
In our lives, we have encountered at least one time feeling of loss or death. However, very few of us realize which stages we are going through when we lost something or someone we love. Therefore I would like to share the summary of "On Grief & Grieving" written by Elisabeth Kubler Ross and David Kessler. According to the authors, sadly, people are living in a grief-illiterate culture although the process of grieving can give us courage and strength to move forward.
Let’s talk about five stages of grief (or loss). These areNot everyone goes through all the stages or in a prescribed order. There is no linear timeline in this process. Stages can last only a few minutes, hours we flip in and out of one to another or to years. Also, there is no typical response to loss as there is no such thing as a typical loss.
DENIAL
"I can't believe he is dead."
"They must be mistaken."
This stage is nature’s mechanism of letting in only as much as we can handle when things are too much to fully believe. This coping mechanism is a must for our survival. This helps to unconsciously manage our feelings. As denial fades, it is replaced with the reality of loss which is the beginning of the healing process and we started questioning.
ANGER
Anger is one of the necessary stages of the healing process. It is not logical or valid at all and can be directed towards everyone around us: colleagues, friends, family, god, and even ourselves.
"Why me?"
"Where is God in this?"
Anger is the front line feeling which hides all the other strong feelings such
as pain, sadness, panic, and loneliness under it. This anger gives us strength
by giving temporary structure to the nothingness of loss. Also, this is the
intensity of your love towards the thing or person you lost. So don’t let
anyone criticize your anger.
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BARGAINING
This is the stage full of “what if…” and “if only…” questions. And we keep thinking about how we could have done things differently.
“What if I stopped her that day...”
“If only I didn’t say like that...”
This is a distraction from the sad reality of life without loved ones. In this
stage, we are ready to do anything just to avoid this pain of loss. We bargain
about the past and even the future.
“I will quit drinking if I get this opportunity once
again.”
“I will do all the good deeds around the world if I
got my child back.”
All these bargainings give us time to adjust and fill the gaps that our strong
emotions generally dominate. Unfortunately, no matter how many times we
bargain, we meet the tragic reality in the end.
DEPRESSION
This is the level of empty feelings which are deeper than others. It is like going into a hurricane and sailing around. Once you reached in it, the exit is nowhere to be found. We have no desire to do anything and are detached from social life. This stage is too often seen as an unnatural one that needs to be fixed. But no expression when losing someone or something you love would be unusual.
This is nature's way of protecting us by shutting
down our nervous system so that we can adapt to something we feel we cannot
handle. To deal with it, we must assume depression as an unwelcome visitor.
It will come to visit you whether you like it or not. So, invite it, sit
with it, and face it without looking for an escape. Allow yourself to
be depressed for some time. It will leave after it has served its purpose.
But you also need to know that it may return from time to time with unseen
unfamiliar forms.
( This is different from clinical depression which is
longer and needed to seek medical treatment.)
ACCEPTANCE
We often confuse this stage with being all right or okay. In fact, most people don’t ever feel okay about this pain of loss. This is only a stage where we eventually accept that we cannot maintain the past intact and learn to live with it.
Instead of denying our feelings, we listen to our needs: we move, we change, we grow, we evolve. We may start to reach out to others and become involved in their lives. Finding acceptance is simply having more good days than bad ones. But remember that we truly begin to live again only after we had given grief its time.
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For a better life through a better understanding of ourselves...
Source:
On Grief & Grieving by Elisabeth Kubler Ross and David Kessler