Grief is a multifaceted response to loss, particularly to the loss of someone we love. When we experience loss, there are a number of emotions that we go through. Grief is often misunderstood. Many people think of grief as a negative thing, when in reality it is a completely natural response to loss. While grief can be very difficult to cope with, it is ultimately a process that leads to healing and growth. Grief is often accompanied by intense emotions and in this blog post, we want to discuss the 10 emotions you're most likely to feel in seasons of grief and how best to manage them.
1. Shock and Disbelief
In the early stages of grief, it is common to feel shock and disbelief. This is because our brain has not yet processed that the person most closest to us is gone. We may try to deny that the person has passed as a way of coping with the pain. Sometimes we still expect this person to just walk into the room, or we completely forget they aren't in the house for a fleeting second. These little moments in and of themselves are quite shocking as we come to terms with the loss over time.
2. Sadness
Sadness is probably the emotion that is most associated with grief. And it makes sense – when we lose someone, we are grieving the loss of their presence in our lives. We may find ourselves crying more often or feeling down for extended periods of time. It is important to allow yourself to feel sad and to cry when you need to. Sometimes this sadness is short lived, a fleeting moment in your day. Other times this sadness can grip you for days on end, like a deep hole that you can't get out of. It's often the case that when we're in this place all we think about is how to get out of the hole, instead of allowing ourselves the time we need to be in this space and come to terms with it.
3. Guilt
Guilt is an emotion we don't often think of immediately when someone mentions grieving, yet it is an emotion we often can't move past for a long period of time. Guilt comes in many forms, we may feel guilty for things we said or did (or didn't say or do) before the person died. We may also feel guilty for being alive when they are not. Hypotheticals and scenarios of every kind run through our head on repeat. What if I did this, what if I said it differently, what if I didn't miss that train home, what if I asked if they were ok? Guilt is a difficult emotion to move past because the amount of questions and scenarios can become endless and hard to shake. This is a difficult emotion to move through and many time you can't move through this emotion until you are at peace with the answers to your questions. As time passes you give more thought to each scenario and learn to process it away from the emotion.
4. Fear
Fear can be a gripping emotion in times of grief. When death confronts us head on it, raises all sorts of questions about life and the loss of life. We may be afraid of dying ourselves or afraid of being forgotten by those who remain behind after we die. Big questions of life often surface and it's the unknown that drives this fear. We may also be afraid of never seeing our loved one again or afraid that we will never get over our grief. Fear is ultimately our body's response to change. The loss of someone close to us is one of the most confronting changes we can ever go through in life. Our instinct is to run away from the change and this drives the fear response. Change is always hard, not just in grief, but in anything in life. Think of any time a change has impacted you...it takes time to process, time to work through it, manage it and get into a new rhythm. Focusing on the things that bring you comfort and peace during a time of change can help you to process this emotion better.
5. Anger
Anger is a common but often misunderstood emotion during grief. We may be angry at our loved one for dying, angry at God for taking them away from us, or angry at the world for being so unfair. Anger can be a common manifestation of grief and ironically anger stems from the strong and deep love you have for that person. It's love that drives the anger. It's coming from a good place. The important thing is to not let the anger consume you or take over your life. Channel your anger into something positive like writing or painting as a way of expressing yourself and working through your emotions.
6. Bargaining
Bargaining is a emotion during grief in which we try to make deals with God or fate in an attempt to bring our loved one back or change what has happened. We may find ourselves bargaining in an effort to make sense of our loss. Whilst a common response to grief, it's actually our phycological way of reducing the fear response. It's our minds trying to create scenarios that can never actually eventuate. This emotion often prevents us from working through our loss as we try to fantasize about a reality that will never come to fruition. Try to focus on accepting what has happened and on making peace with it
7 Anxiety
Anxiety is our tendency to worry about the future when grieving. We may worry about how we will cope without our loved one, what will happen next, how do I move on? Anxiety could also be triggered from financial concerns, the pressure of organizing a funeral, sorting out loans, bank accounts, payments, assets. How to tell people what's happened, how to talk to people, how to be around people? The concerns and worries mount up quickly if you allow them to. In this season it helps to just focus on putting one foot in front of the other. What's your next step? What's your one thing today? Keeping things simple and on the task immediately at hand helps us to shift focus from the what-ifs, to the what-nows.
8 Loneliness
Loneliness is a common feeling when in grief. Sometimes the loneliness is self-inflicted because we want to just be by ourselves. We need space, time and distance in order to process and just be present in the moment. Other times, loneliness can be an external factor - we may feel like no one understands what we're going through or like no one can help us. Everyone is offering to help, or ask if there's anything they can do, but you still feel alone because nobody could possibly feel how you feel right now, or help fix the burning desire to get that person back again. There's nothing anyone can do to fix it - hence the feeling of isolation and loneliness. A feeling like 'you're on your own'. As difficult as it might be, try to accept an invitation for help, or a meal, or a cup of tea with a friend. It may be the last thing that you feel like, but all around are you are people that love you and want to be there for you. There's a time to be alone and then there are times where it's important for you to have a shoulder to lean on. Accepting the help and support of your friends and family members will remind you of the love that you have all around you despite your loss. You'll know when the time is right to open up to their offers of support.
9 Relief
As strange as it sounds, relief is often something we feel in times of grief, particularly during prolonged seasons of illness, poor health, treatments and strained relationship. Relief comes from a feeling of thankfulness for closure. For many, the last few years of life in our older years are some of the most challenging. Finally their suffering has come to an end. We can't tell you not to feel guilty about your relief, it won't change how you feel. Just know that if you have a sense of relief, your loved one probably has the same feeling too. They would want you to know that it's OK and they are at rest now. It doesn't mean you're happy for their death, there's a big difference! Relief comes from a place of care and concern. It's an outward expression of your love for them.
10 Happiness/Joy
Happiness/joy are emotions you may not expect to feel when grieving, but it does happen and it can happen more than you realise. Remembering all of the happy memories, the funny stories, the travels, photographs, videos, road-trips, intimate moments and milestones. Hundreds and thousands of moments that add up to how you feel in this one moment now, today. It's common for us to not acknowledge that we are experiencing a small moment of joy because it is surrounded by so many other emotions. Take the time though to appreciate that the smile you just let out when you say that photograph is your joy. It's your happiness. It's a moment that nobody will ever take away from you - a memory you will never lose. Isn't that precious? Isn't that true happiness? Allow yourself to experience both happy memories and moments of joy as they come. They might go as fast as they arrive, but they're there, they're all around you.
SO HOW BEST CAN I MANAGE THESE EMOTIONS?
Firstly, we can't tell you how to feel, nobody can. You also can't change how you feel in that moment. It's important to be comfortable with feeling a certain way in that particular moment. It's where you are at emotionally, physically, spiritually. So all you can do, is acknowledge your feelings, talk about them and look after yourself. Emotions are your body's way of talking to you, telling you what you need. We often fight them because of how it makes us look, how we're perceived, how we're supposed to conduct ourselves. We can't fight grief forever. We have to move with grief in order to move through it - but we'll never quite move on from it. So how best can we move through grief?
1. Acknowledge your feelings
The first step to managing your emotions is to acknowledge them. It is important to allow yourself to feel whatever it is that you are feeling in the moment. Trying to bottle up your emotions will only make them harder to deal with in the long run. So, if you are feeling sad, angry, or guilty, allow yourself to feel those emotions. They are all a natural part of the grieving process.
2. Talk about your feelings
It can be helpful to talk about your feelings with someone who will understand and support you. This could be a friend, family member, therapist, or grief counsellor. Talking about your emotions can help you to process them and make them more manageable. It can also be helpful to write about your feelings in a journal or blog. Putting your thoughts into words can help you to make sense of them and see them from a different perspective.
3. Take care of yourself
During this difficult time, it is important to take care of yourself both physically and emotionally. Make sure to eat healthy meals, get enough sleep, and exercise regularly. These activities will help to boost your mood and give you the energy that you need to cope with your grief. It is also important to find healthy ways to cope with your emotions such as talking to someone or writing in a journal. Avoid unhealthy coping mechanisms such as drinking alcohol or using drugs as they will only make things worse in the long run.
4. Celebrate their life
It can be difficult to find the energy to celebrate life when we are grieving. We may feel like celebrating is betraying our sadness, like it is something we "shouldn't" do. But the truth is, grief and joy can coexist. Do something that your loved one enjoyed doing. Did they love going for walks in the park? Watching sunsets? Eating ice cream? Find a way to incorporate their favorite activity into your day, even if it's just for a few minutes. Talk about your loved one - share stories and memories with friends and family members. Keeping their memory alive will help you feel connected to them, even though they're no longer physically here with you. You could honor their memory in a special way - maybe planting a tree in their honor or make a donation to a charity they cared about. There are endless possibilities for how you can choose to remember your loved one. Spiritwind has a blog on creating a memorial garden for celebrating life which you can read here. We also range a number of sympathy keepsakes to enhance your memorial space of memory. Feel free to browse our range.
5. Give yourself time to grieve.
Grief is a process, and it takes time. There is no set timeline for grieving, so take the time you need to work through your emotions. Remove the pressures of time, the expectations of society. Give yourself the moments you need to be present. Sometimes it's just a small moment of a day, other times it's the whole day. Be in these moments so that you can work through these moments, each time coming back just a little bit stronger, more resilient, more self aware.
Grief is a complex emotion made up of many different feelings. Each person experiences grief differently so there is no "right" way to grieve . The most important thing is to allow yourself to experience whatever emotions come up and to find healthy ways to cope with them . The honest truth is our grief never truly goes away - we just find better ways to cope and manage with the emotion. Grief comes from love and those we love don't just leave our hearts. They stay with us, they're a part of us and they still form part of our future ahead. This is what often fuels us to become better people, to make them proud, to honor them in a certain way. We love the phrase 'celebration of life' because we know that it's what our loved ones would have wanted - to celebrate them in our life ahead.
We want to leave you with this great video summary from Grief Expert, Julia Samuel, on the secrets to coping with grief.
May your week ahead be a celebration.
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