Coping with Grief and Loss: A guide to healing

• What is grief?
  • Grief’s effects on mind and body
  • How long does grief last?
  • Are there stages of grief?
  • How other losses shape grief
  • Denial, anger, and guilt: The difficult emotions of grief
• Comforting yourself
  • Tend to the essentials
  • Turn to family and friends
  • Commemorate your loved one
  • Consider your culture and preferences
  • Check out books and CDs
  • Keep a journal
  • Try some stress-relief techniques
  • Join a grief support group
  • Seeking additional help
• Comforting others: Suggestions for friends and family members
• Different faces of grief
  • Grief in the later years
  • Grief in men
  • Grief in women
  • Grief in children
  • Losing a child
  • Losing a parent
  • Losing a spouse or life partner
• When someone you love is terminally ill
  • Anticipatory grief
  • Talking about death
  • End-of-life planning: Addressing practical matters
• Making arrangements
  • Planning for a funeral or memorial service
  • Gathering essential records
  • Contacting the appropriate agencies
• Renewal
• Glossary
• Resources
  • Organizations
  • Books and more for children
  • Books and more for adults

Sooner or later, all of us will grieve the loss of loved ones, whether the agent is a sudden heart attack, a car accident, or the stresses of disease or age. Every year, almost 2.4 million men, women, and children die in the United States, leaving behind many others who mourn them.

If you’ve experienced the death of someone very close to you, you know how painful and prolonged grief can be. It’s common to feel overwhelmed at first by its depth and intensity. Immediately after a death, you may be plunged into funeral preparations and logistics before you even have time to register the loss and what it means to you. Later, you may have little energy for even simple tasks like getting out of bed, eating a meal, or leaving the house. You might feel numb, anxious, or full of despair. Warring emotions — sadness and relief, longing and acceptance, hostility and guilt — may catch you off guard. All of this is normal.

Yet there are ways to cope with grief. This Special Health Report is intended to help you do so. These pages contain practical ideas for you to try, based on current research and with an eye to common sense. As you read, you’ll also learn that certain axioms about grief are backed by little or no actual evidence. Contrary to what you may have heard, for example, denial has a useful side. Anger isn’t always part of grieving. And no single pathway leads out of grief or ensures closure.

Accepting that there is no “right” way to grieve can be a powerful first step. Doing so gives you permission to grieve at your own pace and in your own way. Whatever form your grief takes, try to be gentle with yourself.

Amid loss and pain lie opportunities for growth and hope. You may establish a deeper connection to faith and spirituality or to friends and loved ones. Your own loss can make you more empathetic to others struggling with illness or grief. And sometimes grief reminds us to savor the pleasures of life.

No words, written or spoken, are powerful enough to erase grief. But perhaps the advice in these pages can help ease your pain. It may also help to know that most people are truly resilient. Often, the embrace of loved ones, friends, and surrounding community soften sorrow. Over time, healing occurs.