Growing Brave: Grief
In keeping with our theme of growing brave, I’ve chosen to write a piece on the stages of grief. Grief is a universal experience, whether you are grieving the loss of your own health or the loss of a loved one, it touches each of lives at some point. In spite of it being something experienced by all we are often not good at talking about grief and this can leave people feeling very much alone.
The 5 Stages of Grief
It can often to be helpful to understand the stages of grief to help normalise our experience and understand ourselves better. First developed in the 1960s, the five stages of grief is just as relevant today as it was then.
Stage 1: Denial
This is often our first reaction to a bereavement. You of course know that the person has died but it doesn’t quite feel real yet. This can look like feeling numb or it can look to others like you’re carrying on as normal. In this stage it is common to have times where we think we hear or see the person that has died.
Stage 2: Anger
Feeling angry at the cruelty and unfairness of death is a completely natural response. We can even feel angry at the person who has died or angry at ourselves for things we did or didn’t do before their death.
Stage 3: Bargaining
Accepting that someone has died is painful and we can often find ourselves asking a lot of “What if” type questions. Bargaining can also look like making deals with ourselves or God to try and change the inevitable.
Stage 4: Depression
This stage of grief can last for months or years, where deep waves of sadness overwhelm us. Life can sometimes feel meaningless in the absence of our loved one.
Stage 5: Acceptance
It is a relief to know that most people do finally reach a stage of acceptance. As the Cruse bereavement charity puts it we do not “get over” someone’s death but we do learn to live again (1).
The stages of grief do not always happen in order and we can spend a long time flitting between stages or seemingly getting stuck in one stage.
It may be that you need help processing your grief through counselling or a support group. Counselling can be accessed through your GP or through Cruse Bereavement Charity. Support Groups do operate in most areas and are usually through Cruse (2).
A further useful resource is Care For The Family who run a variety of bereavement support courses including courses for those widowed young and sibling bereavement (3).
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