Grief is something we all experience, maybe more than we even realize. When we hear the word “grief,” most of us probably think of traditional grief: the death of a loved one. Maybe you remember your high school psychology teacher referencing the five stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. But there are a couple of important things to remember about grief: it can occur in many contexts beyond the death of a loved one, and the five stages are not a universal experience.
We often associate grief with a loss that has already happened, but it can be present in the anticipation of a loss. For example, having a loved one diagnosed with a terminal illness and watching their mental and physical abilities decline may result in anticipatory grief. Grief can also accompany major life changes, even positive ones, such as starting a new job or moving to a new city. You can be super excited to start your new job while simultaneously mourning the loss of old routines and relationships. There is also the concept of secondary losses present in grief. For example, following a breakup, the primary loss may be the relationship itself, but secondary losses could include losing connections with your former partner’s family who have become an important part of your life. You can also experience grief for something you never had. Perhaps you grieve the childhood you never got to experience because you grew up in an abusive household, or the child you were never able to conceive because of infertility.
Grief is often thought of as an individual experience, but a less acknowledged form is collective grief. A recent example of collective grief is the COVID-19 pandemic. People not only lost loved ones to the virus, but the pandemic also robbed us of time, experiences, and connection. Celebrations, in-person school and work, and some everyday activities were abruptly put on hold. People had to adapt without having much time to think about and truly process the changes in the world. Another less acknowledged grief experience is that sometimes positive emotions are present in the grieving process. Maybe you were a caretaker for an aging loved one who just died and, although you are heartbroken, they are gone, you are also relieved that you no longer have to watch them fade away day in and day out. Both can be true. Feeling relief doesn’t mean you loved them any less.
The experience of grief is influenced by many factors. Was the death or life change expected or unexpected? Do I have a support system? Is my experience impacted by pre-existing mental health conditions? Do I feel pressure to “get over it” and move on? What else is going on in my daily life? Do I even allow myself to acknowledge this loss? While we can acknowledge the complexity of grief, there are a few general ways to support ourselves through these experiences.
What to do with grief?
- Talk about it. Talk with trusted loved ones or a professional mental health therapist.
- Meet your basic needs. When we’re struggling, we are prone to let our basic needs go to the wayside.
- Do not judge your emotions. Emotions will demand to be felt- don’t judge them.
- Honor your loss. Find ways to remember and honor what mattered to you.
A final important note about grief is that the process of grieving is not about forgetting or getting over a loss. That’s not the end goal. The grieving process is about learning to live with the loss. We can learn to live next to it instead of it consuming us. Grief may resurface around holidays, anniversaries, or sometimes for no obvious reason. Just because we no longer have the connection we once did with a person, place, or experience does not mean we no longer hold emotions for it.
I’ll end this with one of my favorite grief quotes. “Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.” This is not from some grief expert or a textbook, but rather from a (now archived) 2014 blog post written by a woman named Jamie Anderson. Jamie was just trying to make sense of her grief, as we all do. The goal isn’t to find a place for our grief to go, but to learn how to make room for it in the lives we’re still living.
Jordan Trent, MS, LPC
