Greetings, my Dear Friends
I have been asked to research and provide information about the various types of grief that can come into our lives. There are not only very different types of grief, but also there are many reasons we can experience grief. I’ll also talk about grief stacking, a term that came to me one day when I was working on this series of blog posts.
The following are examples of why we might experience grief, beyond death:
• Job
• Home
• Divorce
• Retirement
• Change of residence
• Change of School
• Change in living Conditions
• Change in Health
• Holidays
• Disconnection with Friends
• Marital changes
• House fires
• House flooding
• Mother Nature’s wrath
There are many, many, more reasons that different levels of grief can come into our lives. When you feel a sadness take over your emotional state, ask yourself: What are the possible sources of grief in my life at this moment?
Pay attention to how you are feeling about that sadness and where it is coming from. It may very well be grief entering your consciousness from other areas of your life.
The other experience I do not see addressed is the “Stacking of Grief”, or grief stacking. This is what I call the experiencing of more than one cause of grief. For instance: you have just lost a loved one, and within a month you have lost your job, then paying your bills becomes difficult, depression sets in. Neither you nor anyone around you realizes you are experiencing several types of losses within a very short time. The grief from each loss begins “stacking” up before you know what is happening, how deep you are falling and what is involved in each grief scenario. Too many times we equate grief with the death of a loved one, not realizing that the loss of other life events brings its own type of grief, resulting in grief stacking.
There are fourteen types of grief, according to Elizz. Here are some of them:
- Anticipatory grief: Anticipatory grief often starts when the person you are caring for gets a significant diagnosis and their health begins to deteriorate.
- Normal grief: Many people define normal grief as the ability to move towards acceptance of the loss. With this comes a gradual decrease in the intensity of emotions. Those who experience normal grief are able to continue to function in their basic daily activities.
- Delayed grief: Delayed grief is when reactions and emotions in response to a death are postponed until a later time.
- Complicated grief (traumatic or prolonged): Complicated grief refers to normal grief that becomes severe in longevity and significantly impairs the ability to function.
- Disenfranchised grief (ambiguous): Disenfranchised grief can be felt when someone experiences a loss but others do not acknowledge the importance of the loss in the person’s life.
- Chronic grief: This type of grief can be experienced in many ways: through feelings of hopelessness, a sense of disbelief that the loss is real, avoidance of any situation that may remind someone of the loss, or loss of meaning and value in a belief system.
Learn about the others at https://elizz.com/caregiver-resources/types-of-grief-and-loss.
You may find my book, Death Did Us Part, a useful resource for yourself or a loved one.
Till next time,
Carolyn
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