Broken Families: The Aftermath of Covid

When the nationwide shutdown began on March 13, 2020, Marla Geldzahler Sarrel and her husband, Louis Sarrel, were living a joyous life in New Jersey with their two adult sons. Louis, a realtor, property manager, and friend to all, began to feel sick almost a week later. The family feared the worst. 

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“[Louis] had said to me, ‘Don’t bring me to the hospital, because if you bring me to the hospital, I’m not coming home,’” Marla recounted. 

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However, as Louis’s symptoms grew worse, the decision was made on March 30, 2020, to take him to the emergency room. 

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“When I dropped him off, I was crying, going, ‘I don't know why, but I feel like I'll never see him again,’” Marla said. “I don't know what made me even think that. But that's what happened.” 

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As the world tried to figure out what to do about the pandemic, the Sarrel family was fighting through a grueling three weeks of ups and downs as Louis tried to recover. 

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“I remember being so thrilled that he was going to get a ventilator because they were afraid they were going to run out. Crazy,” Marla stated. 

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Alone in the hospital, Louis Sarrel passed away on April 21, 2020, at age 58. Marla and her sons were not permitted to see Louis’s body at the hospital or at the funeral home.

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“It's very traumatic because I still feel there was no closure,” Marla said. “So did he really die? Was that real, you know?” 

 

Marla was able to have a burial service for Louis. Since Louis passed away at the beginning of the pandemic, the funeral home workers were extremely cautious. 

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“I know they did open the casket to put stuff in that I brought to put in for him,” Marla said. “But I know he was buried in a hospital gown. I don’t think they really knew anything. They were afraid to touch him.” 

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 While Marla eventually was able to use the FEMA COVID funeral assistance program to help pay for the funeral, when Louis passed, the program did not exist yet. Although the funeral cost less than it normally would have, since Marla was unable to have a shiva or any other service at the funeral home, the funeral was still expensive. 

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“We did have to get plots. There were two spots by my grandparents' that my father and his sister owned, but were never going to use,” Marla said. “But they still charge you to transform [the plots] to you, and it’s a crazy amount.”  

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Due to COVID restrictions, there were only four people allowed at the grave site. Other family and friends drove their cars to the cemetery to social distance or joined the virtual funeral on Zoom. 

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“And then when we came home from the cemetery, about a half hour later, I would say,  a good 300 cars drove past my house, of all his family and friends that wanted to figure out a way to still pay tribute to him,” Marla recalled. “So that was very emotional.”

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Across state lines in Maryland, Jennifer Kay Jensen went through the same experience as Marla with her husband and father of her three sons, Peter Vedel Jensen. Peter, a commercial real estate business owner, adventurer, and lover of life, was taken to the hospital by an ambulance at the end of July. He would spend the next five weeks on a ventilator, isolated from the world and his family. 

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“I was not allowed near him. Even though my son and I kept testing to say we're negative, we’re negative, but they wouldn't let anybody near him,” Jennifer said. 

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Jennifer remembers those five weeks as a roller coaster of emotions where some days Peter would be improving, only for him to crash soon after. At the end of August, Peter got an infection. Jennifer waited by the phone for her one daily phone call from the hospital to hear how her husband was doing. On the day Peter died, Jennifer had a particularly rude nurse. After his infection became septic, Peter was scheduled to be transferred back to the ICU. On the way to the hospital with her son and his girlfriend, Jennifer received a call from that nurse. 

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“We were driving, and she called us, and she was really chipper. She'd been terrible the whole day,” Jennifer recalled, “and I thought she was going to say, ‘Don’t go, he’s fine.’ And she said, ‘Don't go. He crashed as we were transferring him, and he didn't make it this time. So you can come see him here now.’” 

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After weeks of trying to see her husband, Jennifer and her sons were only allowed to see Peter after it was too late. 

“When they brought us in, his eyes were open, his mouth was open,” Jennifer said. “And my son, he was 21, he lay on [Peter] like a toddler, and he's like, 6’3”, and he just crawled on top. It was horrible.” 

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Before he passed, Peter also pleaded with the nurses and doctors to let him see his family. 

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“He was begging like, and he couldn't speak, and he was like, mouthing ‘my wife, my son,’” Jennifer said. “And I think that's torture. I think he died a terrible, tortured death.” 

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Just like Marla and Jennifer, Leeanne Saro Jereb thought she had the rest of her life planned out. Her husband, Dan, had retired in 2016 after serving 33 years on the Brecksville Police Department, with time spent serving as acting chief of the force. The couple had no children or health problems and were ready for a life of travel, relaxation, and love. However, that dream was cut short after a week-long trip to Mexico. 

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After returning home, Dan came down with COVID-like symptoms. So, he took a COVID test. Negative. He took another test. Again negative. Seven tests later, and Dan was still testing negative. 

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Despite the negative tests, Dan’s symptoms began to get worse and worse. It got so bad that Leeanne had to call an ambulance to take him to the hospital. ​

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“When he went to the emergency room, when I had to call 911, they tested him for the antibodies. So he had had COVID probably for at least a month, and because it wasn’t treated, it got so bad,” Leeanne explained. 

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Dan would go on to spend a month in the hospital. 

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“He actually wasn’t able to speak after five days in the hospital, because he was on a ventilator,” Leeanne said. “I would always tell him, ‘You know, I know what you want, I’m not going to keep you hooked up to this thing.’” 

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On February 28, 2021, Dan got an infection, and his team decided to try a new antibiotic. 

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“I said we’ll try it for 24 hours, we’ll see if there’s any improvement. But within, I don’t know, 10 hours, the hospital called and said he wasn’t going to make it, and we needed to get there,” Leeanne said. 

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Daniel Jereb passed away the following day, on March 1, 2021, at the age of 61. 

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Losing one family member is painful enough, but many families lost more than one loved one due to COVID. Sandi Stanaitis lost both her parents and her stepfather in the span of three years. Her father, Leon Stanaitis, a retired construction worker, passed on April 12, 2020, during the first wave of the coronavirus. The following year, during the first Father’s Day since her dad passed, Sandi lost her mother, Margaret Stantatis Diggins, a homemaker and volunteer, on June 19, 2021. Then, for the next two years, Sandi and her stepfather, Edward Diggins, a retired firefighter, clung to each other as they grieved their losses. However, on October 2, 2023, Edward succumbed to the same disease that had killed Sandi’s parents. 

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To find comfort in her grief and isolation, Sandi, like millions of other Americans, turned to social media. However, at first, all she found was people politicizing COVID and saying the disease was fake. 

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“Now, I'm not bragging, but to give you a scope of how ridiculous this is. I have my Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, my Bachelor of Sciences in Biology, my Bachelor of Sciences in Nursing, I was a trained ventilator nurse, and I have a Master's in Cellular Biology,” Sandi explained, “And these idiots are trying to tell me viruses are not real.” 

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The problem of COVID deniers extended outside of the digital space. Instead of the pandemic bringing people together like it did after the tragic events of September 11, 2001, the disease tore the country apart. People saw those who died as just a number and a statistic rather than a human life. Those who had lost a loved one were left grieving while also fighting friends and family who did not believe the coronavirus was a serious threat. 

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“I had one friend telling me that while [Louis] was in the hospital, ‘Well, you know more people die a year from the flu.’ Well, I'm like, ‘I don't need you right now. Thank you.’ And this was a best friend,” Marla shared. “Well, now an ex-best friend.” 

As more Americans lost loved ones to COVID, support groups began popping up on Facebook. In moments of desperation and despair, Sandi, Marla, Leeanne, and Jennifer all found and joined the COVID-19 Loss Support for Family and Friends group on Facebook. The group is a community for anyone who has lost someone to COVID. 

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 “I'll be on Facebook, and see daughters that have lost mothers, and they’ll comment, ‘My mother died from COVID 5 years ago. I'll always miss her.’  And then, I'll write a comment back, ‘Sorry for your loss, do you belong to a COVID support group?” Sandi stated. “I'll privately send them the link. I mean, we still have people who were a part of the Delta waves that are still joining support groups.” 

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For Leeanne, Marla, and Jennifer, the large Facebook support group was great, but they felt they needed something more. That’s when they found the spousal support Zoom group. 

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“Our group is spouse-specific. We used to meet every Monday. We still meet every other Monday, and we still actually have new people who join,” Leeanne explained. 

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The three women, who were all strangers before, found each other through the spousal group, and the rest was history. 

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“And to this day, I met people through the groups, and there was my amazing Marla and Leeanne, you know, two of my absolute dearest friends,” Jennifer said. “Before, I just didn't know anybody [who lost someone to COVID]. And that feels very isolated.” 

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The trio, who call themselves the “WTFs: Widows Then Friends,”  has since met in person and even traveled to Portugal together. They have helped each other through things they never thought they would deal with, like learning to fix the toilet and dating. The widows also bond with each other through their dark humor. 

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“I know this is going to sound sick, but like that we can joke with, like ‘Your husband died from this thing that wasn’t real?’ Like we say those things, but other people will look at us like ummm,” Marla said. “We can handle it. No one else can say it. But, we say it to each other all the time.” 

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Behind the Front Lines: Funeral Directors During COVID

While the support groups help people with the post-funeral grief, funeral directors are often the first to offer assistance with the immediate grief that comes with losing a loved one. When a loved one dies at home, funeral directors are the ones who come to the house to take the body to the funeral home. They are there to take care of you, your family, and your deceased loved one from the moment they pass until they are buried or cremated. 

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Many people wonder what makes a person decide to go into the funeral industry. While a curiosity for death is a huge part of the decision, ultimately, it is to help people at a time of need. 

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After the death of his grandfather while he was in high school, funeral director and business owner Ryan Cattoni decided on his future career. 

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“The funeral director just made a huge impact on me. He, like, really was a very good person, caring, everything like that,” Cattoni explained. “So junior year in high school is kind of where you decide what the heck to do with your life, so I figured if I could do that for other people, I'd be making a difference.” 

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For Danielle Schleicher, a funeral director and embalmer for the Central Illinois Trade Services, her call to the industry came when a family friend was poorly embalmed. 

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“Freddie had died from kidney failure, so he ended up with jaundice, and whoever took care of him did not do a good job because I could tell, even though I hadn’t even gone to school yet, that he was green,” Schleicher explained. “That shouldn’t have been the last time his family saw him.” 

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As rewarding as being a funeral director can be, it is still a labor of love. From being on call overnight for home deaths to embalming and running the services during the day, most funeral directors work more than 40 hours a week. However, when the pandemic occurred, their workweeks became even longer. 

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“I literally stood down in the prep room and embalmed for 12 hours straight while the apprentices went and did all the removals, because they weren't allowed to embalm by themselves, so I had to be there anyway,” Schleicher said. “I think my record was eight that day. Went home, slept for six hours, and did the same thing the next day.” 

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As many businesses saw a dramatic decrease in revenue during the pandemic, funeral homes became overwhelmed with business. 

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“We were so sleep deprived for those two to three years, our call volume jumped, like, 30% to 40%, and for you know, two people taking on that bulk, that's a big uptick in our business,” funeral director Anna Schlomas said. “You know, we had an average of 70-80 calls a year, and we were hitting over 100, which was just kind of crazy.” 

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While there are some corporate funeral homes, about 75% of the funeral homes in the United States are family or privately owned. This means that most funeral homes have a small staff. Before the pandemic, having a smaller staff did not often cause problems. However, this became a problem as COVID progressed. Funeral directors became extremely overworked. 

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At Schlomas’s funeral home, the schedule was divided so that each funeral director was on call for two weeks and then off for two weeks. As the rest of the world found new hobbies during lockdown, Schlomas spent her days at home recovering. 

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“When you're in this COVID midst, we weren't really sleeping, we weren't getting proper meals because you had to work through it, you know, you were working through services, you ended up getting sick and being less of your best,” Schlomas said. “Which was really awful because you still had to put in all those hours, you still had to put in those sleepless nights, and your body couldn't keep up to recover.”

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The work days also became longer due to all the extra steps funeral directors had to take to keep themselves and patrons safe, especially at the beginning of the pandemic. 

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“I remember in, like, early 2020, when the very first COVID call hit. It was a little old lady,”  Schleicher recalls. “So, we were dressed to the nines in PPE, masks, and face shields. Every few seconds, we were spraying her down with disinfectant. We put disinfectant into the nose and mouth. We basically had her wearing a mask as well the whole time.”

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COVID protocol became the norm as it became impossible to enter a hospital or nursing home without wearing a mask and getting your temperature taken. These steps were necessary to keep everyone safe; however, these steps only added to a funeral director’s day. 

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“Trying to go into nursing homes was the hardest part because a good chunk of them wouldn't even let us go in. We had to give them our cot; it may not look like much, but they're very expensive pieces of equipment,” Schleicher said. “We had to give them our cot, go in, and have them move a deceased person, and they're trained to move live people. I don't know if they're trained to move dead ones. At the time, I was always worried.” 

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Back at the funeral home, they had their own restrictions. In the beginning stages of COVID, funerals had to be limited to ten people or fewer. Everyone was required to wear a mask and social distance. The funeral directors followed the guidelines, but would sometimes have to make a few exceptions.

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“We were supposed to have ten people for the funeral. How am I supposed to tell someone with eleven kids, ‘One of you can’t be here,’ you know what I mean?” Schlomas shared. “As I said, a lot of our funerals that would have been huge visitations and services got reduced to almost nothing.” 

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Like everyone else, funeral homes had trouble getting new supplies. Oftentimes, funeral directors would make trades with other funeral homes when their supplies ran too low. Some funeral homes were forced to think of alternative solutions to stay safe. 

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“But, you know, in the beginning, we were kind of makeshifting our own personal protection equipment. I was cutting garbage bags up, to you know, to put on me,” Cattoni recalled. 

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The hardest supplies to get were gloves and cleaning supplies. It came to a point where it didn’t matter what size gloves actually fit, but rather what glove size was available. 

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“You know how hard it was to get scrub and bubbles? I literally told myself, I was like, ‘Well, you know, what else has alcohol in it?’ I was like, ‘Okay, well, I've definitely got some liquor at home,’” Schlomas said. “I was like, worst-case scenario, I can put it in a spray bottle. I was like, we can disinfect anything in the prep room, anything in the funeral home.”

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As COVID progressed and more Americans died, it became harder and harder for some funeral directors to stay in the profession. For Cattoni, who owns and operates Aquagreen Dispositions LLC, an alkaline cremation business, it can be hard to hand patrons the final bill for his services. 

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“I still battle that thought [of leaving the industry] every day. It takes a special person because if you’re the owner, you’re running a business, which means you have to charge money to pay your bills,” Cattoni explained. “But at the same time, you're a person, and you feel horrible for these families, and you're like, ‘How do I charge people when they're at their lowest moment?'” 

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Like Cattoni, Abby Dudek felt uncomfortable with the monetary side of the business. Unlike Cattoni, however, Dudek left the funeral industry right before the pandemic began to pursue a career in chemistry.

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“One of the main reasons why I left the industry was because it felt very transactional, very predatory. Like, I went into it because I cared. And it became, like, kind of numbing in a way, and, thankless, too, because a lot of families are like, ‘You're just trying to take my money,’” Dudek shared. “I didn't set the prices, you know, and there's cost to doing business, like, you know, we have this building, and we are performing services, so, like, there is a cost to it, but yeah, it was, like, kind of very, yeah, it felt very predatory.” 

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While some funeral directors struggle with that predatory feeling, others are in it to make a profit. 

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“I don't think we increased prices during COVID. I know a lot of other funeral homes or, like, trade services were charging for, like, cleaning and stuff like that after a COVID case, and I'm like, that's just shitty,” Cattoni said. “Excuse my language, but how can you price-gouge people during this time when they need you the most? But, you know, other people didn't see it that way.” 

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Government Assistance During the Pandemic

Thankfully, the United States Government recognized the enormous cost of COVID. During the beginning of COVID until March 22, 2022, Americans who were uninsured did not have to pay any medical bills for COVID treatments. Those with insurance had their COVID medical bills waived. When Marla’s husband, Louis, who had been in the hospital for five weeks, passed away, at first she worried about her bill before she heard the news. 

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“So I have insurance, but I don't think they were charging for medical Covid-related bills then. I mean, I saw a bill at one point for over half a million dollars, but I never got a bill to pay.” Marla said. 

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Along with waiving medical bills, the government created the FEMA COVID-19 Funeral Assistance Program. The program, which started accepting applications on April 12, 2021, allowed Americans to receive compensation, up to $9,000, for their loved one’s funeral if they passed away due to COVID complications on or after Jan. 20, 2020. 

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After her husband passed and was cremated in March 2021, Leeanne did not have a Celebration of Life until July 2021. By that point, she was unaware of the FEMA program. 

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 “The COVID-19 Support loss group is the people who told me [about the program]. The funeral home didn’t tell me about it,” Leeanne said. “I was very frugal with the service that we had, so I could have done more.”

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For Leeanne, it took four months for her to receive her money after she applied for the program. Additionally, the money did not pay for her husband’s full service.

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“They did not reimburse me for flowers because I bought them at Costco versus from the funeral home, which I thought was kind of silly. But, you know, they definitely paid for the lion's share,” Leeanne said, “They paid for the funeral cards, the cremation, and the time at the funeral home.” 

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Sandi, who had already paid off half of her mother’s funeral arrangements before the pandemic, had to use the FEMA program to pay off the remainder of the bill. However, the process at first was complicated due to the specificities of the program.  

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“The medical director of hospice did not have COVID-19 listed as a cause, which was one of the prerequisites for the FEMA coverage,” Sandi explained. “Actually, as fate would have it, the medical director was going out on vacation the next week for ten days, so that was the first delay. So then I wrote him a letter and told him what hospital records are from the rehab facility, and then it was about two weeks after that that they could amend the death certificate to include the COVID-19 diagnosis. “ 

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Once she gathered all the required documentation, Sandi was able to apply for the program and receive her money in six weeks. However, for other applicants, the process was much slower. 

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Marla, who had a full burial for her husband, did not have trouble with the application but had trouble submitting all her documents. 

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“It was hard to make it work because I would send everything to them, and then they would tell me they couldn't read this document or this one didn't come through clearly. And then if I sent that one document again, they didn't include it; they did it as a new application,” Marla explained. “I finally said, you know what? I'm going to snail mail it. And that’s what I finally ended up doing.” 

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Jennifer, who heard about the program through Marla, waited until September 2025 to apply for the program. She was eligible to apply sooner, as her husband had passed in August 2021; however, Jennifer was struggling with the emotional weight of the money. 

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“I kind of waited because I was hemming and hawing because there were fires in California and, you know, Asheville had flooding. I didn't want to take that [money] from anybody,” Jennifer said. “I think it was Marla who said like “No, it’s been reserved for that. Like you should get it. It's for Peter,” and so I thought, ‘I guess I'll get it for my boys.’” 

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As more Americans died and their families went into debt, Cattoni felt a need to help his patrons apply for the FEMA assistance program. Many were unaware of the program and were beyond thankful for his help.

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“Yep, so we try to help as much as we can, with filing the paperwork, because one week you, like, submit one document, and they're like, ‘Oh no, we need this other document’, and you're like, ‘Well, we didn't have to do that last week, why the hell do we gotta do it now?’” Cattoni said, “So it was just bureaucracy, but yeah, we tried to help families, with that as much as possible.” 

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Although over 1,200,000 Americans died from the coronavirus in the five years the program was open, only over 500,000 applied for funeral assistance. Despite the coronavirus continuing to take lives, the program closed to new applicants on September 30, 2025. Those who are still surrounded by the effects of COVID urge people not to forget about them. 

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“And the sad thing, people are still dying from COVID,” Sandi said. “It's like the world wants to sweep us under the table.” 

The Future of the Funeral Industry

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Since the FEMA assistance program has closed for COVID families, Americans must come up with alternate ways to afford the cost of the modern funeral. Especially, in the aftermath of COVID, since the prices of funerals have gone up. 

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“Since working in the funeral industry, there has been a big increase in pricing for every funeral service and burial service,” said Molly Wyman, a funeral director since 2022. “Cremation has gone up, and so have traditional funerals. Even the materials we use for services have gone up.” 

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In 2023, the national media cost of funerals with a wake and burial was $8,300 compared to the median cost of cremation, which was $6,280. While this number is high, what makes it worse is that funeral homes require the full payment on the day of the services. 

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“A lot of times, payment is due in, like, before services are rendered, too, or shortly after. And you know, like, I don't know many people who have $10,000 lying around.” Dudek said,  “So a lot of people came in, and they were already having financial struggles, and their loved one dies, and they're like, ‘Oh my gosh, it's this much.’”

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To counteract the high cost of dying, funeral directors recommend pre-planning and pre-paying. It is never too early to start planning for the end, as it only helps your family in the long run. 

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“I've seen both aspects of it, where, family's pre-needed with us, and the family has to make one call, and everything is taken care of,” Cattoni said. “And then we've had cases where people just drop dead, unfortunately, and families have no clue what they want, they have no idea where information is, and they're scrambling, and they don't even really get to process what just happened.” 

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When those tough conversations are had about funeral arrangements, another factor to consider is how each method affects the environment. Traditional burials take up valuable land space and place toxic chemicals into the earth. Flame-based cremation releases harmful greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. To counteract these effects, there is now a range of environmentally-friendly options for people to choose from. Companies like Loop Biotech offer biodegradable mushroom coffins. The unembalmed body is placed in the casket, which is lined with a choice of moss, wool, or organic cotton. After 45 days, the body and the casket will return to the earth. Another option is to have the corpse turned into human compost. Recompose, a funeral home that offers this service, says the process takes eight to twelve weeks for the body to turn into soil. 

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While these services are eco-friendly, they can be costly. Loop’s caskets cost around $4,000, while Recompose charges around $7,000 for their services. One eco-friendly option that is more wallet-friendly is alkaline cremation. Alkaline cremation uses 95% water and 5% alkaline chemicals to cremate the body. The body is placed in a single air-tight chamber, which is insulated. This helps with the cost as the chamber retains heat. The water is then heated up to anywhere from 200-300 degrees Fahrenheit. Depending on the size of the body, the process can take anywhere from three to sixteen hours. The cremated remains come from the pure white bones that are left after the process is complete. The bone fragments are placed in a machine that pulverizes them into ashes. 

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“With regular crematories that have big gas pipes, it's essentially a big furnace, so it's mainly used by propane or natural gas. They have to burn it to get the heat, whereas we just use water, alkali, and heat. The heat is electric. So it's a much greener process,” Cattoni said. “We use about one-tenth that of a regular cremation for energy consumption, and we release one-tenth of the carbon output of a crematory.”

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At a flame-based crematory, funeral directors often encourage patrons to buy a casket for their loved one to be cremated in. Although it is required by law for funeral directors to let patrons know about alternative containers, like a cardboard box, most people are deterred from that option by the funeral director. At alkaline crematories, caskets are often discouraged, which ultimately saves patrons on the overall cost. 

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“Also, we do not use any caskets or vaults, and that's a big moneymaker for a lot of places. So I know I've heard a lot of people go to present to, like, funeral boards [about alkaline cremation], and on the funeral board is the owner of a casket company,” Cattoni said.“Well, he's gonna see this as a threat and not like it.” 

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To have your loved one directly cremated at Cattoni’s alkaline crematory, the bill, which includes the cremation process, the transfer of the body, the filing of the death certificate, the cremation permit, the urn, two copies of the death certificate, and the cremated remains hand-delivered to you and your family, is for only $1,945. 

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As the cost of funerals continues to rise, outside memorial services are becoming the economical option. During the pandemic, many families were unable to have traditional wakes and funerals for their loved ones. Instead, some people decided to throw their own memorial services and Celebrations of Life once things began to calm down. These services were usually informal and held at home or at a bar or restaurant.

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“I see more of the families that we serve are more of the ‘I don't want to be in a sad wake where we're looking at a body.’ If we do anything, we want to just come say goodbye, say a final prayer, and give them a kiss,” Cattoni said. “Then have a more uplifting, remember-them service, or memorial service, or celebration, than having the darkness of a funeral home and, you know, things like that.” 

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Grief: A Never-Ending Cycle

As the country moves on from the pandemic, it’s important not to forget those who are still actively fighting COVID. In October 2025, there were over 500 deaths from COVID in the United States.  For those who recently lost a loved one, especially as the country forgets about COVID, it can be an isolating experience. 

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“To anybody who loses a spouse to anything, they should join a widows' support group,” Jennifer said. “because I think grief needs a witness.” 

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The grief journey is not meant to be gone through alone. When someone is going through the grief cycle, they need to find people who understand what they are going through, especially during times of isolation like the pandemic. Although the circumstances that brought Marla, Leeanne, and Jennifer together were beyond horrible, they couldn’t imagine if they were never in each other's lives. 

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“But I do have to say, I have some of the best friends I've ever had in the world due to this,” Marla said. “And we believe our husbands are together, and we believe they put us together.”