by Catherine Leahy

Created on: June 07, 2008

The loss of someone close to us through death is one of the major life crises that we have to go through and it can be even more difficult to watch someone you care about go through such a loss. Supporting a partner or close friend through a bereavement can be painful and difficult. Grief is something we tend to hide away in our society. For this reason it is not easy to offer support and many of us simply do not know what to do or what to say. Should we avoid discussion of the dead person? If our bereaved partner or friend cries or gets upset should we encourage him or her to express that emotion or should we try to help him or her to stop crying? Should we listen or should we talk? Should we be a shoulder to cry on or a practical no-nonsense support? It may seem obvious that all these things are necessary, but in the actual event, with a partner whose mood swings or extremes of emotion create a confusing maelstrom, it is actually very difficult to know what to do. You can find yourself becoming judgmental about the extent to which he is indulging his grief and not "getting on with it" or you can become impatient with her denial of her loss or his withdrawal from the usual course of your live together.

Try to remember to talk. Talk about the person your loved one has lost. Remember the good things, anything you admired in that person or any fond memories you have. Saying what that person meant to you shows an understanding of what your loved one has lost and allows him or her to share what they feel about that loss.

The one important thing to remember is to be patient. Grief is a process that can last for quite some time. Grief has different stages and different feelings and emotions associated with each stage so that you may not recognize that a close friend or partner is reacting to something out of their grief because it does not fit with what your expectation of grief is.

Grief is entirely natural and all of us experience it at some stage in our lives, but as each of us is unique, our grief will also be unique and there is no right or wrong way to grieve. As already mentioned we go through stages in recovering from bereavement. However, these stages are not necessarily experienced in the same order, they are varied emotional responses and can be cyclical, occurring and re-occurring and lasting for varying lengths of time. The entire healing process can vary from person to person so do not have any expectations of how long your loved one needs to heal.

The

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