Sunshine and Shade

Friendship and Bereavement

As a society we aren’t great at dealing with death. Deep down, we all know that the end of life is on the horizon – whether it’s our own or that of someone we love. But until death is right in front of us, we’ve seemingly been conditioned to ignore it. British culture hides grief and death behind a veil of privacy, so we aren’t aware of the logistical and emotional complexities, a combined lack of information and familiarity can mean we remain awkward and ill at ease when confronted with our own mortality or someone else’s grief.

These are universal experiences, but many bereaved people, or those facing the end of life, feel isolated because their friends simply don’t know what to say. It’s up to us to make grief more of a collective process. There’s a lot of power in grieving together – openly sharing stories about the dead and speaking about what grief feels like can be a huge relief for all involved. It helps to reduce the overwhelming nature of grief, the stigma surrounding it and, ultimately, the fear of our own deaths.

For some, grief is wholly outward and hard to suppress. But for others, grief is internal, secretive and hidden. You might feel totally numb, wildly angry, or relatively happy and assume there’s something wrong with you. In fact, all of these reactions are normal, valid and natural. Grief doesn’t look any specific way, because it’s a uniquely individual response. Our bodies and brains need time to adjust to the new state of our world without this person in it. Grief doesn’t follow the “rules” of other emotions. It has no definable end point (although we often wish it did!) but it does seem to have two phases: an acute phase and an integrated one. During the former, it can be helpful to name some types of grief you might feel.

Anticipatory grief; when you’re expecting a death, it’s easy for your mind to try to prepare itself by pre-empting how the loss might affect you. This can provoke feelings of guilt for treating someone like they’ve already died, along with feelings of anxiety about what’s to come.

Complicated grief; for some, the acute grief phase lasts for years and years, or seems to deepen in intensity as time goes on. This is known as complicated grief. More than 10% of people suffering a loss after the death of a partner or sudden death of a loved one find themselves in complicated grief.

Cumulative grief; grief overload happens when a previous loss comes into focus while you’re experiencing a current loss. Why is your grief different?

Delayed grief; not reacting to a death at first is really common. You’re subconsciously suppressing emotions in an attempt to avoid feeling the full reality of what’s happened. There are countless stories about grievers being criticised for moving on “too quickly”, behaving “too normally” or crying “too much” about their loss.

Some people may also question their own emotional response to a loss or fear the judgment of others. How we grieve, though, isn’t a choice! It’s a set of involuntary coping mechanisms. So be sure not to inadvertently “grief shame” yourself. Remember: it’s OK to cry without warning, it’s OK to feel exhausted or anxious or guilty or numb. Everyone’s grief looks different. Everyone reacts in their own way. Whatever you’re feeling is completely valid.
Sometimes the most relief can be found from support systems that involve people who personally understand the nature of grief, people who are in this strange land and want to share its topography and geography; it’s a helpful and supportive navigatory mechanism, which can bring some clarity and comfort.
Rachel Snowball has has established many Friendship and Bereavement Groups “Sunshine and Shade”
which meet in community venues throughout Chesterfield and District  please contact her for further information.