Stages of Grief and Loss

Losing someone or something you deeply value can be remarkably painful. Knowing and understanding death or loss, however, doesn’t make accepting and living with the loss any easier. Grief is an intense human emotion. It is experienced because some say it is “the price of love” (Andrew Clark in BJPsych Advances) and “the cost of commitment” (Colin Murray Parkes in Bereavement: Studies of Grief in Adult Life).

You may feel grief after the loss of a job, your health, relationship, or business, but the most challenging and painful loss that you may experience is losing someone you love. It is natural to grieve when someone or something you love has been taken away from you. Will grief is inevitable, suffering is not. Be mindful of how you are feeling and how you are functioning. If grief starts to keep you from living your life it may be time to reach out for help. 

Even Natural Grief Takes Time

Both Colin Murray Parkes and John Bowlby believe that natural grief “is an extension of the natural human response to separation.” It is a response to a traumatic experience, and as such, it generally takes time to process and move forward. Depending on the circumstances surrounding your loss, grieving can last from a few weeks to years. Grieving has its value in helping you adjust to the changes in your life. 

Grief often occurs in five stages, these stages have been outlined by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross most famously. These stages are: 

Denial: This is often characterized by feelings of numbness. When individuals are in denial they may carry on as if nothing has happened as a means of coping with the intense feelings that come with loss. 

Anger: Anger naturally follows denial. After we begin to realize that we have in fact suffered a loss we become upset. It often feels unfair and can lead us to feeling very angry. This is natural and part of the process. 

Bargaining: In this phase we begin to try to act in certain ways to make things happen or to make ourselves feel better. By making deals with ourselves we start to accept some parts of the loss but not all. This is when you can also get into a lot of “what if” kinds of thinking and feel stuck wondering if we could have changed what happened if we had only done things differently. 

Depression: Sadness is a natural part of the grieving process. During this phase it is often felt most. 

Acceptance: Eventually you will arrive at a place of acceptance. This doesn’t mean you stop having feelings about your loss, it simply means you have accepted it has happened and are beginning to look at what a life afterward might look like. 

These phases, however, are affected by a number of variables, such as culture, personality, and other experiences. Thus, they are not distinctly separate from each other and have no precise duration. Everyone’s grief is unique. For some the worst time may be after two weeks and depressive symptoms may last four to six weeks, but some may have these feelings extended for a much longer time. Natural grief will take its natural course, eventually moving on after one or two years for major bereavement issues. We also don’t necessarily move through these phases in order or stop grieving once we go through all of them. 

Grief and Counseling

You don’t have to navigate your grief alone, therapy can help. Finding a therapist that is the right fit for you can help you to move forward after a loss. Counseling can allow you to have a space where you can openly share how you feel without judgment. CCS – Fayetteville contracts with counselors that know how to treat grief and will provide you with the support you deserve. Call today to schedule your first appointment.

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