Grief is a personal journey and no two journeys are exactly alike, area counselors say.
“There are people who come in and say, ‘I’m grieving, but I don’t think I’m doing it right,'” said Mary Macek, a clinical therapist at Harbor in Toledo. “Some of what we do with folks is just to normalize the grief process, to reassure people they are not going crazy for being in as much pain or distress as they are in.”
One of the biggest misconceptions about grief is that it follows a certain timetable, said Dawn DeFalco, a licensed counselor and team leader for bereavement at Hospice of Northwest Ohio.
“Grief is a lifetime journey and the journey ebbs and flows,” DeFalco said. “Many people feel they’ve come to terms with it, but then they are surprised months or years later when something triggers a special memory of a loved one. It is normal to have a reaction to a stimulus like a smell, taste, the different seasons of the year, an anniversary, a birthday or their favorite holiday.”
Macek agreed.
“Grief is a funny process. Even in its natural resolution, there are ups and downs and sometimes people have periods of time where they think, ‘OK, I’m doing better’ and then all of sudden they are overwhelmed by grief again and say, ‘OK, what did I do wrong?'” Macek said. “But I think it’s in the nature of grief to have those times when grief is more distressing again, so I don’t think it’s necessarily strictly a liner process even when it’s going well.”
Many people are familiar with psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’ Five Stages of Grief — denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance — but not everyone experiences every stage and the stages don’t necessarily happen in that order, Macek said.
“It’s just to give a model to something that seems pretty overwhelming and out of control to a lot of people, but I like to think of grief as something that is normal and adaptive,” Macek said. “It’s the process by which we resolve some pretty intense feelings and take into ourselves information that for the most part we don’t want to take in.”
Many people who have lost a loved one feel lost after the funeral, Macek said.
“The funeral’s over, you’re back to work, everything is supposed to be fine and dandy and it’s not,” Macek said. “We don’t have a lot of visible markers in our culture beyond the funeral for dealing with loss. There are some countries in which the bereaved person is relieved of all the things they have to do on a daily basis for a year. We don’t seem to have some of those cultural norms any more.”
Many people seek help from a counselor or support group when they feel “stuck,” Macek said.
“Sometimes people get stuck on guilt. They think, ‘Boy, there should have been something else I could have done to prevent it,'” Macek said. “Some people get stuck in depression. They think that if they start to get happy, if they start to live their life again, they are going to lose their connection to the person who’s died. And some people get stuck because of the trauma. If a loved one has died in a sudden or violent way, there is some trauma associated with that that can impede their ability to resolve grief issues. A caregiver who has provided care for several years to someone whose condition has gotten progressively worse, I think those folks are somewhat traumatized too.
“The places where people get stuck are usually places where they are afraid to go near their own pain,” Macek said. “If you’re stuck and you’re not getting unstuck that may be an indication it’s time to talk to somebody.”
Harbor and Hospice of Northwest Ohio both offers individual and family grief counseling. The Hospice sessions are free. Hospice also offers free grief support groups, including Kids Grief Support, Mid-Life Spousal or Partner Loss, Young Families in Grief, Men in Grief, Supportive Spouses, After Your Parent Dies, Coping with Any Loss and Pathways, which includes a spiritual element. Everyone starts with Grief 101, a one-time session that addresses expectations.
“The support groups help people normalize what they have experienced so they don’t feel so alone,” DelFalco said. “We learn from each other and we can be supportive of others and receive that support. It’s about getting back to some kind of normalcy in their life even though it’s going to be new normal for most people.”
When Maryellen Schmidt’s 20-year-old son died in a car accident, she sought help from GriefShare, a free Christian-based group offered through CedarCreek Church’s LifeSupport series. The 13-week program is open to anyone who has lost someone close to them through death. People can join at any time and work through the series as many times as they need, Schmidt said.
Schmidt participated in GriefShare for two years before becoming a group leader two years ago.
“Those who have not experienced grief are often uncomfortable around those who are grieving and often shut the bereaved person down,” Schmidt said. “When you have a loved one who has died, you don’t just get over it and get back to work. It takes time. It might take two or three times through to even begin to heal.”
Some GriefShare groups meet at a church; others meet in homes, Schmidt said. GriefShare leaders facilitate the sessions through videos and workbooks.
“The leaders are not counselors. We’re just people who have experienced the death of a loved one and have dealt with grief,” Schmidt said. “I would encourage people to step forward to get help. Choking that grief and pushing it down leads to all kinds of other problems. As painful as it is, it’s most helpful and most beneficial to face it and deal with it.”
Schmidt also operates the Northwest Ohio chapter of The Compassionate Friends, a nonprofit organization for parents who have lost a child “at any age, from any cause.”
The group meets at 7 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month at St. James Lutheran Church, 4727 W. Sylvania Ave., but is not affiliated with any faith. The group host a fundraiser called Walk to Remember on Oct. 13. Registration is $5. For more information, visit www.compassionatefriends.org or email tcfofnwohio@gmail.com.
Most people think of grief as a response to the death of a loved one, but there are many other situations that cause grief, Macek said.
“People who have experienced trauma as children, when they are resolving that they are in part grieving the childhood they didn’t have. If someone has a difficult relationship with a parent, part of the adjustment to a healthier relationship with that parent may be grieving the loss of the parent you didn’t have so you can actually have a relationship with the parent you do,” Macek said. “There is some aspect of grief work in most forms of counseling.”
Counseling isn’t the right fit for everyone. Some people, including many men, are “functional” grievers, Macek said. Instead of wanting to talk about it, they want to be doing something.
“For some people, talking is probably not the best way of accomplishing things,” Macek said. “They want to work on a project and while they are working on things, sometimes their grief can resolve that way. To force someone who is a much more functional griever into talk therapy can be misguided and nonproductive.”
Even after resolving issues found in acute stages of grief, there are still adjustments to be made.
“Then there is the part about how do I rebuild my life and move on without this important person,” Macek said. “People have had expectations about how their life was going to look going forward and all of a sudden it doesn’t look that way and they have to make a new plan. That’s kind of a longterm consequence of grief.”
For more information, visit www.hospicenwo.org or www.harbor.org.
