Coping with Grief After the Death of a Loved OneLosing a loved one can be one of the most difficult, devastating events of anyone’s life. After the loss, you may feel pain, loss and even anger. It is important to understand that these feelings are natural, understandable and expected.
Everyone Grieves Differently
One of the most important things to remember is that everyone grieves differently. It is personal and needs to be an individual experience. There are many factors that go into how people grieve, including personality, coping skills life experiences, faith and the nature of the loss. Healing from grief is a gradual process and there is no normal timetable for when grieving will end.
Stages of Grief
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, a psychiatrist, identified five stages of grief in 1969 based on her studies of patients facing terminal illness. These stages have since been applied to death as well:
Denial – “This cannot be happening.”
Anger – “Why is this happening to me?”
Bargaining – “Make this not happen and I will do this”
Depression – “I am too sad to do anything”
Acceptance – “I am at peace with my loss”
Not everyone goes through all the stages and not everyone goes through them in the same order. Some who have suffered loss say that grief is more like a roller coaster with many ups and downs as well as highs and lows.
Understanding that everyone suffers loss differently can help you deal not only with your own grief, but the grief of others who have also suffered a loss. Something a family can do is rely on the funeral directors Castle Hill