The grieving process

Here are a few myths that you may have heard about the grieving process and how it progresses over time, along with the realities that many people face.

Myth

‘Grieving takes place in clear stages, and once you have passed through one stage you do not go back to it.’

Reality

People move back and forth between feeling that they are coping well and not coping at all, during the days, weeks, months and years following the death of someone close to them.

There is not a right way to feel, and there isn’t one shared path that people take when they are bereaved.

Emotions, thoughts and feelings associated with grief are not like an alphabetical list that starts at A and finishes at Z. We all experience different emotions at different times and in different ways. If we can try to accept this, it may not feel quite so crushing.

The grief experienced shortly after a death does seem to be generally different from grief years later, however. The early response is often intense, all-encompassing and can involve daily yearning, significant emotional pain and a range of strong physical reactions.

Trouble focussing attention, zoning out and forgetfulness are common. If you are further on in your grief and do not feel that you have seen a significant shift in any of this, you may wish to seek further support.

‘There is an acceptable period of time to be grieving for. After this point you should not, or will not, feel upset by the death.’

Reality

Everyone has a very different timeline for grief. It is not unusual for things to take longer than people expect to feel less distressing. Try not to be impatient with yourself to be back to normal.

Equally there is no rule that says you have to be acutely upset for a long period of time; this does not say anything about you as a person or the depth of your attachment to the person who has died.

You may notice that the people around you are keen to set a timeline for you to feel better or be back to normal; maybe they are also grieving for the person who died and they are doing it very differently or at a different pace to you.

If you can, try and talk about this with people you care about in a compassionate way. This will be in your own words, but something like this might help you to frame it:

“I know you also miss [the person who died]/are concerned about me. At the moment I need time to process that they are gone. I know it might seem like I am taking a long time to do that/I am doing that in a different way to you. Please bear with me.”

If you don’t feel up to doing that yourself, you may want to ask someone you trust to send similar messages/have conversations on your behalf.

‘Grief has an endpoint.’

Reality

When you are in pain it is understandable to want to know when it will end. Perhaps people around you have suggested that you should be further on or even over it by now and you are wondering if you are stuck.

Grief changes over time, but it is unlikely that you will get to a point where you feel that your grieving has finished. However, as our lives continue on, we often find that a bit of space opens up around the grief and it is not always as all-consuming as it feels at first.

Over time, the reality and meaning of the death are better understood and people feel more able again to re-engage with meaningful or pleasurable activities and relationships. Ideally, we find ways to stay connected to the person who has died – if that is what we need – without their physical presence.

People often find that they are either focusing on their loss and doing things that bring up the feelings of sadness and pain, or they are distracted from their grief for a period of time (this could be minutes, hours, or days) by activities that are focused on restoring everyday life.

Immediately after the death, it might be that you spend most of your time focusing on your loss, and very little of your time is spent on everyday activities. This will change over time, but there is no prescribed timeframe for how this happens and it might not move in the same direction across time.

Both experiences are important in the process of grieving, as we need to have time to process our emotional response and mourn for the person we have lost, but we also need to be able to attend to the lives that continue on for us.

You might find that you spend much more time in one mode of grief than the other. You may feel guilty when you are in a mode that is more about restoring some kind of normal (for instance, catch yourself not thinking about the person who has died for a while or even enjoying yourself and laughing); you may feel stressed, anxious or judged when you are in a mode of focussing on your grief if you feel that you (or others think you) should have moved on or be coping better.

This is part of being human and does not mean that there is something wrong with you or with your bond to the person who has died.

There may be periods when you feel that you are moving backwards and more intense grief re-emerges. This can occur around the time of significant events, such as holidays, anniversaries, birthdays, other losses or a particularly stressful time.