Joyce, Karen's Mum 

Suicide grievers struggle with "why" and "what if" more than other bereaved individuals. Our grief is driven by the learning from our search. Seeking meaning after loss is usually seen as positive. Among suicide grievers it intensifies bereavement because most of what we encounter is negative. We face myths which "blame the victim" or characterize them as pathological deviants.

 

We discover signs that we missed or ignored. We realize that suicide is preventable. These perceptions amplify our grief. We try to cope. The intellectualizations that "worked" with other deaths fail us. Things which others say to us are often upsetting . What helps those facing other losses don't work for us. We have found it helpful to think of suicide grief like this:

 

Dissonance: Grief opens with conflict between what is felt, believed, and heard. We try to use our experience, but we sense disparity. Our loss challenges our expectations and assumptions about life. We try to integrate our loss into our beliefs and values, but there are discrepancies. We are encouraged to heal, but there is no leverage. We lack knowledge about suicide and seek information.

 

Debilitation: Efforts to make sense of it all breakdown. We realize that we will never be the same. Hopes of healing wither. Our pain worsens with the first holidays,birthdays, and anniversary of our loss. Our emotional deterioration is aggravated by seeing that our loss may have been prevented by our action or that of others.

 

Depression: Our disaffection bottoms. The enormity of our loss creates a sense of powerlessness. Severe stress and pain peak and plateau. Interpersonal relationships become strained. We feel alienated from those who do not share our suffering. We lose many interests.

 

Desensitization: Our pain stops growing. It gives way to a dull interminable ache. We regain some energy. Our grief remains but at a lesser level of acuity. We become less passive in our grief, and display it less. Interests return or emerge, but not all come back. This is the chronic phase of our bereavement. We are regrouping emotionally.

 

Differentiation: We move to self-realization -- an understanding of who we are as a consequence of our loss. We grasp how we are different from who we used to be. Value and belief systems that once sustained us are altered. We are not healing because we cannot regain our former intactness.

Something will always be missing. We are moving to a new sense of self. This may be what Wrobleski means: "Things will never go back to the 'old normal;' grief means building a 'new normal'" (Suicide: Survivors - A Guide for Those Left Behind). This perspective is not a benchmark. There's no timeline. What I am trying to describe is not a linear process or a one-way trip. We may find ourselves in two or more phases simultaneously and we may recycle through various phases many times.