Bereavement and Grief

What is bereavement?

In our society we normally associate the word 'Bereavement' with losing some-one we love through death.

Pain can be physical, emotional or spiritual - whichever aspect it starts with, it will always spread to the others, so the earlier we start dealing with the pain of loss and death, the less likely it is to affect the other aspects.
(Laura Mitchell, International Stress Management Conference, 1987)

What is grief?

Grief or mourning are the feelings and thoughts we have in reaction to our bereavement. However, feelings of grief can follow any experience of loss, such as moving house, divorce, redundancy, these can all trigger feelings of grief and loss.

All to often in our modern hi-tech environment, death appears to be something that happens to others - we see and hear about death everyday as described by the media, which somehow detaches us from the reality of death.

Sadly, when it affects us personally death comes as quite a shock and sends us 'reeling' in disbelief that it has happened.

Death is no observer of time, it can happen any where, any time.

Many of us store unresolved experiences of different losses great and small, and emotional wounds from the past.

Grief that is unresolved or 'brushed over' or 'unacknowledged' can cause long lasting physical and emotional problems, the pain and trauma of loss has to be held somewhere and our bodies are very good at storing these experiences.

This type of grief can lead people to think that they are 'going mad', because they feel that they are not coping, or they cannot talk to relatives or friends for fear of 'boring' them.

Grief is a natural, normal response to the loss of something or someone we love. The sooner we learn to grieve, the sooner we can begin to enjoy the life we still have. Grieving is the process through which a person comes to terms emotionally , spiritually, physically and mentally with losses setbacks, disappointments and death.
(Barbara Ward, author of Healing Grief)

The most common stages of grief are:

• Shock and disbelief
• Denial
• Growing awarenes of feelings such as:
  • Longing
  • Anger
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Acceptance

These feelings don't necessarily just occur when somebody dies, they can also be applied to all forms of loss, just think about the emotions you go through when you lose your house or car keys, or your computer crashes and you lose that important assignment you had to prepare.

If we work through our thoughts and feelings and talk through our worries or fears about what loss means to us personally, it can help us to deal with future losses.

Unresolved grief can present as physical symptoms such as:

• fatigue,
• insomnia,
• loss of apetite,
• palpitations,
• stomach pains,
• backache,
• gastrointestinal symptoms such as IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome)
• or Emotional symptoms such as:
  • increased anxiety.
  • Stress
  • panic attacks
  • Depression

If you are experiencing any of the above, my therapy service may be more beneficial than my counselling service.

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