Grief treatment
Grief is a fundamental human emotion because of the loss of a loved one. Grief means that our world has been destroyed.
The American-Swiss psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1926 -2004) is known for a multi-stage model for the grief process with the following stages: denial, anger, negotiation, depression and acceptance of the loss. However, not all bereaved people experience all the emotions, and it is not sure that these emotions appear in a certain order, because grief always has an individual course and consists of many and sometimes opposing emotions.
The grieving process alternates between
- Missing and aversion to the loss
- Fear and anger about unfairness of life
Are you familiar with the following symptoms?
For a young woman, time has stood still since her father died. Nine months have passed, and she describes her life situation as if she is sitting on a train that won’t run. In therapy, she uses this image to describe her grieving process. We talk about the uncertainty where the “new train” will take her and the costs and benefits of riding a “new train”.
Grief can affect relatives and survivors, but also the person affected by the disease and the person who has overcame illness well. When serious illness such as cancer is cured, it does not mean that life can just continue from the time when life was reset by the disease. The time after being cured is not always a period of joy and optimism, but can be marked by great fear of death.
It can be very difficult to decide whether to contact a psychotherapist
But is also the most difficult step for you in the therapeutic process, because after that we will find away together.
Find a new balance in life
Through therapy, you can find a new balance in life. In therapy, we switch between paying attention to the the past, the present and the future. I can help you to process your grief and many opposing emotions such as anger, depression, emptiness and self-blame for not being a good enough friend, partner or parent.
If you have any of these symptoms of grief for a longer period, you may benefit from therapeutic conversations:
- Intense preoccupation with the loss
- Overwhelming feelings of sadness, anger, anxiety, shame, guilt, etc.
- Social isolation
See also the website of the National Sorrow Center
Recognize these symptoms?
Human life is full of big and small crises. Within crisis psychology, a distinction is made between developmental crises, which are the result of changed social expectations such as e.g. becoming parents or retiring, and traumatic crises, which have a sudden, external cause. It can be the experience of illness, death, accident, violence and aggression, sexual abuse, war or pandemics. The crisis can “set in” as anxiety and depression and result in abuse; sometimes we lack the tools to understand the crisis and act constructively.
In therapy, we will explore your patterns for acting towards crisis and develop new ways of acting in crisis situations.
Do you have any questions?
Do you have questions or are you ready to see a therapist? – Fill out the contact form, call or send an email. I will do my best to answer your questions or find a time for you when it suits.
