Identity, Grief & Choice | Five Years of Long Covid: Part 1, with Nicola Holmes

I suspect many of us have a date seared into our memory, when our lives changed forever - because even if some of us have recovered, the experience will change us irrevocably. For me that date was March 13th 2020.

In this video I talk to fellow 5 year long hauler and coach Nicola Holmes about what the experience has meant to us. The intention is not that we’re going to moan on about symptoms and supplements, rather ask the big philosophical questions that this experience has raised for us. We’ll have a number of subjects based around a series of single words.

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CHAPTERS:

0:00 Introduction
1:44 Identity
5:49 Purpose (past)
8:24 Grief:
13:00 Denial
14:22 Bargaining
15:09 Anger
23:33 Fear
29:22 Choice
39:47 Transformation

In the next part, we'll discuss:
Growth
Purpose (present)
Meaning
Happiness
Challenges
Wisdom
Initiation
Fate
Gifts

LINKS & RESOURCES:
Nicola Holmes, Change & Transition Coach: https://www.nicolaholmes.ca/

Some resources recommended by Nicola:

The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief, a beautiful book by therapist Francis Weller that honors grief as a soulful, transformative and inevitable life companion.

True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart, book by Tara Brach, therapist and Buddhist Dharma teacher who wrote this in the wake of her own experience with a mysterious and life-changing illness.

Cured: The Remarkable Science and Stories of Spontaneous Healing and Recovery, a book by Dr. Jeff Rediger, that opened my mind to the immense connections between body, heart, mind and soul and holistic dimensions of health and illness.

The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness, book by Megan O'Rourke, which explores the rise of chronic illness in our times, compassionately confronting the reality of living with a hard-to-understand medical condition, and inviting new evolution and ways forward.

Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted: book by Suleika Jaouad, telling the story of her cancer diagnosis, illness and healing journey throughout her 20's. While it's not about Long-Covid, this book is worth reading - and a testament to the power of creativity, community and connection in the midst of illness and profound life disruption.