Our contemporary awareness and honoring of the emotional stages of dying and grief are rooted in the work of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, a Swiss-American psychiatrist. Made famous by her pioneering work in near-death studies, Kübler-Ross conceptualized five common emotional stages experienced by her clients facing terminal illness: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (DABDA).
Read the rest of this article at https://hospice.me/understanding-the-emotional-stages-of-dying/ Joining a grief support group or seeking individual grief support is a powerful way to learn more about grief, how it affects you in your daily life, and process your grief to move forward in a more balanced way.
When you begin searching for grief support, you’ll have two available options. The first is to enlist the help of a clinical grief therapist. The other is to join a peer grief support group or one-on-one peer grief support help. This post clarifies the difference between the two, so you can determine which one feels like the best fit for you at this moment. Read the rest of this article at https://hospice.me/the-difference-between-clinical-and-peer-grief-support/ During one of our grief support groups the other day, a member shared that the first grief she ever experienced was when her family sold their green VW bus. She was five years old at the time, and when the family left the van at the car lot, she was beside herself with grief. She cried and cried, and her parents didn’t understand why.
From her perspective, it was the only car she knew, and she remembers feeling like they were abandoning a member of their household without giving it a proper goodbye. She’s wanted to buy a green VW ever since. While the group nodded and smiled as she shared, we were also grateful to have a chance to share some of “The Other Types of Grief” we have experienced in our own lives. Read the rest of this article at https://hospice.me/types-of-grief-its-not-always-related-to-death/ “Grief and love are sisters, woven together from the beginning. Their kinship reminds us that there is no love that does not contain loss and no loss that is not a reminder of the love we carry for what we once held close.” – Francis Weller (The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief) The above quote, by Francis Weller, is a beautiful reminder that while grief is born of sorrow, it is also born as the result of deep love, connection, or a desire to heal that which was broken. As a result, there is a wild array of emotions that takes over when we are in the midst of grief. Those emotions can be so overpowering that if they aren’t allowed to express themselves or find a way to move through and out of the griever, they can become stuck. When that happens, the following 5 signs may begin to reveal themselves.
Read the rest of this article at https://hospice.me/5-signs-you-may-need-grief-support/ Grieving the loss of a loved one is an incredibly painful, melancholy process. Grief is uncomfortable, and we often try to skirt around it by pushing our feelings away and moving on with our lives. Who wants to spend weeks and months feeling sad? It’s easier to try to forget the loss and keep moving forward. Embrace Your Sadness
However, grief and sadness are emotions that can’t—and shouldn’t—be ignored. As much as we would like to get rid of these feelings, we must work through them to find healing. Pushing the difficulty of a loss away will only prolong the grieving process, but working through those emotions, acknowledging their existence, and opening ourselves up to them allows grief to become less painful. After experiencing a difficult loss, many people's instinct is to run away from the situation and their feelings. Grief often feels like more than we can bear, and our fight-or-flight response tells us to get rid of those feelings as quickly as possible. However, the only way to truly find healing after a loss is to sit in the sadness and allow yourself to feel the loss of the person you loved deeply. Grief will be painful and uncomfortable, and it’s important to accept that feelings of sadness and depression will overwhelm you in the first days and weeks after your loss. Allow yourself to be open to these emotions, acknowledging that they will not last forever but that they are true representations of your feelings. Slow Down Wanting to quickly return to your normal life after a loss is a common feling. Normal life is easy and painless, and without the time and care that was required by your loved one, you may feel inclined to return to a life free from the stress of illness. However, slowing down after a loss is necessary, and sometimes required, to allow our bodies and minds space to grieve. You may feel like you’re walking through a deep swamp of sorrow during a time of grief, and the most basic of tasks may seem too challenging to manage. It's okay to consciously slow down your life during your process of grief and accept the grief support of friends and loved ones to manage the tasks of each day. Look Towards the LightYour feelings of grief will not last forever. Over time, you will experience sadness in a less-severe way, and eventually, you will go days without experiencing those negative feelings at all. You will be able to live a happy, fulfilled life again, while still acknowledging the meaning your loved one brought to your life during the time that they were in it. Throughout your period of grief, it’s necessary that you view the future in a hopeful light and understand that, in time, you will be okay. Grief looks different for everyone, and sometimes it's too much to manage alone. Contact Hospice of the Golden Isles today at 912.265.4735 to receive grief support and resources to allow you to better process these difficult emotions. |
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