{"id":626,"date":"2023-03-27T16:42:11","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T16:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.illuminate.co.com\/?p=626"},"modified":"2023-03-27T16:45:04","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T16:45:04","slug":"griefs-oscillation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.illuminate.co.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/27\/griefs-oscillation\/","title":{"rendered":"Grief’s Oscillation"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row css_animation=”” row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”grid” angled_section=”no” text_align=”left” background_image_as_pattern=”without_pattern” z_index=””][vc_column width=”2\/3″ css=”.vc_custom_1566406304942{padding-right: 10% !important;}”][vc_column_text]Grief\u2019s Oscillation<\/strong><\/p>\n

Recently, I had the experience of being by the side of my mother as she died. This sad event provoked strong emotions that sit with me still. Seeing those around me helped me to recognise that something in the popular and somewhat old-fashioned cycle of loss and grief just didn\u2019t fit.\u00a0 There is a more helpful, alternative model perhaps more aligned with my experience.<\/p>\n

Loss and grief are experiences all of us go through at some point in our lives. The journey, the process, can be intensely felt, prolonged and it can feel lonely and painful. \u00a0But while the experience of loss is inevitable, the feelings evoked, and the process are not universal.<\/p>\n

In the late 1960\u2019s Kubler Ross proposed a 5-stage model of loss and grief including: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. <\/em>Her approach entered popular culture as the \u2018go to model\u2019 to explain and manage grief or loss. She correctly identified that we don\u2019t go through the stages in a neat, step by step approach and rightly proposed we occupy different stages at different times and move back and forth between them. Some people get \u2018stuck\u2019 and need help to move forward.<\/p>\n

While I find this model is potentially<\/em> useful with an \u2018out of the blue\u2019 loss or multiple such events in quick succession, the process she describes is not a universal experience. \u00a0\u00a0In 1999 Stroebe and Schut proposed a dual process model of grief whereby a person oscillates<\/em><\/strong> between loss orientation<\/em> attending to the feelings of sadness and grief, potentially resisting the reality of it and restorative orientation<\/em> (moving on) attending to changes and new roles. Back and forth, back and forth, incrementally moving toward one of future resolution. This is a model more aligned with my experience and those around me.<\/p>\n

Combining Stroebe and Schut\u2019s model with CBT concepts may be useful during grief or loss.<\/p>\n