Flourish Programme for Grief Bereavement Loss
Grief is a measure of our love and dependence and is the price that we pay for loving. It is mainly a reaction to loss, or anticipated loss, but it also includes our distress on behalf of the person who has died or who is dying. One of the things that we all need at such a time is a deep understanding of both these parts of the grief reaction. For with understanding, will come some relief.
Young Woman suffering grief after her partner died. The Flourish Programme can help her overcome this
It has a course to run. And as the duration of life varies with individual, so does the duration of grief.
Grief is not simple. The chaos it causes can be at the same time overwhelming and a refuge to retreat into. For those who are suffering there is no consolation and for those around them words prove appallingly inadequate.
The feeling of confusion. The feeling of despair. One day, one moment, you dare to think you might be able to face life again, albeit changed. The next you plummet back into the pit.
There are four parts to moving out of this state:
- Accepting that loss is a reality. This includes intellectual and emotional reality both perhaps equally important but one so much harder to achieve.
- Entering into the emotions of grief and dealing with the feelings encountered there.
- Acquiring new skills in order to make new life possible.
- Reinvesting in new ways in order to make new relationships possible.
Everyone is different so the way they work through their pain is unique – some people are able to move on quite easily and others find it very difficult. It does not matter how many times we have a bereavement of loss of someone close it tends not to get easier for the person left behind.
Definitions
Grief: is ‘a mental pain, distress or sorrow. Deep or violent sorrow caused by loss or trouble; keen or bitter regret or remorse’.
Bereavement: is identified as being one is deprived, robbed, stripped of, dispossessed of, life or hope.
Therefore, grief is consequent upon something, some event or happening. It is the normal response to loss.
Types of grief
Typically or Normal
- Numbness
- Attacks of yearning and anxiety alternating with longer periods of depression and despair
- Preoccupied with thoughts of the dead one
- Insomnia
- Eating pattern changes
- Irritability
- Social withdrawal
All these soon begin to decline in their intensity.
Chronic
All the normal symptoms are present but they are all more pronounced. The general impression is one of deep and pressing sorrow.
Inhibited
The person shows little reaction to the death or loss. Most common in children under the age of five years. It is widely agreed that some forms of depression in adult life may be attributable to losses in early childhood. As a couple grow older they experience a period of ‘disengagement’ – a mutual severing of the ties between them and others in society.
Delayed
This is where a typical or chronic reaction occurs after a period of delay during which the full expression of grief is inhibited. The grief may only be called to mind when some later loss is experienced. Crying, a normal reaction in grief, often absent in inhibited grief, has been linked with feelings of guilt.
Flourish Programme for Grief Bereavement Loss
Flourish Hypnotherapy is Phase 1 of the Flourish Programme. It can get people where they need to be in just 2-3 sessions.
The goal of the Flourish Programme is to help you let go of someone or something you don’t want to let go of. You must let go of in order to carry on living.
The overall goal of the Flourish Programme is to help you (the survivor), complete any unfinished business with the deceased and to be able to say a final goodbye.
The number of sessions is not fixed but most people require 2-3 hours of help. Some may need more.