Loss and Bereavement

This article explores the different ways people cope with loss and grief, and discusses the stages of mourning. It also examines the factors that affect grief and bereavement, and highlights the benefits of grief and bereavement counseling and therapy.

LOSS AND
BEREAVEMENT

INTRODUCTION
There are many different ways through which the people cope or meet with the loss of their
family and friends and these ways can be both right and even wrong. Death is a natural
phenomenon which will happen in any of the case and there is no other way to stop the people or
the loved ones to stop from dying. The manner in which an individual will deal with the loss of
the loved ones is totally dependent on the thinking and mindset of the person along with religious
and cultural background of the person.
Grief is a defined as the reaction or response of the individual to the loss which has occurred.
The grief occurs when there occurs some terrible event in the life of the individual.
On the other hand, bereavement is defined as the period of time which is taken by the individual
for mourning over the loss which has been occurred because of death or any other person
connected to them.
In contrast to this mourning is referred to as the act through which the person mourns or laments
over the loss of the loved one.
For overcoming with the people who have died, the individual has to find some way which will
divert the mind of the person from the loss and will increase the emotional energy of the person
so that they can overcome the loss. There are three phases which the person passes at time of
mourning which are like urge of getting back the dead person, the second is the sadness and
disorganization and the last one is the reorganization.
Also, there are some stages which person encounter at time of bereavement which are discussed
in the following points connected below-
 The first stage is of denial under which the person denies to accept the loss that the loved
one has died. Here the individual goes numb and is not in the state of understanding
anything and is not in condition of accepting the loss.
 The next stage is the anger which is an emotion of the person in direction of accepting the
loss. The pain of the individual for accepting the loss is shown in form of anger.
 Further the next step is to bargain for the loss. Like the person bargain with the god that if
this situation is rectified then I will do this and other things.

 The next stage is of depression where the person goes more in the remembrance of the
dead person. Here the person only thinks of the loved one who has died and mourns over
their death.
 The last stage is of acceptance where the person accepts the fact that their loved ones has
died and nothing can take place relating to the fact.
Factors affecting grief and bereavement
There are many different factors which the grief and bereavement and their nature. These factors
are discussed in the following points-
 The first and foremost factor is the relation of the mourning person with the dead person.
This is major factor because if the relation is strong in between them then the grief will
be high and vice versa.
 Another factor is cause of death because if the dead person was ill from a long time then
the other person is mentally prepared that any time the ill person will die.
 Another factor is the age of the ill person if they are older than the other people can
accept their death.
 One more factor affecting the grief and bereavement is the personality and mindset of the
grieving person. This is majorly because of the fact that if the person is string then they
will adapt to this fact in fast manner and if not then they will mourn for longer and will
be difficult for them to accept the fact.
Grief takes place for a longer period of time and here the person has a mix feeling relating to the
situation. Like for instance, first they feel numbness for the situation that is they are not in
condition of understanding the situation. Some people have experienced the emotion of anger
and blame some other person for all the situation from which they are going. Some people lose
their faith in god and goes in depression and sadness and do not have interest in any other thing.
After all these feeling the last feeling is of the acceptance where the grief person tries to think
logically and tries to accept the fact that now nothing can happen and the fact need to accepted.

Grief and bereavement counselling and therapy
Both grief and bereavement are a type of psychotherapy that helps the grieving person to
accept the death or any other loss. This acceptance is done with help of different response of the
individual like emotional, spiritual, physical, social and many others related with the loss or
death of loved ones.
The counsellors dealing in grief and bereavement states that every person deals with the
grief in different way which are based on many different factors. These factors are like beliefs of
person, background of family, experience of individual and many others.
There is a difference among therapy and counselling where counselling includes assisting
people in moving from coml;icated grief or situation to a healthy life. On the other hand, therapty
includes use of different clinical equipment and tools for dealing with the complicated
bereavement situation. The therapy of grief and bereavement is a psychotherpy which is
practiced to rectify the traumatic situation. The major reason behind use of grief theroy is to
outline the situaton and solving it for the betterment of the person. These therapy can be for
individual or gorup or even common under which all person dealing with same issue are treated
along. The therapy includes different task which are helpful for the mourner to recover which are
discussed in the following part-
 Developing the person to experience and adjust the pain.
 Outlining the different ways of meeting the change
 Helping the mourning person to stay fit and healthy so that they can function properly.
 In the end again re- establishing the relation and developing healthy image towards the
world.
The therapy relating to bereavement and grief involves dealing with the blockages which comes
in the process of the mourning and identifying the relation with the deceased person and the
amount of loss from the death to the grieving person.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals