groups

There are five stages of Grief

1. Denial....You tell yourself this is not happening.
2. Anger... Anger comes as you begin to accept reality.
3. Bargaining...Trying to get them back
4. Depression..an inevitable part of loss.
5. Acceptance....When you have worked through all of the other stages, you will come to acceptance. You accept that everything happens for a reason. You may not see why yet, but you accept that it happened. You will see that you were married to this person for a time for a reason, but that it is now over. You will realize that it is final, and you are ready to get on with your life. In a divorce, you will come to realize that everything happened for the best, and that your life does have meaning. You will begin to feel free from the pain and the hurt. You will be finished with your grieving. You are ready to move on to a new life and let the other life remain in the past. You will be able to remember the good as well as the bad.

With a death, you accept it as what was meant to be - it was their time in the whole scheme of things. You accept death as an inevitable part of life. You will always love and miss that person, but you realize that you are alive, and you have to go on living and make a new life for yourself without that person.

Moving On

There is a time to move on, out of our grief and back into life.

Here is a quote to keep in mind:
"The tears happen. Endure, grieve, and move on. The only person
who is with s our entire life is ourselves. LIVE while you are alive."
(Author Unknown)



There is a Bible passage that reads:

To everything there is a season,
a time for every purpose under the sun.
A time to be born and a time to die;
a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
a time to kill and a time to heal ...
a time to weep and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn and a time to dance ...
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to lose and a time to seek;
a time to rend and a time to sew;
a time to keep silent and a time to speak;
a time to love and a time to hate;
a time for war and a time for peace.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

Very wonderfully said. I have lost many in my lifetime, thought that I had a handle on things, but you never know or fear that the loss with strike closer. I must learn to prepare.....

Thanks.

Nice to see you Orchidlover. I have lost many people that I have loved. It is so difficult. I even felt when I was getting this post ready how the words just bounce off some who have just lost a loved one and especially a child.
I feel like I am going through a grieving process of my own over my son. There has been no contact at all in 6 months and it has left me with a hole to deep to fill. Sometimes, I wonder if having your child alive and not being able to get to them or see/talk to them isn't as hard as far as grieving...I feel like I have truly been grieving the loss of our relationship.

Linda...well said..we all have to go through grief at one time or another in our life....sometime you hold on to that grief....you feel that is all you have...but this to shall pass...give it to the Lord..and He will give you peace and understanding...that is the only answer...God Bless You

Yes there is a time for everything, let us all keep strong through it all, I have had deaths and it hurts, but then I realize, that is a part of life. So I bend down on my knees, pray to God and then over time He heals me of my pain, and replace it with happiness. Thank you for the post, Linda.

It is hard to lose a loved one. I lost all my family members at one and two year intervals. I wasn't even into the depression part good when I would lose another one. I can tell you, you do get over it eventually. I grieved for years, but I finally made it out to the other side. I always thought that if my grandmother died, I would go with her. I wanted to for the longest time, but I made it through. Losing someone is a terrible pain and you don't know how you will be able to go on, I caught myself trying to call my grandmother even up to a year after her death. I'd see someone who looked like her and almost faint. It's hard. You will always have them with you in your heart and mind, it gets easier. Even now, twenty-five years later, I have nightmares where I try to call them on the phone, but I can't get the number right, but the pain is no longer there. It takes a while and each one of us has a different time period of when it's over. The main thing is to move forward each day and not allow ourselves to become stuck in the mire of depression.

Another stage in the process - atleast for me - is the "what-ifs" that come along with the depression. What I mean by "what ifs" is the nagging doubt I've got that says "what if I'd done X . . . what that have made a difference?" It hit me for the first time back in February 1993 when my grand-mother's aunt passed away and we found her body after being unable to get her to answer the phone. Based on the Medical Examiner's findings that she had been dead for approximately two hours when we found her, I "what if'ed" the situation nine ways to Sunday because I'd been the last one to talk with her and she'd said she didn't feel good. It wasn't until a fellow EMT took me aside and said "Walter, her body was tired and God was ready to give her rest" that I stopped blaming myself.

Walter, I think that is one of the biggest things we put ourselves through when we lose someone we love. What if I had only"

It took me a LONG time to stop wondering if I could have done something that would have helped her and prevented her from dying. What made it worse was the fact, that because I knew her medical history and the meds she'd been taking (and I could secure the house), the Police and the Medical Examiner asked me to stay around until they could complete their investigation the day that she died. I think that was one of the hardest things that I've ever done.

Oh Linda, thank you so very much for this posting. I read it and nearly wept for the loss of my husband. I starting losing early in my life when my Daddy died when I was 13. Then much later, our oldest son was murdered at the age of 24, (very hard, but we had each other then), then I lost my oldest sister to colon cancer, then a grandbaby of 1 day old, then another sister to heart disease, then I lost my dear Mother, 3 months later my dear Mother-in-law, then less than 4 months later, I lost my first husband of 37 yrs(the love of my life), then this past year I lost my brother to Alzheimer's Disease, and 6 weeks ago, my second husband of less than 4 years to open heart surgery. I KNOW losses and I am still standing. You have to take one day at a time, pray a lot, cry some, and keep on keeping on. Life DOES go on and those lost would not want us to sink into the depression that is so common. With God all things are possible, and He is bringing me through this too. I love the saying.... "This too shall pass"........AMEN! God bless you all and Keep on Keeping On you all. Hugs, Joanne ♥