, especially in Maryland, has contributed to any untimely demise, is the topic of another discussion at another time.

In Virgil’s Aeneid, it was said, “Una salis victus nallam sperare salutem,” “The only hope of the doomed is not to hope for safety.”

One of Virgil’s characters in the story is Aeneas; the Greco-Roman mythological figure who was also a character in Homer's Iliad. Actually, according to my foggy recollection Aeneas was the main character and hero of the story. He was a Trojan hero, who ventured to Italy and began what we now know as the Roman Empire. The tale of Aeneas is inspiration because of how he constantly overcame grief, overwhelming odds and hardships. Of course, we can always be a tad jealous over his affair with the Carthaginian Queen Dido… Okay, well - moving along…

Interestingly enough, it is reported in numerous academic discussions, including one found on the website for Reed College in Portland Oregon that “Virgil was still working on revising the Aeneid when he died in 19 BC.” What a cruel irony.

“As an aside, remember, the story of the Aeneid is set in the years immediately after the fall of Troy. One ancient chronographer figured that Troy had fallen in the year 1184 BC, and archaeological evidence at the site of Troy confirms that there was a violent destruction in the second half of the 12th century BC,” according to the Reed website.

According to the Reed College website, “The poem contains a few lines which are only half as long as they should be, which confirms the traditional belief that the work is unfinished. The poem is not, however, incomplete; it was meant to end where it ends…

“The tradition also says that Virgil was so dissatisfied with the Aeneid that on his death bed he gave orders for the manuscript to be burned, but the executors of his estate did not comply.”

In my experience as a fire department and police chaplain, unfinished business, dissatisfaction, and unintended consequences are just a few of the vast multitude of feelings, emotions and challenges that the terminally ill – and their families face in that long hallway at the last stage of life. Moreover, these feelings serve as difficult memories during the holidays.

I recently ventured upon a journey of my own and took the Bereavement Skills Training at Carroll Hospice, taught by Kathleen A. Bare, M.S. a bereavement counselor at Carroll Hospice.

The topics included an introduction to Carroll Hospice and the services and functions provided when family members, loved-ones, friends and colleagues are “Crossing the Creek.”

Class segments included ‘normal grief,’ natural grief responses, children and grief. Complicated grief, suicides, communication skills, rituals, support groups and resources.

On the last day of class, a member of the class distributed a photocopy of the publication, “Crossing the Creek, A Practical Guide to the Dying Process,” which the author, Michael Holmes, RN, identifies as “A nurse’s perspective on the medical aspects of the dying experience and advice for caregivers.”

I took the class because death and dying are family dynamics that frequent come to play in our lives and that of our friends, family and neighbors. Just recently the untimely death of a Baltimore County police office, Jason Schneider, made many in the first responder, EMS, firefighter and police officer community sad and grief stricken. For many it is going to be a difficult holiday season.

In my capacity as the Westminster Fire Department and Maryland Troopers Association Lodge # 20 chaplain, I have already talked with some folks who are feeling blue for the holidays.

If you are feeling blue for the holidays, take the time to reach-out for a helping hand. You will be pleasantly surprised to learn how many of your friends care for you and are willing to lend a hand. Don’t row this boat alone.

Reminds me of the story about the man who fell in a hole. In his despair, he reached-out for help. A friend happened-by and shouted – stop digging, I’ll lend you a hand…. Then, to the man’s great surprise, his friend immediately jumped into the hole with him.

At which time, the man said to his friend, “What the what - Why did you do that – now we are both stuck down here?

His friend responded, “I’ve been down here before and I know the way out…”

If you are feeling blue for the holidaze – reach-out for help. You might be surprised to find-out how many friends will go out on a limb to help – and better yet, know the way out… Just saying.

Merry Christmas. Remember Jesus is the reason for the season. And everything happens for a reason…

Kevin Dayhoff is a chaplain with the Westminster Volunteer Fire Department and the Maryland Troopers Association Lodge # 20.

In addition he currently serves on the executive board of the Carroll Co. branch of the NAACP and the church council of Grace Lutheran Church.

In the past, he has taken a number of classes in various aspects of the chaplaincy, including non-violence training, emergency incident command and response, Red Cross disaster response training, and a Federation of Fire Chaplains’ class in the Essentials of Fire Chaplaincy…

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