The stages of grief are commonly believed to be denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. I've written before that these were actually not intended for survivors but rather for those receiving terminal diagnoses. Further, they were never intended to be seen as firm steps but rather as patterns. It's rare that someone moves from denial to anger without feeling a bit of denial again.
But, for survivors, I want to propose a different pattern and I believe the journey tends to start with The Fog before moving into The Fall. Anger, depression, and acceptance all seem natural after that but The Fog and The Fall are big differences.
The Fog is different from denial. I haven't met too many widows who are fully in denial - rather, it's more like they're in a foggy state where they might even forget that their partner has passed. Or, they understand that reality but they seem to be doing fine. We've all seen someone like this - despite a devastating loss, they're "fine." (Not coincidentally, I hate the word "fine.") Those around the survivor marvel at how that's possible. "How is she fine? Her husband died!" Well, that's because she's not fine. She's in a fog and this is a crucial and almost universal experience after profound loss. It's part of the shock, to be sure, but it goes beyond that: it's our brains' way of helping us survive those horrible early days. We focus on what needs to be done, we have lots of visitors, we're attending to all of those distractions. And we have a moment when we think "Hey, I might be able to handle this..."
But then? The Fall hits.
The Fall usually happens a few months out - it could be a few weeks, it could be six months - when The Fog begins to lift and the true pain of the loss hits us. And it tends to hit out of nowhere. We'll be driving along and a song comes on that just makes us totally lose it. And at this point, we breakdown in a way we haven't before because The Fog has lifted just enough to no longer serve as a bumper. To me, The Fall stage was the WORST because that's when I began to think "Holy hell, I am never going to feel any better..." This is when everything goes bleak around us. It also tends to be when other things begin to go wrong - we have to wrangle with uncooperative insurance agencies, we might experience other ancillary losses, whatever - but there tends to be something else that happens that makes the profound pain even worse.
I suppose the good news, if we can call it that, is that this is totally normal. I noticed this with my own experience and I've seen it with other widows I talk to either professionally or socially. And to me, The Fall stage is the one we need to be aware of and to prepare for. It's usually around the time with well-wishers start to disappear.
We can't fully prepare for the pain of grief but some awareness can help us understand that yes, this is normal - and that yes, this too shall ease a bit with time.
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