The Grieving process - how to Grieve Properly and Cimpletely

Place : Bukit Kiara Equestrian
Speaker: Dr Edmund Ng
Date : 1 Dec 2012
Organizer : GGP Outreach

Introduction
- 6 years ago his wife passed away
- devastated, painful, lonely
- Tan Sri Yusuf shot himself 3 years after his wife died - cannot bear the pain of losing his wife.

Type of Losses
- tangible - home
- intangible
-,secondary - divorce
-,developmental - child leave the home

introductory statement
- death is part of life
- life is unfair - accept it is a fact
- when the person time up, there is nothing can be done
- learn to cope with present and live for future
- cognition - how we think, how we feel and how we behave - effects our life

Nature of Grief
- painful
- unpredictable
- unforgettable
- personal
- solitary
- unique

5 possible outcome of grief
1. Complete return to original state
2. Improved - come out a better person
3. Partial recovery
4. Permanent damage
5. Progressive decline

Consequence of not grieving
- not grieve successfully - prone to illness
- total absence of grieve - not healthy

Three position to avoids
1. Victim mentality
- poor me - self pity
- counter - survival mentality

2. Cure me mentality
- normal grief is not a sickness but a step by step journey that must be taken

3. Bypass mentality
- suppressing grief
- negative energy eating inside you

Grief chart by Davidson 1984
- two years of grieving is fine

Traditional model of grief
- Kubler Ross Stage of Death
1. Denial and isolation - dream
2. Anger and hostility
3. Bargaining - one more chance

Worden task in mourning
1. Accept the reality of the loss
2. Work through the pain of grief
3. Adjust to an environment in which the deceased is missing
4. Withdraw emotional energy and reinvest the life back

TIME Approach
1. Time
- time is needed to grieve
- it is a process and journey
- no quick fixes
-

How to grieve properly
1. Embrace the grieve
- relax in it
2. know the normal manifestation of grief
- emotional
-- guilt
- cognitive
-- disbelief
- behavioral
-- eating with taste
-- breathing problem
3. Doing the grief work
- effort to confront and experience the grief
- just hidding will not solved

Inherent danger

T - Telling the Loss
I - issues and resolved
M - Meaning is sought
E - Ending

Telling about loss
- opportunity to process
- talk help to release the emotion
- help to confront the denial

What is denial?

Tears bring relief
- bring relief and healing to the soul

I - issues
- issues hinder recovery
- cognitive issues
-- guilt - self guilty - self blame
- confess and deal with it once
- responsible to yourself
- impulse of the moment - take it seriously

practical issues
- finance

Spiritual issues
-

M - meaning is sought
- try making sense
- moving on

E - ending or referral
- new normal - without present of the love one
- what is recovery -
1. Able to talk about the decease
2.

Desire outcome
1. Regain equilibrium
2. Able to function as normal life

When to refer
- disproportionate fear of death - big reaction of sickness
- unresolved theme - better to die

Q&A
1. Expose - phobia
- talk about phobia level by level until it is gone
2. Bipolar
- mania and depression in a split of second
- bipolar and grieve is two different thing
3. Complicated Grieve
- double loss - loss the parent and relative disown her

Speaker : Dr Ng Wai Seng
Topic: Helping Children Coping With Grief

Introduction
- her brother passed away at age of 9
- her brother at 14 was not inform and later came back and he was devastated
- her sister a caretaker for the sick brother - never have childhood
- mum carry the guilt until today
- father disconnect emotionally to the son

4 Tasks of mourning
By Sandra Fox
1. Understanding
- it is ok to ask question
- learning to accept the loss

2. Feeling the loss
- it is ok to grieve

3. Commemorating
- it is ok to talk about deceased person

4. Moving on
- reorganized our life

Understand grief reaction in children:-

1. Cognitive Emotional
- denial -
- guilt - blame them-self,
- acting out - teenager, smoking, tattoo etc

Is not about challenging the authority

Physical & behavioral
- somatic - hollow stomach, headache etc
- regressive

Age - different age react differently
Cyclical - come back again and again
Increasing - intensity in grieve increase
Confused - could said I hate God of taking Dad away
Attention seeking behavior - ask friends help

What children need in grieving
1. Information and explanation
- go with their question
- google - how to explain death to the child
- make connection to things surrounding such as tree leave fall, dog die etc

2. Help in expressing feelings
- see in their drawing, painting
- allow time to response

3. Involving in goodbye
- saying goodbye with the coffin

4. Reassurance

Ways to help grieving children
- grieve map - google
-

What we need to help grieving children
1. Eyes to see grief
- monitor their behavior

2. ears to listen to grief
- empty cup - allow pain to be pour to you
- allow small hole at the bottom to leak through

3.heart to embrace grief
- pay attention
- own
- accept
- embrace grief like a friends
- treat grieve like a friends
- be positive with grief

Grief = Love