What happens when we grieve?

Losing a spouse can be frightening even for people who have good social support. But what happens to your bodies, minds and spirits after the death of a loved one, when you can’t find your spouse in bed in the morning? When your plans with him/her are shattered? When you see your children in pain, longing for their mum or dad?

When on top of all that you worry about the financial consequences of his/her passing?

In short: when you feel extremely vulnerable and shaken?

Your fight and flight system gets activated OR you freeze as in feeling numb and in shock. That’s right. You react as if you are in danger. Here is where your nervous system comes into play.

Basically, symptoms of grief are "manifestations of the nervous system responding to danger created by loss". Put differently, your nervous system is signalling to us that you are in danger after experiencing the loss of your beloved. Thus, your body and mind are thrown into turmoil.

Perhaps we can even call it a stress response in the extreme.

And when the passing of your husband was unexpected and sudden this can be traumatic and may even aggravate the stress response.

Grieving affects amongst others our heart, hormones, immune system and sleep. You may even have heard of a broken heart syndrome. This shows you how strong a reaction some people can have to the loss of a loved one.

According to therapist Candyce Ossefort-Russell grievers commonly report dizziness, emotional numbness, loss of appetite, feelings of fear, dread and intense sorrow, muscle spasms, concentration and memory difficulties, extreme fatigue, social withdrawal and profound loneliness.

You can also feel angry or irritable. You may wake up in the middle of the night with thoughts racing through your mind, unable to stop them, making you feel even more unsafe, which will make it harder for you to fall asleep again, as your fight and flight system might be activated.

These thoughts may aggravate your despondency and feelings of helplessness. They may distract you from what really matters like your well-being and the well-being of your kids.

It’s important to realise the power of these night-time thoughts. If you don’t investigate them these thoughts can seriously destabilise you as everything looks so much worse in the middle of the night.

That said, when grief doesn’t get blocked it moves naturally, like a wave it comes and goes. That is the purpose of grief: to move with your emotions and allow yourself some restoration. Swinging between loss and restoration, loss and restoration.

You need rest to heal your wounds and action to repair the damage. Both states, the fight and flight and the freeze response, allow you to do just that.

When you feel shutdown your body, mind and spirit get the opportunity to rest.

When you are faced with a problem you need to deal with, you can take action by using your fight and flight response.

But: This can only be done if you feel safe and understand what is happening in your nervous system and how it is actually helping you move through your grief. But you can’t get there if you don’t feel safe. Someone has to offer you a place where you can safely grieve with your body and mind relaxed.