What You Might Not Have Realized About the Grieving Stages

Grief is an intense, messy, overwhelming experience for everyone, regardless of how many times you have gone through it. Over the decades, people have developed and expanded on the idea of grieving stages. If grief is a journey through the wilderness to an unseen location called Acceptance, then the grieving stages are the guidebook of what to expect on the journey.

During grief, you will encounter unpredictable emotions and surprising reactions. At some point, you will become stuck in depression or some other powerful emotion. As long as you know that what you are going through is normal, you will have less to worry about and a little more to look forward to.

The stages you walk through during grief are not linear. They are not the same for everyone, and they do not account for how confusing grief can be. The grieving stages also apply to types of grief besides bereavement. They highlight that your experience is valid, even when no one else understands.

The grieving stages are sometimes taught or explained in a way that makes grief seem oversimplified or confusing, especially when someone does not experience one of the outlined stages. They are a loose framework against which you can compare your experience and understand something about yourself.

The stages are not a rigid step-by-step program that everyone must complete and do so in the same way. The grieving stages have always been about approaching death and loss with dignity and compassion, and not feeling alone as you try to deal with your thoughts and emotions.

The Updated Grieving Stages

Until recently, we have collectively talked about grief happening in five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Swiss-born psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross originally provided this framework in her 1969 book On Death and Dying.

After working with terminally ill patients in America for many years, she began to notice that there was a pattern to grief. Years later, people found that the five stages of grief applied to things besides death, like job loss and divorce. In recent years, however, the five stages of grief have become seven, with updated stages that elaborate to recognize a fuller spectrum of grieving.

The updated grieving stages are not an insight into what should happen for everyone, but an expanded idea of what often happens. The idea is that your experience is validated when you hear that other people have historically experienced similar things.

One of the core ideas of the grieving stages is that you gain an idea of what lies ahead for you, both the good and the bad. Grief is largely unpredictable. When you have some understanding of what you are going through, you have less shame and anxiety to deal with on top of everything else.

Stage 1: Shock and Denial

When you lose a loved one or go through an irreversible life change like divorce or a breakup, there are initially so many things to process that you simply can’t do it. You sit on the edge of the bed for an hour, unfocused and not thinking or feeling anything in particular. You might be in this frozen state for a few days, but that is a normal and even an appropriate first stage of grief. If you can’t cry, can’t think clearly, or can’t communicate easily, you are responding normally during this stage.

Stage 2: Pain and Guilt

This is the part of grief that no one wants to experience, and, sadly, it is the part that lasts the longest. During this time, you might try to find ways of coping with your emotions in unhelpful ways, like with substances that feel as if they numb the pain. You also might begin making questionable decisions with lasting consequences. Even if you have grieved before, it never gets easier to handle this stage.

Stage 3: Anger and Bargaining

At a certain point in the grieving process, many people become easily irritated and begin lashing out at those closest to them. After these outbursts, they might begin desperately trying to save the relationship out of fear of being rejected. Although this is an intense and uncomfortable time for your relationships, it is a natural part of the journey. You are trying to make sense of a confusing time and trying to regain control of your emotions without knowing what to do.

Stage 4: Depression, Reflection, and Loneliness

In some ways, the emotions in this stage are at the opposite end of shock. At this point, the reality of the situation has fully set in, and you begin to accept the inevitable truth, and it hits hard. There are few things as lonely as grieving for a person or situation when everyone around you has moved on and can’t feel what you are feeling.

Stage 5: The Upward Turn

While you are in the thick of it, grief can feel like it will last forever. At some point, it can feel as if your life might have begun to adapt to a new reality, and you start making peace with the gaps left in your life. You are not completely healed, but you are no longer stuck. There are days when you’re still overcome with sadness, and you break down over simple triggers, but you don’t stay down for long. Life continues, and you have begun to catch up with it.

Stage 6: Reconstruction and Working Through It

When you reach this part of the grief journey, you have started to adjust to your new life, and you are making clear progress. This is included in the updated grieving stages because grief doesn’t suddenly end one day. Instead, you continue to grieve, continue to battle powerful emotions and confusing mindsets, but you are doing that while making progress and moving on.

Progress can look like physically moving on to a new place, job, or relationship, taking accountability where you need to, beginning a new relationship, or finding support in counseling and therapy. Your past has shaped you, and now you are moving on with gratitude.

Stage 7: Acceptance and Hope

There will come a point where you take stock of your life and realize that you have a lot to live for and a lot to look forward to. Healing is complex, and the grieving stages do not move forward in a straight line, but eventually you will find acceptance of the situation and hope for the future. You are forever changed by the things you lost, but now you can move on.

The First Day of Spring

Everyone grieves differently. Your process might seem a lot different from someone else’s. This does not mean that you are grieving incorrectly. You might get stuck on a certain emotion, or feel like you have been grieving for far longer than you expected. You are not beyond hope, if so, and you haven’t done anything wrong. Grief is messy, and you might need help moving on.

The idea of the grieving stages is to help you know roughly what to expect. They ought to remind you that you are not alone in your experience; you haven’t lost your mind. Grief is like a long, bitter winter that leaves everything looking barren and feeling numb. When Spring eventually comes, and it always does, it brings a much-needed change of scenery and a hint of hope.

Whatever stage of grief you find yourself in, one of the most helpful things you can do for yourself is to get counseling. Perhaps there is a single thing you would like to speak with someone about, or maybe you feel as if you need more general support. You can speak about whatever you like with a counselor without fear of being judged or misunderstood.

Please contact our reception team for information on how to find a counselor, or consult our online catalog to find someone who is the right fit for you.