This Feel Good Therapy blog is talking about the state of grief, what it is, what it does, how it impacts our lives and why it happens. By the end of it you will achieve a degree of understanding of what is happening to you, you will get a positive perspective of grief and you will get a step by step guide on how to process grief positively, so it doesn’t overwhelm you and threaten your wellbeing. You will also be given links that may be helpful in your grieving process.
What is Grief, what does it do?
Grief is something we can experience from loss of any kind, as long as it has meaning or value in our life. For our purposes we will talk about Grief in terms of the loss of a loved one. When a person we love, whom we have an attachment to, is no longer on this earth, in the physical sense. They cannot be seen, heard, held or hugged, we are suddenly presented with a problem, for which, we instantly, see no solution. The dilemma we face as the loved one, who is left behind, in processing this permanent absence, becomes the emotion of Grief. Grief may be mild and short lived or deep and long lasting. Regardless of its length or depth, only the person left behind knows what, they feel. Only they know whether they are, or are not coping or processing their grief in a healthy way.
Understanding what you are going through
Losing a loved one can be devastating, especially if it comes completely out of the blue which, it did for me. The moment it happened I felt like my life would never be the same, that this pain and deep hurt that I was experiencing would never go away. I recall begging God to undo the deed of death, refusing to acknowledge the reality when, I was being told to accept, what had already happened. I was denying the evidence of my own eyes and ears. I remember being told to pull myself together, that I had to be strong for others who needed my support. The day after my loss, whilst ordering flowers for the funeral, I found myself laughing with the sales assistant. When I finished paying for the flowers and walked towards my car, I felt guilty for having laughed. I didn’t understand how I even managed to laugh. I recall getting in side the car, turning the ignition key and, suddenly like a wave, the hurt and pain returned and I began sobbing.
In the weeks after the funeral, I went from uncontrollable tears, sleepless nights, going into autopilot with housework and chores and then just curling into bed, unable to think or function or do anything. I tried to distract myself by staying busy, going places, and then labelled myself a failure because I would keep breaking down in private. I felt a sense of isolation because others around me seemed suddenly to be getting on with life and I just didn’t know how to.
I felt I hadn’t said goodbye, and I needed to say goodbye. I kept telling myself that if I could just have one last conversation, I would suddenly be alright. People expected me to have gotten over it by day 40, but six months passed, a year passed, two years passed and then another loss of another loved one compounded, the first grief and I felt so low, and each day I woke up, I just felt more sad. I was so weighed down by the simple tasks life expected of me.
I began to behave out of character. I felt useless, worthless, like I could do nothing right. My self esteem plummeted and I was sensitive to every word that was spoken to me. I would just sit in front of a television screen, self medicating on day time shows, because I was in full blown depression.
Years passed by and my close family just accepted who I had become. I would let the washing pile up, dishes would overflow out of the sink and we would frequently run out of essentials like bread and milk. Where before, I would cook full meals, suddenly I was always too tired to even do the shopping. The less I did, the more other family members had to do, and the more they did, the more resentful they became of what they thought was my ‘laziness’.
It has been almost eighteen years and I still find something that triggers a memory and brings tears to my eyes. Not one day passes when my thoughts don’t turn to how much of a hole has been left in my heart. The point at which I started to heal was when I began to understand what I was going through. I cannot point exactly to when that was, but it was a long time in coming. What I realise now, is that understanding grief and our individual process is the one key component necessary to our own healing. Instead of feeling isolated and mentally ‘cracked’ for want of a better word, we need to know that this thing, that we are going through, that is outside of our control is, in fact absolutely normal. For me, that began because I read a book called ‘On Grief and Grieving’ and immediately afterwards I read ‘On Death and Dying’.
The understanding of grief, provided by Elizabeth Kubler Ross
Elizabeth Kubler Ross was a psychiatrist who claimed that our emotions grapple with reality until we arrive at a place of acceptance. That before we could get to acceptance we had to pass through five stages, or I think, more correctly, five attitudes:
- In Denial, our brain is trying to limit the trauma to our mental wellbeing by ignoring or refusing to acknowledge the reality in front of us. It wants to convince us that its simply untrue.
- However, when finally we do, a natural, go to response is, to get angry. Anger is yet another protective mechanism the brain equips us with so we redirect our pain as blame at someone else. By projecting blame we still don’t have to accept what has happened.
- When we come to the realisation that there is no one to blame and we cannot direct our anger at anyone or anything we revert to bargaining. Through bargaining our aim is to undo what cannot be undone and we are willing at this stage to ask any divinity, ones we believe in and even those we do not, to make death disappear.
- When finally we realise there is nothing that will help our situation, we become helpless, and depression becomes our companion. In the best of cases it may be fleeting but, in the worst it can result in real illness, and the seriousness of that illness cannot be predicted from one person to the next.
- Acceptance is our final attitude. It is where we may still mourn, but have arrived at an understanding that we now face a new reality, that no longer includes our loved one beyond our memories.
Upon reading these stages, that make up what is known, as the Kubler Ross Model and reading the recollection above and perhaps comparing it all to a bereavement you have suffered, are you able to identify with what, has gone on during your grief?
The Rules On Grief
The actual rules about grief are simply that there are none. Accepting your feelings, deep or otherwise is a personal choice. The depth of grief is usually an indication of the depth of love felt, for the loved one, who has died. Our grief is influenced therefore, by a variety of factors; the relationship we shared with the deceased person and to a greater degree upon ourselves. Our resilience to the shock of loss and our innate characteristics all play a part, in how quickly we get to acceptance. That is not to imply that a resilient person cannot feel deeply and cannot suffer longer. People are individual and their individuality plays a big part in grief. Its also import to understand that not everyone will go through the Kubler Ross Model in a linear fashion, or even go through all 5 stages. They may just go from denial to acceptance in one step, with not long in between. they may even hover between bargaining and anger, or even acceptance and denial. Everything is dependent on the brain and how it chooses to process this very sad and sorrowful phenomenon.
The beauty of the Kubler Ross model is that it provides a template. How we use, access or process that template is down to us and our desire to stay stuck or overcome. Whichever, conclusion we come to for ourselves is normal. The problem is unless you are the one going through grief at any given moment, it seems to be incumbent upon you to get over it as quickly as possible, based on the opinions of the wider society. Those not grieving, find it very hard to deal with those who are grieving. Their sympathy isn’t limitless.
This causes strain and unwanted pressure that just piles on more pressure, on top of the possibly overwhelming pressure of the grief itself. So, even though you would prefer for there not to be rules upon grief, society inevitably places the rule of ‘get over it quickly’ whether you want it or not.
The impact of grief upon your wellbeing
The other thing about grief is, that despite how personal it is and, how badly we may be sympathetic to the idea of respecting those who are grieving, to let grief loose without keeping it in check may be more problematic in the long run. The reason for this is that it can have impact on our physiology and begin to negatively effect our physical wellbeing. If it turns to illness and that illness becomes debilitating it is not a desirable outcome. This is perhaps the reason why, society erring on the side of caution, attempts to pull the grieving out of grief, sooner, than we sometimes feel ready. There is no doubt that focus on matters at hand, distract from grief. There is nothing wrong with that. The moments where we are distracted and get on with the mundane will turn into minutes and then hours and then days and months until finally we are back to ‘normal’ with a moment thinking about our loved one.
Guilt is a useless emotion
Sometimes in the moments, minutes, hours and days where we become distracted we may feel guilty for being left. Guilt is useless, it serves no one. Your loved one probably wouldn’t want that anyway, because lets be honest, death is not in our control. Life is in our control and grief has been described as the price we pay for love. Love is why we grieve.
When we love someone What if, when our loved one dies, we mourn, but we also celebrate them. Take joy from the joyful moments we shared with them. Give gratitude for their achievements and the memories they left behind and just go on loving them, by finding different ways of showing that love. Put up a chair by the grave. Plant a tree in their scattered ashes, plant a garden, grow some vegetables to feed the needy. There are so many positive ways in which we can love, even in absentia. Talk about your journey with others. Whilst getting solace, give solace. Lean on others in healthy ways. Ask friends and confidants to help you plan a remembrance day, include the favourite songs, favourite music of your loved one and create a pleasurable atmosphere and amidst this cry and laugh. You will probably find they will cry and laugh with you. By all means grieve, but temper your grief, so you are able, when you are fully ready to pull yourself back into a new life, a different life, than the one you had. These things I am suggesting are nothing more than choice. Whether or not you choose to choose them is entirely up to you.
If you are suffering from grief of any kind and would like support, then by all means consider grief counselling. Here are a couple of links.
If in the meantime you would like Feel Good Therapy’s Free, step by step, self help guide, to support you to, process your grief in a healthy way then please, send your email address and contact details to the enquiry email: enquiries@thefeelgoodcentre.co.uk
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