Five Stages of Grief
Psychologists talk about there being five stages of grief:
1. denial
2. anger
3. bargaining
4. depression
5. acceptance
Yet, it is not that these five stages occur in a specific order. It is sometimes the case for folks that the order DOES occur consecutively as shown above, but there are variations. Sometimes people can move back and forth between stages, and sometimes stages may be skipped in certain instances. Also, at times, a person may become stuck in one or more stages.
All of us have grief of varying sorts. Some forms of grief may be more extensive than others. In my recent past, I can identify five significant areas of grief:
a) The suicide of my close friend/colleague about two years ago. His office was only a few doors from mine I believe I am mostly in the acceptance phase with regards to this.
b) The unexpected passing of another close friend/colleague about 1.5 years ago, due to a heart attack. Again, I believe I am mostly in the acceptance phase with regards to this.
c) The additional, unexpected passing of another very close friend/colleague about 1 year ago, also due to a heart attack. His office was next to mine. Again, I believe I am mostly in the acceptance phase with regards to this.
d) The very significant personal grief I have experienced from the actions of the two colleagues I have written about many, many times..... the one who is a person I dislike very intensely, and the other is a former close friend. In this case, I think I have been alternating between anger and depression about this situation for a very long time, but I believe I have been moving during the last few months towards more of the acceptance stage. The number of times I have been angry/depressed about those two HAS diminished a fairly significant amount. I do not think I am fully in the acceptance phase, but it is an improvement.
e) The very significant personal grief I have experienced from the actions and choices by the person whom I do not write about here any longer. Surprisingly, I feel in this regard, I ALSO have been able to move considerably towards acceptance. I am not yet always in the acceptance phase with regards to this person, but I am feeling calmer and less continually in grief about this person's choices.
* * * * *
But, as you may have gathered from my last several posts.... I am pretty damn agitated right now and have two additions to my "grief plate". But, I did not directly write about them Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday, because my feelings of anger, grief, anxiety, and sadness were SO, SO very strong. I feel I am in a state of being "resigned" at the moment. Being resigned is, I guess a form of acceptance. With my resgination, however, there is also a lack of "descriptors" at the tip of my tongue, so I guess it is just the facts (and not so much my emotion) as I list these two new "items":
1. My wife and my youngest son (who lives at home) both tested positive for Covid-19. This occurred during the weekend, hence my discovery of and subsequent post about the damnable CDC. My wife initially experienced a bit of shortness of breath, but that seems to have diminished. My youngest son has experienced tiredness, but that has subsided. Thus far, I have tested NEGATIVE with two different tests days apart. I hope I stay negative. All of us are fully vaccinated and boosted.
2. I mentioned about a year ago how ANOTHER of my close friend/colleague (His office was two doors from mine.) experienced a debilitating stroke. Unfortunately, that stroke severely affected his thought processes, and he had to be moved to an assisted living establishment. Equally unfortunately, his affected thought processes became thoughts of suicide and he was institutionalized (no visitors allowed) for the last four months. He was put through a battery of trials of various psychotropic medications and only was released back to assisted living about a week and a half ago. I had wanted to visit him to be able to talk together again. With the Covid situation at home, I did not visit due to the risk of me converting to being Covid positive. Unfortunately, we received word on Tuesday, that he had died in his sleep the evening before (presumably of a heart attack).
So. That is about it.
PipeTobacco
4 Comments:
This is so much to handle! I hope your wife and son are better soon and that you escape Covid. It's so frustrating when we try to do everything right and then STILL get it. Such is the nature of viruses. Kubler Ross studied dying people, not grieving ones, so I take her 5 stages with a grain of salt. There are similarities but also many differences, in my opinion.
You have certainly lost a lot of work colleagues. I trust that the C crisis at yours passes swiftly and relatively uneventfully.
Even at therapy we talk about grief, even not as in death. But changes in one life.
Coffee is on and stay safe
I'm so very sorry to hear about all of this loss and illness. By now, Saturday, you may know if you contracted covid but it's not inevitable so I'm hoping for the best for you. My son who lives at home got it in September despite being vaccinated. My husband and I just kept our distance from him for a week and never got it and we're old -- plus I have leukemia so presumably at high risk -- so it's a tricky virus.
May I say by the way that you are very, very hard on yourself. Having high personal goals and standards for yourself is of course a good thing, but is it possible to expect too much of yourself?
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