Counseling

Coping with Grief

 

Grief Journey Tips

Recognize Your Loss: After a significant loss, you may be numb for awhile. Being numb allows us to accept the loss a little at a time. It is important to acknowledge the loss and the pain.

Be With The Pain: You are hurting. Admit it. Feeling the pain after a loss is a normal part of living and loving. Denying the loss does not lessen the pain, it prolongs the suffering.

Accept All Of Your Feelings, Even The Feelings You Don’t Like. Fear, anger, guilt, sadness, depression, despair, heartbreak, and an overwhelming feeling of disorganization are characteristic reactions to a significant loss. Avoiding naming and feeling our feelings, will mean our feelings will be expressed in unexpected ways.

It Is Okay To Feel Anger: Everyone feels angry at a significant loss. Channel it wisely and it will go away as you heal. Walk, run, and exercise. If you find yourself more irritable, journal and explore what your anger is about. Anger is also a way for some people to avoid feeling the more vulnerable feeling of sadness.

You Are Vulnerable, Be Gentle with Yourself: Invite help only from people who you know will be gentle with your feelings and can accept all of your feelings.

You Are Not Alone, Seek Comfort As You Need It: Although you feel alone and grieving is an individual process, you are not alone. Grieving is a sad part of life everyone experiences. Accept support from others. Let them know what they can do to help. Do not expect comfort from a grieving partner as your partner may not be able to give when you need due to their own grief. Weekends and Holidays can be very hard, make plans with others.

Suicidal Thoughts Are A Symptom Of Your Pain: Sometimes people feel survivors guilt or that they wish they had died instead of their loved one. The OU Counseling center 248.370.3465 is here to assist as Common Ground which has a 24/7 Hotline: 1-(800) 231-1127. If your thoughts of dying persist and you feel they are out of control, SEEK HELP AT ONCE by going to your local emergency room.

Healing Does Not Occur In A Smooth Line or On A Time Table: Healing occurs in phases where you move in and out of different feelings. Remind yourself that you can get through this. If it feels like you have been there long enough remember there is no way around grieving. You can only accept where you are in each moment and continue on your journey.

Heal At Your Own Pace: Never compare yourself to another grieving person. Each of us has our own timing.

Expect Relapses: There will always be certain things that trigger sadness again. This is normal.

Keep A Journal: Putting your thoughts and feelings on paper is a good way to get them out and understand them..

Do Your Mourning Now: Allow yourself to be with your pain-it will pass sooner.

Postponed grief will return later.

Tips for Coping:

 

  • Physical exercise along with relaxation will improve sleep and concentration.
  • Keep a journal: write through your sleeplessness and change the ending of your
  • Talk to people; talk is one of the most healing activities. It is how we let go of stress.
  • Give yourself permission to feel rotten and share your feeling with others.
  • Give yourself permission to have moments of happiness or escape.
  • Spend time with others. Resist the temptation to isolate yourself.
  • Get plenty of rest and eat regular meals even if you don’t feel like it.

 

Ten Common Myths of Grief

Myth #1: The experience of grief and mourning proceed in predictable and orderly stages such as denial, anger, guilt, etc.                                   This stages-of-grief idea is appealing, but inaccurate. It emerged from Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’ groundbreaking book, On Death and Dying. However, Dr. Kublar-Ross did not intend for these emotions to be interpreted as stages or steps, but rather to help people understand that denial, anger, guilt, and sadness are common, normal and expected reactions. If you are expecting anger, it doesn’t mean that you are “less evolved” than someone feeling guilt. Many people do not fully experience all of these feelings.

Myth #2: After losing someone you love, your goal should be to “be strong”, and “get over” your grief as soon as possible. Crying means that you are “falling apart” and that is not what anyone wants.            Crying is nature’s way of releasing tension, letting others know that you need to be comforted, and discharging accumulated stress toxins. Society often encourages people to quickly move away from grief. Unfortunately, refusing to cry, suffering in silence, and “being strong” are often viewed as admirable and desirable reactions to loss. Friends, family, and co-workers may encourage this stance because they don’t want to talk about painful things, and there is nothing they can say or do to make it better. Many people have internalized the idea that grieving and mourning should be done quickly, quietly, and efficiently. The messages from others seem to be, “Just get over it.” Find someone who accepts that no one can “make it better”, that your life surely will not be the same without the person you loved, and who can be present with you while you grieve so you do not have to bear it all alone. In time, you can learn to live with your grief while you learn to adjust to life without the presence of person who has departed.

Myth #3: “It has been six (or nine, or twelve) months…Shouldn’t they be over by this now?                                                                                            This myth relates directly to our culture’s impatience with bereavement and the desire to move people away from the process of mourning as quickly as possible. We expect grieving people to “get back to normal” soon after the death or loss. All too often, we succumb to the myth that grief should be moved away from rather moved toward, as something to be overcome, rather than experienced. Interestingly, when people are allowed to move toward their grief and to mourn openly, their grief becomes less intense and more manageable over time.

Myth #4: If the bereaved looks okay, they must be “over it.”         

The bereaved do look like the non-bereaved on the outside, but inside, they experience a wide range of chaotic emotions- shock, numbness, anger, disbelief, betrayal, rage, regret, remorse, guilt, etc. These feelings are intense and confusing. Thus, grievers feel misunderstood and further isolated when people comment in astonishment, “You look so well!” Helpful responses should simply and quietly acknowledge their pain and suffering through statements such as “This must be very difficult for you,” “I am so sorry,” “How can I help?” or “What can I do?”

Myth #5: The best thing we can do for the griever is to avoid discussing the loss.        

The bereaved need and want to talk about their loss, including the minutest details connected to it. Grief shared is grief diminished. Each time a griever talks about the loss, a layer or pain is shed.

Myth #6: “You need to be more active and get out more!”                              

Encouraging the bereaved to maintain their social, civic, and religious ties is healthy. Grievers should not withdraw completely and isolate themselves from others. Erroneously, however, some caregivers try to help the grieving “escape” from their grief through trips or excessive activity. This was the pressure felt by Phyllis seven months after her husband died. “Several of my sympathetic friends who have not yet experienced grief firsthand suggested that I interrupt my period of mourning by getting out more,” she recalls. “They say, solemnly, “What must you do is get out among people, go on a cruise or take a bus trip. Then you won’t feel so lonely.” I have a stock answer for their advice: “I am not lonely for the presence of people. I am lonely for the presence of my husband. But how can I expect these innocents to understand that I feel as though my body has been torn asunder that my soul has been mutilated? How could they understand that for the time being, life is simply a matter of survival?”

Myth #7: Grief support groups are too depressing and not helpful.          Groups formed specifically to provide support for grievers are extremely helpful for the bereaved. Most who attend describe the meetings as anything but depressing. There, grievers receive encouragement, sympathy, practical advice, and emotional support from people who have “been there.” Also, those early in the grieving process see and hear from others who are further along and adjusting in healthy ways to the loss. Such individuals become strong role models for the recently bereaved.
Myth #8: If you don’t cry, it means you aren’t sorry about the loss.         Crying is a normal response to sorrow, but it’s not the only one. People have many ways of coping and grieving. There is no since “right way” to grieve.

Myth #9: Moving on with your life means you’re forgetting the one you lost.                      

Moving on means you’ve accepted the death, which is not the same as forgetting. You can have new life and memories without sacrificing the memories you have of your lost loved one.

Myth #10: Grief is such a personal thing; it should be kept to yourself.           

Your grief should never be a private affair. You need to talk about your experiences and your feelings. There is tremendous support in being with others who have also experienced loss. The more social your grief work is, the better you will do with it. The more you talk about it publicly, write about it in letter and share in the grief with others, the more effectively you will adapt to your own loss.

 

Grief and Loss Resources

WEBSITES

Grief Healing:

http://griefhealing.com/index.htm

A site created by someone who has lost both a parent and a child that offers information, comfort, and support for those anticipating or coping with a significant loss

GriefNet: http://rivendell.org/

An Internet community of persons dealing with grief, death, and major loss

Journey of Hearts: http://www.journeyofhearts.org/

A site that combines elements of medicine, psychiatry, poetry, prose, and images to provide resources and support to those who have experienced loss, be it acute or long- standing

National Students of AMF Support Network: http://www.studentsofamf.org/

A network dedicated to supporting college students grieving the illness or death of a loved one created by a student on the loss of his mother, Anne Marie Fajgenbaum (AMF)

Survivors of Suicide: http://thewebpager.com/sos/

An independently owned and operated website not associated with any specific group, organization or religious affiliation intended to help those who have lost a loved one to suicide resolve their grief and pain in their own personal way

Virtual Memorials: http://www.virtual-memorials.com/

A site that creates free online memorials that celebrate the lives and personalities of lost loved ones and provides a place where these cherished images will have a permanent home

WebHealing: http://www.webhealing.com/index.html

A site by Tom Golden, LCSW, an internationally known psychotherapist, author, and speaker on the topic of healing from loss that contains information, discussion boards, and an “honor page” to memorialize lost loved ones

BOOKS

Clarissa Pinkola Estes: The Radiant Coat: Myths and Stories about the Crossing Between Life and Death (book and audio with archetypal myths/stories about transition and death)

Rachel Naomi Remen, MD: My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge and Belonging (some stories about death, others not; “Blessing” is about author’s grandfather dying—see http://www.rachelremen.com/blessing.html; “Wrestling with the Angel” is about author’s grandfather’s story that helped her when she was in a coma—see http://www.rachelremen.com/wrestling.html)

Rachel Naomi Remen, MD: Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories That Heal (some stories about death, others not; “Giving Darshan” is about dying—see http://www.rachelremen.com/darshan.html)

Pat Schweibert and Chuck DeKlyen: Tear Soup: A Recipe for Healing After Loss (a beautiful story about the process of grieving, written for children but can be used for adolescents and adults too; also available on video or DVD)