Article 25

Before reading this article I did not realize how important grieving is to a person after the death of a loved one. I also didn’t realize that there was such an important distinction between grief and the grieving process. The article pointed out how important and complex the process of grieving is. I just thought grieving was a way some people coped with death. I find it very interesting that grieving can help a person restore their sense of autonomy and not be such a “disease like” process. The article talked about seven stages that a person will progress through when dealing with their grief. The first stage they talked about was shock and denial. I always knew that it’s very common for people to be in denial after they lost a loved one but I did not understand that denial can help protect a person from the realities that face them in the social world. It does make a lot a sense once I think about it. I always looked at denial as something negative because it’s only postponing the pain someone will eventually have to face. But after reading what the article has to say, it can protect a person until they are ready to deal with all the ugly realities of losing their loved one. When the article talked about disorganization it stated that disorganization is a normal emotional experience for someone who is going through the grieving process. Before I read that I also thought that if a person was starting to become disorganized that was a sign of a mental illness that was triggered by the death of their loved one. It does make a lot of sense that it’s only natural for a person to experience confusion and social disorganization after their social identity has been destroyed by the death of their spouse, because many peoples identity will revolve around their husband or wife. So it does seem very practical that once their spouse dies, they face a period of identity confusion. The article also discussed guilt as another normal stage of the grieving process. To me this is the one stage that makes the most sense. I have seen it time and time again when someone blames their self for the death of their loved one. What I did not know was that a person is actually encouraged at times to feel guilt because individuals in our society tend to blame the victim of bereavement. I can not believe that is the cause of a person’s guilt after the death of their loved one. They already have to go through enough and on top of it to feel the guilt for their loved ones death has to be terrible. The last thing society should be doing is blaming the victim of bereavement, that only adds to the stress they are already facing. The article also talks about the four tasks of mourning. To me all four stages seem extremely important. I feel like unless a person completes these stages successfully they will not be able to mourn their loved one. This means they will never really be able to move on with their life. Each stage seems critical to the whole process. Without accepting that their loved one is really dead a person can not truly experience the pain of grieving. They then will not be able to form new relationships and form a new identity without their loved one which means they will not be able to reinvest in new relationships that will actually make them happy and allow them to feel complete again. After reading this article I realize that grieving is not a negative experience but actually a positive life experience that everyone needs to go to after the death of someone they love. Each stage is very important because with each stage comes progress towards moving on with their lives. I realize that through grieving a person can cope successfully when death happens.