Grief is a natural response to losing someone or something that is important to you. Most people have experienced grief, either through losing a loved one, a divorce, a health condition, loss of a job, and so forth.
Doctors say that when you’re grieving, you can experience shock and numbness as the first reaction, or overwhelming sadness, with tiredness or exhaustion, and anger – towards the person you’ve lost or the reason for your loss. At times, you can even feel guilty about something you said or did not say.
Everyone grieves differently, but there are some similarities in the stages and the order of feelings experienced during grief. Swiss-American psychiatrist Elizabeth Kübler-Ross wrote in her book "On Death and Dying” that grief could be divided into five stages. Her observations came from years of working with terminally ill individuals.
The stages include denial, for example, a person with terminal illness will say, ‘this is not happening to me’ or ‘the results are wrong’. The second stage is anger, where the same person expresses their anger by saying ‘where is God in this?’ ‘How can God let this happen?’
The author also highlights bargaining, this stage of terminal illness diagnosis, a person will say, ‘if only we had gone to the doctor sooner, we could have stopped this.’
She adds that with the depression stage, for instance, a person may feel like their whole life has come to a terrible end. But with acceptance, the person gets an opportunity to tie up loose ends and make sure they get to do what they wanted.
Yvonne Uwamahoro, a counsellor at Mental Health Hub, Kicukiro, the length of time it takes a person to progress through these stages or waver between stages of the grieving process vary by individual. This is because several factors can determine how long it takes a person to grieve.
"The type of loss plays a big role in how long a person’s grief will last. The length of grief after a divorce varies greatly from the length of time it takes a person to get over the death of a spouse or child.
"Your relationship to the deceased also matters, if the grief is following the death of a loved one, for instance, the time it takes to grieve after the death of a spouse, child or parent may be longer than that of a friend or a more distant relative,” she says.
Uwamahoro adds that it all depends on the type of relationship you had, how close you felt to that person, and the impact their absence has on your life. Sometimes, the circumstances of their death plays a role in the grieving process.
For example, when a person is expecting the death and has time to prepare for it, they may not take as long to grieve the person as someone who dies suddenly in an unexpected way. Having closure with the person can make a big difference in the grieving process.
She also notes that a person’s cultural beliefs can also play a role in the duration of grief. Grief is experienced in different ways among different cultures. Some cultures have mourning rituals that may help them cope with loss.
Or your own life experiences can affect your grieving process. Things like difficulty accepting loss, previous losses, personal beliefs, and views on life or pre-existing conditions (such as mental health disorders) can all play a role in how long someone grieves.
The mental health counsellor adds that complications of long lasting grief can be depression, suicidal thoughts or behaviours, anxiety, including post-traumatic stress disorder, significant sleep disturbances, increased risk of physical illness, such as heart disease, cancer or high blood pressure and long-term difficulty with daily living, relationships, or work activities.
Therapy
Encyclopaedia of Mental Disorders Forum states that people grieving can seek grieve counselling, which refers to a specific form of therapy, or a focus in general counselling with the goal of helping the individual grieve and address personal loss in a healthy manner. Grief counselling is offered individually by psychologists, clergy, counsellors or social workers, in groups led by professionals, as well as informal support groups offered by churches, community groups, or organisations devoted to helping individuals grieve specific losses.
"Specific tasks of grief counselling include emotional expression about the loss (which can include a wide range of feelings), accepting the loss, adjusting to life after the loss, and coping with the changes within oneself and the world after the loss.”
Uwamahoro recommends Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), during the session the therapist will help the person to deal with grief to identify negative thought patterns that can affect their behaviour. The therapist may ask the person to explore thoughts related to grief and loss or other thoughts to address how these thoughts affect one’s mood and behaviour.
She says, you can also try acceptance and commitment therapy, where an individual accepts negative emotions, distances from emotions so that it’s easier to examine and understand them, and encourages people to focus on the present as that is when change is possible.
According to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, children, especially younger ones, react differently to death than adults. In general, preschool age children see death as temporary and reversible, but children between five years and nine years think slightly more like adults. Some common ways grief counsellors treat children include play therapy using a child’s most instinctive behaviour of interacting with the world around them by playing.
A therapist may use dolls, puppets, stuffed animals, a dollhouse, or other toys to inspire the child to communicate thoughts, feelings, questions, and concerns they may otherwise struggle to express.