Grief beyond death: A Universal Process

Grief is a funny thing.

Funny peculiar, not funny ha ha, I should clarify.

It's something that's different for each of us.

We often hear about the well-known five stages of grief, introduced by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in her 1969 book, On Death and Dying:

1.    Denial

2.   Anger

3.   Bargaining

4.   Depression

5.   Acceptance

It's acceptable, even expected, to grieve when someone dies. But how often do we openly discuss all the other times we need to grieve? Death isn't the only loss we experience.

Grief Beyond Death: A Universal Process

While Kübler-Ross's work focused on death, these five stages truly apply to all grieving processes, and it's crucial to remember that grieving is not linear.

We could say the anatomy of grief is the same for us all, but the order of the stages, their duration, their intensity, or even whether we experience multiple stages simultaneously—all these factors make my grief process look different from yours.

That said, there's enough similarity that anyone who has gone through loss can empathize with another person in the depths of it.

Let's look at an example of grieving due to death for two different people: David and Susan. Both recently lost their mothers.

David's mother died after a long battle with illness. His process went something like this: At the time of her diagnosis, he went into denial for many months. It was only when he saw her ravaged body at Christmas that he realized she was truly dying. He then felt angry at himself for not seeing it sooner and immediately began bargaining with God, pleading for his mother to get well. She rallied a bit in February, gaining weight and having more energy, and David slipped back into denial. But then in April, she took a turn and passed away. David raged, then accepted, then fell into a deep depression before coming back around to acceptance.

Susan lost her mother suddenly in an accident. The shock dropped her straight into a deep depression. Her family and friends didn't know what to do; if they tried to talk to her, she refused, wandering like a zombie through her days in denial and depression. Then the dog got run over, and Susan found her rage unleashed. She didn't know how to contain the anger, misdirecting it left and right. She tried bargaining with herself, "I'll try therapy if this just stops feeling like this." Therapy took longer than she expected to resolve her anger, and she cycled in and out of anger and depression, running hot and cold. Then one day, a few years after her mother's death, while having coffee and looking out at her garden, she felt at peace and sensed her mother's presence. Acceptance had finally come.

Same but different. This example is about loss from death.

The "Life, Death, Rebirth" Cycle

In my line of work, we recognize that there are many "deaths" that aren't literal.

It's the life, death, rebirth cycle. If we learn to acknowledge endings, we'll be more ready for ours when the time comes, or so I sense.

As humans, we struggle so much with change, yet change is inevitable.

Every stage of life requires a grieving process so we can acknowledge what was, what it taught us, and consciously and intentionally step into the next phase of our journey.

If we do this, we carry less baggage into the next part of our adventure.

If we never "declutter," by the time we reach the end of our lives, we're bogged down with conversations not had, lessons not integrated, and grief not shed.

If something was or is important to you, it deserves to be grieved when it ends.

Here are some "grief spots" many of us have experienced:

Grieving the end of:

• Childhood

• Single life

• A relationship

• A stage of parenting

• A job

• A broken, much-loved object (smaller, but poignant)

Grieving:

• A loved one moving away

• Moving away yourself

• Selling a home

• Selling a car

  
  

Seriously, I could go on all day.

For most of these things, it's more acceptable to celebrate the "birth" that followed:

Grieving the end of:	Celebrating the beginning of:
Childhood	Adulthood
Single life	A new relationship
A relationship	Single life
A stage of parenting	The next stage of parenting
A job	A new job
Grieving:	Celebrating:
A loved one moving away	Their new start
Moving away	Your new start
Selling a home	A new home
Selling a car	A new car

Do you see where I'm going with this?

Our society encourages toxic positivity to a degree, if it doesn't make space for grieving one thing as we celebrate the next.

Often, we're unable to truly celebrate until we've done some grieving.

Other times, we're doing both simultaneously, feeling that emotional rollercoaster.

As I said, we'll all do the grief thing in our own way.

Likely, we won't grieve for years over that favorite mug the dog's tail swished to the floor, leaving it in pieces.

But taking a moment to be sad, angry, disbelieving, and then accepting is healthy.

It will certainly mean you don't ignore your dog for days, because he doesn't have the same attachment to "stuff" that you do and won't understand.

Don't forget to honor the thing you lost—from a person, a job, an experience, a season, to a part of yourself.

If it was important, it deserves to be mourned.

Grieving for the Living: The Unspoken Loss

This is a topic near and dear to my heart right now, and it has been for the last four years.

Even though it's still a raw topic and one I'm in process with, I realize there are probably many of us silently struggling with something similar.

We don't talk about it because it's taboo.

But then it festers, and we feel like nobody understands, or like we're wrong/bad for making a really tough choice.

So, without elaborating, because it's not my intention to hurt anybody, I want to address what it means to make a decision to go no contact with people in your life.

This is particularly tricky and societally frowned upon when it's a fundamental relationship, such as a family member.

I want to say this if this is you, and also if you know people who have taken this drastic step:

It's not a choice one makes easily; it's a last resort kind of decision.

And from experience, I know it's hard enough to deal with your inner critic, let alone people trying to convince you to "try again."

Trust me, if someone chooses to go no contact, they are grieving that person.

They are grieving who they wanted them to be, while coming to terms with who they actually are.

They are coming face to face with their own shadow, probably experiencing guilt and shame for all the past versions of themselves who stayed in a toxic situation for probably way too long, and the one who dared to leave.

They are most likely peeling back the layers of the onion to try and understand how this happened and if they can fix it, hoping to get to the little slip in the center of the onion where there's nothing left to grieve… but all that happens is the onion makes them cry, the shame makes them depressed, the guilt pushes them into denial.

Then the self-compassion they have been cultivating flares up as anger.

As they look at all the times they bargained—with God, the person they've gone no contact with, and most especially themselves.

Then, hopefully, acceptance.

But will it be there to stay, or will its grieving bedfellows return?

Can we all sit around a table with some tea, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance, and me?

Can we befriend this inevitable grief team?

Can we be grateful for the grief that reminds us we have lost someone we loved?

Can we love them still, and hold onto the good stuff, knowing that the healthiest thing is to close the door?

And no, they are not dead.

But for your peace, for your health, the relationship is.

Grief is a funny thing. Funny peculiar, not funny ha ha, I should clarify.