Denial's Five Stages Of Grief

Denial is the first of the five stages of grief. Denial gets us through the death or loss. In this stage, everything seems overwhelming. Life makes no sense. We are in a state of shock and denial. We go numb. We wonder how we can go on, what are we fighting for? In this stage people are just looking to make it to the next day. Denial allows us to spread our grief and allows us to not be overwhelmed. There is so much sensory overload and impulses going on, that denial slows it down to a point where we can function. It is nature’s way of letting in only as much as we can handle. Acceptance that there is a loss will be slow but it is part of the healing process. Denial is acting like nothing happened but there cannot be progress without the acknowledgement of this stage.
Anger is a necessary stage of the healing process.
In dealing with loss it is okay to be angry. It is completely natural. The more you truly feel it, the more it will begin to go away. There has to be acknowledgement of the anger because if there is not all this anger that is bottled up will come out in a negative faucet. The anger must be expressed. Other emotions can fall under this category but usually anger is the predominantly main one. There are no limits when it comes to anger. Anger can be extended to the people closest around you, but also to God. You may ask, “Where is God in this? How can a God let this happen?” There is pain behind anger. It is natural to feel abandoned, but we live in a society that fears anger. Anger is strength and it can be utilized in a positive manner. Anger gives people a direction and purpose when there is nothing left. People express anger in different
ways.
When it comes to bargaining people would pay any price to get what they lost back. “Please God,” there’s bargaining, “I will never fight with my wife again if she lives.” After losing something, bargaining can manifest itself as a temporary truce. “I will be a better man; I’ll go to church more?” We become lost in “If only…” or “What if…” statements. We thirst for everything to be back how it was; we want our loved one back. Guilt and bargaining go hand in hand. The “if only” cause us to find fault in ourselves and what we think we could have done differently. There is misunderstanding that these stages last weeks or months. Often times stages are responses to feelings that can last for minutes or hours as we cycle in and out of one and then another. No linearity is associated with these stages. There are no absolutes. We may feel one, then another and back again to the first one.
After bargaining, our attention changes into the present to depression. Once we hit the depressive phase grief has sunken in at this point. This stage feels as though it will not end. It is the appropriate response to a great loss. We withdraw from life, left in a cloud of sadness, worrying about what is to come? Why continue? Depression after a loss is too often seen as unnatural: a state to be fixed, something to snap out of. The loss of a loved one is a very depressing situation. Depression is a normal response. Not experiencing depression after a loss would be unusual. When a loss sinks in, the realization of the loss is understandably depressing.
Acceptance is the last stage in the process of grieving. This stage is about accepting the reality that the loss is now the new norm. It may take a very long time to get to this point but one cannot truly be healed without accepting that what is gone is gone. We learn to live with it. In counteracting this new reality, at first we try to keep everything the same before everything happened. Over time this does not work out and a new way of living has to be established. It has been forever changed and we must readjust. We must learn to readjust roles, re-assign them to others or take them on ourselves. As we go on living are lives and start to enjoy our life, we often feel guilty and betrayal to our loved one. There can never be a replacement of the lost but people can build themselves back up by meeting new people and forging new relationship. This is a time where the feelings and emotions that a person is feeling should not be suppressed but expressed. This is a time where extending a hand to others starts occurring. This stage is when the individual starts reinvesting back into themselves.