Coping with Grief Bursts: Helpful Strategies

As summer comes to a close and school begins, the change of seasons can activate grief. Those who have had children or college students die, can feel how drastically their life has changed. Even the change in the weather and the beginning of football season can activate old wounds and grief.

Grief just seems to show up when you least expect it. You’ve probably heard of grief triggers which I like to call “grief bursts.” Grief bursts are waves of emotion that come on quickly with great intensity and leave you feeling vulnerable and unprepared.

If only you could find a way to control grief…unfortunately, you can’t control it; but there are things you can do to help when you experience grief bursts. Remember, grief is never a problem to be solved, but rather a reality that you have to incorporate into your life as you learn how to live with it. Once you enter the grief journey, you are on it forever because grief is connected to love and love never dies. However, it’s important to know that grief does change. It won’t always feel like it does today.

Four Things that Help

Here are some things that may help you as the seasons begin to change:

Acknowledge It

“Name it to tame it” is a phrase popularized by Dr. Dan Siegel, a leading psychiatrist and neuroscientist. When you identify and name what you are feeling, it engages the thinking part of the brain which helps to tame the emotional part of the brain. Naming what you are experiencing reduces the power of the emotion. As you tell yourself, “I notice I’m feeling [anxious, sad, or whatever emotion you are having]” notice what you are feeling in your body. What you feel in your body is your body’s signal to you of anxiety. Naming what you are feeling and where you are feeling it allows you to get curious about why you might be feeling it. It also creates some distance between you and your emotions.

Present Moment Awareness

You might notice that your heart is beating faster, your mouth is dry and/or your breathing is shallower. When you feel unsafe, your mind tends to speed up. You tend to go into the future with catastrophizing or into the past with rumination. Once your mind begins to speed up, you disconnect from your body which leads you to feel unsafe and the cycle continues. To step out of this cycle, it’s helpful to come back to the present moment. Begin to focus on your breath. You can find videos to walk you through this practice. The most important piece with breathwork is to exhale longer than you inhale as this activates the calming part of your vagus nerve. As you begin to focus on your breathing, feel your feet on the ground and name the things you see and hear around you (a blue sky, green grass, birds chirping, etc…). This brings you back to the present moment where most likely you are not in danger. (If you are in danger, please call for help and get to safety! Your body is doing what it is supposed to do!)

Self-Compassion

When grief bursts come, your inner critic may judge, criticize, or condemn you for not having more control over your grief. The truth is, as mentioned above, you cannot control grief. It’s a natural and normal human process. You come from a long line of grievers and your body knows how to do it if you will give it time and space to do the grief work. It’s not easy but learning nor healing can occur when you beat yourself up for being human. I highly doubt you say the same things to others with a similar experience that you say to yourself. Try showing yourself the same compassion and grace that you show to others.

Support

The truth is that healing rarely happens in a vacuum. We need the support of safe people who love and care for us. We need to know we have a safety net to land in when the intensity of emotions overwhelms us. Just like a scale helps us to gain perspective about our weight, friends can help us to have perspective about our grief while also bringing us comfort. We cannot give ourselves what we have not received from another. If you are struggling to find healthy support, perhaps there is a remembered resource from your past. This is a person who was supportive of you and spoke truth in a grace-filled way. You may not have physical access to them, but they live in your heart and mind. Ask yourself what they might say to you during this time.

Conclusion

If you or someone you know is struggling with the intense emotions of grief, feel free to reach out for support. You can sign up for a free 15-minute consultation here.

Grief is not the whole of your story; it is only a part. What you do with the grief as you learn to incorporate it into your life and carry it forward with you will make a difference in the way you process it. If you want help processing, please reach out!