Grief and Loss

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Grief

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 a current 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 cause you to 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 eases 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. 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:

  1. Denial
  2. Anger
  3. Bargaining
  4. Depression
  5. Acceptance

You may recognise these stages in yourself – for example:

Thinking and feeling things such as ‘I can believe they’re gone’; ‘I’m so angry they’re gone’; ‘I’d do anything to talk to them one last time’; ‘I feel so lost and sad’; and after time ‘I can begin to live my life whilst being with the pain of the loss’

Recognising and understanding your own process can be helpful in coming to terms with what has happened.

Things that may help

Expressing your Grief

Expressing your thoughts and feelings around your grief and loss can be very helpful to process the emotions that you feel.  You may find it helpful to talk with trusted friends or family who can provide space to listen.

If you don’t feel like talking about it, you could choose to write about your feelings. No one else can read this so it can be very freeing and cathartic to write down exactly how you are thinking and feeling.

Embracing Your Emotions

Taking the view that emotions are OK can be helpful.  If we are pushing away emotions that make us feel uncomfortable or that we feel are not acceptable, we can be missing important aspects of our grief.  All emotions are part of the grieving process and as we feel them and allow them to be, we experience how emotion may change over time, that it passes, or that we have some new meaning or understanding arising from being with the difficulty.

Helping feelings of regret and guilt

When someone dies it is common to have thoughts around guilt and regret. You may think of things you said or did, or that you did not say or do. Events that might ordinarily have seemed a normal or trivial part of life or work may take on a new meaning given what has happened. Over time most people find ways of resolving these emotions. However, sometimes we can get stuck with these thoughts seeming to loop on a circuit.

This can be very distressing and can get in the way of being able to grieve. If you are feeling like this, here are some things that you can try:

  • Write down your regrets.
  • Recall kind and compassionate feelings.  This is the attitude that we want to bring forth when thinking of the situation – We all have regrets and sometimes make mistakes, but that’s not the whole story of you or the situation. See if you can take a broader perspective and offer yourself some kindness, like you would to a dear friend.
  • Ask yourself:
    • If the person you are thinking of could hear and see you feeling regret and feeling guilty, what would they say to you? How would they reassure and comfort you?
    • What would a kind and wise friend say to you?
    • If this was another person that was feeling regret and guilt, what would you say to them?

Rituals and Customs

The person’s funeral is a ritual that can help us acknowledge our loss, say goodbye to the person and celebrate their life. How the funeral is carried out and the rituals and customs around the funeral are often influenced by our culture. Whilst these formal traditions are often very helpful to us, it may be helpful to also create your own memorial and ritual to celebrate that person’s life in a way that feels meaningful to you.  These processes can help us make sense of what we are feeling and help us begin to acknowledge our life without that person.