Grief is an emotional natural response to the loss you feel after someone or something so dear to you is taken away. Any kind of loss can cause grief but the significant of the loss determines the intense of the grief, for example when a person close to us dies we tend to grief more than when the same thing happens to someone we do not know. The manner in which we grief depends on every individuals experience in life, faith, coping style and the nature of the loss (Melinda and Jeanne, 2014). For healthy grieving it is better to be patient with yourself and allow a natural process of getting over the grief to take place, not minding how long it takes with time all will be well.

In her 1969 book on (“death and dying’), Kubler-ross talked about the five stages of grief we face emotionally when faced by an intense loss. These stages are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. When grieving one goes through this stages and they do not necessarily have to follow a certain pattern but they come in different ways and going through these stages of grief does not mean you are a weaker being because they take place naturally. When faced by a loss we tend not to accept that it has taken place, we hide from the reality and the fact is that this only takes us through the fast stage of pain and it is short lived because the reality will soon strike us (Melinda and Jeanne, 2014). After the reality settles in that the loss has really occurred we now feel some anger and start blaming ourselves for thing we should have done to prevent the loss and we suffer from a lot of resentment for having allowed the loss to happen (Willie, 2014). The anger we hold inside will make us start bargaining if the loss does not take place we will do one or two things and when we realize that the bargain and anger are in vain we now sink into depression and we find ourselves withdrawing from everything and getting filled with sadness and find nothing good around us, all we want is to keep to ourselves and stay alone and quiet. The only healthy way to deal with all this pains is to face the reality and accept the loss, although this is hard it is the best way and the easiest road to recovery (Kübler-Ross, 2005).

Grieving happens even to the high ranked in the society, a good example is Job in the bible that went through a painful grieving period of losing his property and his loved ones. He went through a period of denial, not only for him but even his wife who would not believe this was happening to him and as a result he lived in the ashes because he believed the condition of skin was bad enough to live with the rest of the people (Willie, 2014). With a lot of anger his wife told him to curse the God he prayed to because he was not saving him from his suffering, it was not that she did not believe in God but the pain of seeing his husband suffer drove her to saying this things (Melinda and Jeanne, 2014). After all this suffering Job seems to have lost hope in healing he started bargaining with God that at some point he almost distrusted him, he lived a very sad life in seclusion and did not go near anybody. But through all this he held on believing that his God will save him and his faith was not lost and thus he accepted what he was going through at that period and for that reason he lived to see his property and loved ones restored (Kübler-Ross, 2005).

Grief is emotional and so is joy we can hardly pretend when we are experiencing any of the two because the processes happen naturally and are not controllable. It is still possible to have joy in the midst of our grief if only we have healthy grieving where we allow nature to take its course and avoid being sad and finding people to blame or blaming ourselves for the loss (Melinda and Jeanne, 2014). When acceptance occurs, then the grieving person can begin to reassimilate back into their life and the lives of those around them but it won’t happen overnight. We need patience and loving understanding for those coming back from grief (Willie, 2014). Coping with loss is a ultimately a deeply personal and singular experience — nobody can help you go through it more easily or understand all the emotions that you’re going through. But others can be there for you and help comfort you through this process. The best thing you can do is to allow yourself to feel the grief as it comes over you. Resisting it only will prolong the natural process of healing (Axelrod, 2006)

Conclusion

Grief is a natural process that has to take time when its time comes and the only safe way to deal with it is to allow healthy grieving where we should avoid the five stages of grief discussed above. Seeking help or support from a friend and accepting the loss can help ease the pain.

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