Grief is a powerful emotional and physical reaction to the loss of someone or something from your life. When you have lost someone, it is normal to feel powerful feelings of grief. There is no right way to grieve, so it is important to remember everybody’s experience of grief is different, even when people are grieving the loss of the same person. Our previous experiences with death, grief and loss may also influence how we experience grief and relate to the loss.

When you have experienced loss, initially you may feel overwhelmed by grief. It is normal to feel a wide range of ever-changing emotions, for example, one minute feeling angry, the next love for that person, the next confusion and disbelief. Grief is often characterized by deep feelings of sadness and sorrow, and often by a powerful feeling of longing to see or talk with that person again.

Other effects of grief include feelings of numbness or emptiness, or feelings of fear or anxiety. You may feel frustrated with yourself for how you are feeling compared to how you think you ‘should’ be dealing with things, or even comparing yourself to how others are dealing with things. You might feel angry with the person who has died or angry with yourself for things you did or did not do.

If you feel others don’t understand you response, and this could make you feel alone or that you don’t have support. You may be worried that you will never feel better, or that you will not be able to cope. This is normal, particularly when the grief is new and raw. There is no ‘quick fix’ to this but there are ways that you can help yourself to come to terms with your loss.

Ways of Understanding Grief

We can think of grief as being like a wave coming to shore in a storm, at first the waves, of grief come quickly, are large and overwhelming, we are tossed by the grief waves and it is difficult to come up for air; but as time passes the storm too passes and the waves slow in frequency and intensity, and you are able to come up for air in between the waves. There may be a surge in the waves from time to time, around anniversaries or when things remind us of that person, but the sea then becomes calmer again.

The ‘stages of grief’ are often talked about. The grief stage model was developed by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross when she was working with people who were dying. However, it can be useful to recognise that people may experience similar stages when they are grieving the loss of someone from their life. Grief is not a linear process i.e. one does not necessarily move from one stage to the next stage or even go through all stages.

The five stages of grief are:

Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance

See Grief & Loss in the Recovery Hub for further information.