Delayed Grief: It’s Never too Late to Process
Delayed Grief - When You Grieve A Little While Later
When we experience the shock of a loss, we are often thrown into survival and don’t get to digest the many aspects, feelings, sensations and layers that are impacted. Often, the bubbling grief surfaces much later down the road, even after it seems like you’ve “finished grieving”.
Many times, we carry a feeling of pain and heaviness that’s related unprocessed grief or loss, and we aren’t cognizant of the connection. The blogs written in this Grief Series is here to sprinkle some clarity and direction on the cloudiness that accompanies grief.
My wish is that you find some healing in some of the words shared, and are inspired to validate and honor your grief- and healing. Wherever you are in your grief timelines, may you find way to re-engage with your mind, your heart, your relationships and the world with a new sense of belonging….and vibrant.
Words written with love and care, from our heart to yours <3
Living With the Invisible Presence of Grief Through Expressive Arts
7 Mindset Shifts to Help You Ride the Waves of Grief
When the Grief You Are Carrying is Not Your Own
6 Ways to Rise Up When You Feel Ready to Rebuild
What is Delayed Grief?
Delayed grief is an experience of feeling deep sorrow, long after experiencing the death of someone you are close with. It is when our emotional reaction to loss doesn’t happen right away. Somehow the reaction is postponed. Pushed off for months, years, or even decades.
This can be due to dissociation, where the mind and body block off the emotions, thoughts, feelings or memories because they are just too painful to feel. The emotions get “frozen” in a deep freeze, until you're more ready to process it. Or it can be because you don't have the emotional language, the verbal words, the supportive people or the safety to feel all the “feels” going on.
Grief is intense, it's sloppy, it's painful and it hurts.
It brings up big feelings in us and in those who are around us as we grieve, feel our feelings, notice our fears and tap into the powerlessness and deep sadness of the emptiness that lives within. However, when we finally are able to “feel the feels” and slowly start engaging in the phases of healing related to grief, we are able to start healing.
The talk I gave at the LINKS Grief Summit about Delayed Grief wasn’t about pretending that a grief chat with a trauma therapist will help take away the pain of longing, the sadness, the unfinished conversations or the empty chair at the table. Nothing will ever take that away.
Grief isn’t about sweeping the pain away.
Rather, about widening your heart and mind to make a space for healing to happen.
The conversation was about helping people develop a better understanding of the symptoms related to grief, understand how grief shows up and steps they can do to efficiently move with an through it.
As most of us know, Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross was the first person to present a phase model (used to be stage model) for grief. Over time, many variations have been mapped out, but she will always be known as the one who coined the original 5 phases of grief. Let’s explain it a bit below.
Five Phases of Grief
Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance
Denial
Denial is when you first hear about the loss and you’re in shock - your thoughts tell you ”This isn’t happening.” often accompanied by a feeling of numbness, which is the brain's way of dealing with something that is just too big to handle. Too much happened too soon for the body and brain to digest.
Anger
Anger steps in when your brain starts digesting the fact that this shock of your loss is real. Along with that comes a feeling of intense pain, almost like a damn has just broken and your emotions are flooding. You feel totally out of control, powerless and confused. The body, feeling so out of sorts, feels very angry that it’s being served something so terrible without having had any input to change it or make it stop. These feelings can feel like a volcano that needs to erupt, so the anger explodes on the people around you, at God, or at the world - be it in the workplace, with friends or even standing in line at a café. You might even feel anger and rage at the person who suddenly left you… feeling betrayed, lost and left.
Bargaining
Bargaining is when you start going in circles about what you might have been able to do to prevent the loss from happening. The “what ifs” and “I should have /could have” can keep you up at night. Like a broken record, the story you tell yourself replays on repeat until you learn to tell a different version of the story. Many people also bargain with God, making unreasonable promises based on their (hopefully) temporary narrative.
Depression
Depression kicks in when the sadness, the horror and the emptiness sets in. When you begin to actually feel into the facts of how much life has and will change because of this loss. Depression comes along with tears, trouble sleeping, decreased or increased appetite, a feeling of regret, overthinking, moodiness, loneliness or just an ongoing feeling of overwhelm.
Acceptance
Acceptance is the final phase of grief (although we can and often ebb and flow in between all of the phases forever - so acceptance is not a guarantee of permanence.) Hopefully, at some point you can start to accept the loss, and slowly start imagining a new version of your life without this person in it - as painful as it is. With acceptance you become more willing to take baby steps toward focusing on the aspects of your life that are within your control while also finding a new sort of space for the person you lost.
A note about acceptance: Acceptance is know to be the most challenging phase because that's the phase where the person has processed the death, and somewhat comes to terms with the fact that life will never be the same.
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Grieving isn’t a linear process.
These are not stages we ever officially graduate from. It’s totally common and expected to spiral back into a phase after a triggering situation or a life event, for a short period of time. However, overall, as you go through these phases and engage in the feelings and process properly, the intensity of the ache lessens, and grief finds a more gentle place to land.
Healing isn't about the pain going away, it is about the ache beginning to ache a lot less.
May you know that you are not alone, when you hold your aching heart close to your chest. And may you know that…
…With the right kind of love, tenderness and understanding, you can slowly re-sew the brokenness in your heart.
If youre looking for some one on one counseling to help you in your healing, reach out here today.
We are here for you.
Much tender care,
Xx
Esther and the Integrative Team