Grief in the Receipts: Recognizing the Hidden Triggers of Tax Preparation

If you find yourself unexpectedly weeping during your tax preparation, it may be more than your financial woes.

Photo by Joao Viegas on Unsplash

Something I hadn’t considered when I was struggling after my mom’s death was that her taxes would still need to be filed the following year.

So, just a few months after I’d survived my first Christmas without her, I found myself knee-deep in all the receipts that were often-painful reminders of our journey the year before.

Dates brought back vivid memories of how Mom was doing during a certain period, when her health started to decline, and the limited time she had left - of which I wasn’t always aware.

As I was organizing her paperwork, I’d find myself gazing at a receipt and thinking of specific symptoms she had or how long she lived after a certain date.

That first year was so painful, and my memories so fresh, that the last thing I wanted to do was go through a pile of receipts to remind me of all we’d been through in the last months of Mom’s life.

But I plodded along through tears, calculator in hand, trying to focus on one of the final tasks I’d be privileged to complete in support of my precious mom.

Tax time is a great reminder to cherish the here and now

That retrospective understanding of the sequence of events prior to Mom’s death was such an odd feeling, yet something I know many who have lost a loved one experience.

To look at a picture or remember an event and know when looking back that someone has a specific amount of time left - and sometimes wishing you were more aware of that then.

Now, I knew Mom’s health was declining, so the timing of her death wasn’t a surprise.

And I try to be really cognizant of taking nothing for granted. I’ve worked with so much death throughout my career that I’m highly aware that we never know when our final moment will arrive.

Sometimes a chronic illness signals its approach and sometimes it happens when someone runs to the store to get milk.

Which is why Mom and I tried to embrace the precious moments we had while she was here.

It’s something we need to do with everyone we love, since there’s no guarantee about what tomorrow will bring.

Tax receipts can create a mixed bag of emotions

But grief isn’t the only emotional pain we may find hidden in our receipts.

In 2019, a similar dynamic happened.

I had surgery the previous year to remove a mass, which I’m grateful was benign.

However, I didn’t know my outcome would be so positive when all those medical receipts were piling up.

So, when our tax preparation time rolled around, I found myself looking back on each date and remembering the fear and stress I felt at that time.

There may be lots of hidden triggers in the receipts you shuffle through for tax preparation.

It could be grief due to the death of loved one - or other types of grief; medical trauma for yourself or someone else; or any other type of emotional pain that is captured in the tax documents you have to prepare.

The important thing is to understand that the triggers may be lying there in wait, ready to pounce when you least expect them.

In that light, self-awareness is important when dealing with something like this.

If you think that reviewing all that information won’t be helpful at this time in your life, or if you’re already in the tax prep process and feeling the impact of reliving those memories, find the support you need.

If you’ve always done your own bookkeeping and receipt tracking, you might want to ask for help from a family member, friend, or a pro - like a professional bookkeeper or someone within an accounting firm.

And if you find that tax preparation has triggered your grief or pain in some way, you might want to consider finding additional help - like a counselor, support group, or faith leader who can provide the support you need.

The most important thing to remember is that you don’t have to wade through the grief and other pain in your receipts alone.

Speak up.

Reach out.

Let someone know you need some help.