Grief on pause: Family has waited more than a year to hold funeral amid COVID-19 restrictions

When Olga Lapuk passed away in March 2020, her family decided they would wait to hold a funeral.

The first case of COVID-19 in Manitoba had appeared less than two weeks earlier. In the days before Lapuk's death on March 24, public health officials issued self-isolatation requirements for travellers and limits on gathering sizes.

What her family thought would be a matter of weeks has now stretched into more than a year of delayed grief. 

"It's been really hard. We feel like we haven't been able to honour her properly," said Lapuk's daughter, Karen Mondor. When her mother died, Mondor had just returned to Regina after moving Lapuk from her apartment into a temporary nursing home.

It was just days after she got home that the nursing home called Mondor to tell her that her mother had been taken to hospital.

"While I was in the process of packing and getting ready to return to Manitoba, the doctor called and said that wouldn't be enough time, that she was not going to last six hours or whatever it was going to be to drive there. And so she passed away," Mondor said.

"The thought that I couldn't be there with her at the end was very hard for me to come to terms with."

Lapuk didn't die of COVID-19, but the pandemic has affected how the family has been able to grieve.

They began making arrangements for a funeral, and Mondor was preparing to go to Winnipeg to clear out her mother's apartment and nursing home room. She planned on staying in her mother's apartment while in the city.

As she was driving to Winnipeg, the nursing home called and told her she wouldn't be able to come in unless she isolated for two weeks. Her mother's apartment building said the same thing, so she had to turn around and drive back to Regina.

"I understand the reasons, I understand the bigger picture, but it's just made it very difficult," Mondor said.

The current COVID-19 restrictions limit funerals to a maximum of 10 guests (not including an officiant). Mondor says her mom had a large family and many friends, and expects 75 to 100 people would like to attend the funeral. 

When her mother died, "COVID was very new, and we thought, 'Well, we'll wait a few weeks before we have more of a memorial service,'" said Mondor.

"And then summer came and went, and we thought, 'Well, maybe in the fall, in October, around my mom's birthday.' And of course, that didn't happen. And it just got later and later."

'Unresolved grief issues'

Kevin Sweryd, president of the Manitoba Funeral Service Association and owner of Bardal Funeral Home, says he has a long list of families waiting for a call once public health orders allow for funeral gatherings of 50 to 100 people.

Funeral service providers have made adaptations during the pandemic — like upgrading streaming technology to enable virtual services and staggering visitations to avoid large indoor gatherings. But many families have done a simple cremation, with plans to eventually hold a memorial service.

"But whether or not they will, once the restrictions ease, becomes a bit of a question," said Sweryd.

Funerals bring support networks together, often including friends and family who may not have seen each other in years, and Sweryd worries some families may be left with grief that is "unobserved, unrecognized [and] unsupported."

"I think you have a lot of unresolved grief issues," he said. "I think it can easily lead to more severe mental health issues if they don't get the support they need."

Rituals perform an important role for people during milestones in their lives, helping them move on to the next stage, said Stephanie Reimer, a therapist and director of Winnipeg's Conexus Counselling.

"The reality is when we experience a tremendous loss, someone really close to us, there is often a feeling of being alone, even at the best of times. But the loneliness now is so much greater."

In lieu of holding a funeral, Reimer recommends doing things to remember a late loved one, such as using photos, or doing something to honour the memory of the person, like planting a tree.

And at all times, people should give themselves permission to take time with grief and to recognize that the process is complicated and non-linear, Reimer said.

Athletic, technologically savvy

Mondor remembers her mother as an independent, kind, generous and supportive person.

An athlete, Olga Lapuk played semi-professional softball. Technologically savvy, she worked for a company making circuit boards for gas pumps.

Mondor tells a story of a time her family's television broke. Her father wanted to call a repair person.

"My mom sat down, took the back off and looked at things, and took things apart and put it back together. And it worked," Mondor said.

At the time of her death, the family didn't write a full obituary, thinking they would soon have a full memorial service.

They wrote an in memoriam notice, published in the Winnipeg Free Press, to mark the anniversary of her death.

"If we'd known at the outset how long it was going to take, maybe we would have done it differently," Mondor said, adding that she would have considered holding a virtual service.

For the past year, she's been cut off from family. She wants to be able to see them and hug people, and share stories about her mom.

"Now that we've waited this long, we'll wait a while longer."