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The myth of getting over grief
The myth of getting over grief
When you are grieving, you may hear phrases such as ‘move on’ or ‘get over it’. Even when they are intended to be reassuring, these words can suggest that grief should gradually disappear and that there will come a point when you leave it behind.
Your experience may be very different. A bereavement can remain significant throughout your life, although the way you experience it may change over time.
One way of thinking about this is Lois Tonkin’s model of growing around grief. Rather than imagining grief becoming smaller, the model suggests that life can become larger around it. New experiences, relationships, responsibilities and sources of meaning may develop, while the loss continues to have a place in your life.
Like any model of grief, this is not a rule or a description of what should happen. It simply offers one way of understanding how grief and continuing to live can exist together.
What might this feel like?
As your life changes, your relationship with a loss may change too. At times grief may be in the foreground; at others it may be less noticeable. You might:
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continue to miss the person who died many years after their death
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find that your loss is less present in everyday life without feeling less important
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build new relationships or have new experiences while carrying memories of the person who died
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feel grief strongly again around an anniversary, birthday or important event
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experience happiness and sadness alongside each other
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find that new experiences bring a renewed awareness of who is absent
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notice that your understanding of the loss changes as your own life changes
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become more involved in everyday life without feeling that you are leaving the person who died behind.
There is no point at which you are required to have ‘finished’ grieving. Continuing to feel grief can sit alongside relationships, interests, enjoyment and new experiences.
How might counselling help?
Counselling is not about helping you to ‘get over’ a bereavement or trying to remove your grief.
It can offer a confidential space to explore the place your loss has in your life, whether the bereavement was recent or happened many years ago. You might want to talk about memories and feelings, changes in relationships or identity, or what it is like to continue living in circumstances that are now different.
There is no particular place you need to reach. Counselling gives you space to explore what your loss means for you, now and over time.