For as far back as I can remember, people have always said there are five stages of grief. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. What most people don't tell you is that this is not a linear process. It can go any way it wants. You can get to anger before you get to denial. You can start off with bargaining. And then go to denial, and then go to anger.
The Five Stages of Grief
At a young age. I lost both of my grandparents on my mother's side. I was sad and I never for the life of me could get out of the depression part of it. Let me break this down in the stage that it happened to me.
Stage 1: Denial
Couldn't see anything outside of that just denial at first, I didn't believe it to be true. This didn't make sense. I had just seen them on the weekend, how could they be gone after I just spent a weekend with them?
Stage 2: Anger
I was angry. Angry at myself. Angry that I didn't spend as much time with them as I should have.
I regretted every single moment that I didn't spend with them then came depression
Stage 3: Bargaining
There was no bargaining that happened, I don't remember any bargaining happening, but I know depression happened, and it just stayed.
Stage 4: Depression
The thing with depression is that it wanders in like an uninvited guest, but it doesn't bother you. It doesn't mess with the party, it just sets up a corner for itself. It just stays there, even when the party is over. It stays there. Now, like I said it doesn't really bother you. You carry on with your life and it's just there. As time goes on depression slowly starts to take up more space until you're the guest in its house. That's when it starts to bother you because you didn't realise that as time went on, it was taking up more and more of your space. This led to feeling like an intruder in your own home.
But is it even your home at this point? You’re the inconvenience in its life.
Stage 5: Acceptance
I like to think that things are slowly starting to get better. I finally got to this somewhat idea of acceptance. Slowly started to get better, slowly starting to take up space again, pushing depression back into its little corner. Things were going well till they weren’t
Stage 3: Bargaining
My lost living grandparent died. We weren't extremely close. I know him and he knows me The was a time period when we all lived together, but he wasn't that significant in my life, you know?
Now, I don't know if I'm allowed to feel bad for the fact that he's gone.
Am I allowed to cry and mourn his death now that he is gone?
I didn't know him as well as my other grandparents, but he was still a grandparent.
Stage 5: Acceptance
I had already accepted his death. I was told his very sick at the moment. Things weren't looking great for him. Since we were not close, I kind of pre-accepted the fact that this month or the next month, he would be gone and would be okay. But then when the time actually came for him to be gone, I was okay. This was an acceptance that was already pre-empted. So that acceptance was there.
Stage 2: Anger
Days slowly started to pass and I don't really know if I can say it was anger… it was anger. Anger started to boil up for him and the things he had done but because he is dead that is the end of it. You can't kick a dead horse. His death was the end,
Stage 4: Depression
After I kind of accepted that, I got depressed. I'm not 100 percent sure why his death in some way
gave depression back the house and made me an intruder in my own home but it’s done that.
I don't know.
Maybe I'm just feeding off everyone else's emotions.
Maybe I can cry at the funeral, but it would feel so unreal and wouldn't make sense to ME.
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