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Processing Grieve Anxiety, Anger & Guilt
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When grieving, it is normal to experience different physiological responses ranging from shock, denial, numbness, anger, guilt, bargaining, depression, hopelessness, blaming others, loss of appetite, sleeplessness, self-blame and blaming God before you can reach acceptance and return to normalcy/re-building.
1. Respond and Normalize Grief Anxiety: it is okay to feel the way you do under the circumstances; you have lost someone or something special. You may feel; emptiness, lethargy, helplessness, breathlessness, trouble sleeping, irritability, disbelief, crying, dreaming of the deceased, etc.
2. Approach Family, Workplace, and Lifestyle Dynamics: How are you functioning in the family, talk about the change, how the situation has affected your functioning at work, how are you relating with colleagues, and what changes have you noticed in your social life and your lifestyle in general, sleeping, eating pattern, relating to others moods, etc.
3. Religion, Spirituality, and Rituals: Talk about your religious beliefs (if any) or your spirituality under this situation, how do you make sense of everything that has happened in line with your religious/spiritual beliefs? how is that helping you to cope? or do you find that interfering with your healing process? What are your beliefs? What rituals do you observe in this situation? Did you attend the funeral ceremony; memorial etc? Do you wish to talk about that?
4. Work Through the Feelings of Anxiety, Anger, and Guilt: Do you want to talk about your deeper feelings, how can you describe or express them, do you find yourself experiencing anger? If you do, who is it directed to? Is it to yourself, the deceased, others, God etc? tell me more about that anger and possibly any guilt or self-blame.
5. Cultivate Self-compassion and Resilience: It is okay to be compassionate and gentle with yourself, you are doing your best in the situation, and you have managed to achieve a lot; e.g., your coming here is a strength, talking about it is another strength, getting up every day and taking each day as it comes is a strength.
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6. Utilize Mindfulness and Meditation: This involves Perceiving, Thinking and Behaving. Paying attention to your environment, body scanning for knotted tension areas, mindful breathing, mindful body stretching exercises and allowing yourself to feel the emotion. You could also use grounding by identifying and counting 5 things you can SEE, 4 things you can TOUCH (focus on the texture), 3 things you can HEAR, 2 things you can TASTE (mint or gum etc, focus on the taste) and 1 thing you can SMELL (or dub a perfume on your arm and focus on the scent, or use scented candles). Alternatively, you can count from 1 to 10 breathing in and out gradually and visualising an imaginary or existing calming and peaceful place you know e.g., the ocean, beach, farm, waterfall, village, beautiful garden etc. If you are religious or spiritual, you could play your favourite calming, soothing gospel music or meditate on your scriptures that give you strength.
7. Grief as a Process: Grief is a process, The pain does not disappear overnight, telling your story helps/ talking to someone may help, and surrounding yourself with people who care can help, but at times you may feel that you need to be alone; it is also okay. Notice your triggers: birthdays, anniversaries, Momento, memorabilia, people, events, food types, sounds etc.
8. The saying; “time heals” is just a myth; some people lost special people 5-10 + years ago, and are still in pain and struggling with grief.
#9. REMEMBER: We do not get over grief, we go through it. The only cure for grief is to allow yourself to grieve (Kessler,2023; Math,2021). As Math (2021) goes on to say;
Not everyone will experience all five stages,
and you may not go through them in this order.
Grief is different for every person, so you may
begin coping with loss in the bargaining stage
and find yourself in anger or denial next.
You may remain in one of the five stages for months
but skip others entirely. But the pandemic changed
the way people process, and express their grief...
Image Source Justin Bieber Imagines.
References
Kessler, D. (Accessed 2023, Oct 15). The Five Stages of Grief
Math, S.B (2021, May 19). Covid Grief-Covid Bereavement-Coping with Covid-Related
Death or Grief or Covid-RelaMourning https://youtu.be/O03oq-T6VkA?si=_xCMDEh0CihSiyX8
Nortje, A. (2020, June 5). How to Practice Mindfulness: 11 Practical Steps and Tips.
Smith, B.C. (accessed 2023, Nov 7). Conscious Grieving: A Transformative Approach to Healing from Loss. https://clairebidwellsmith.com/
Smith, B.C. (accessed 2023, Nov 6). Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief.
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