The death of a loved one is one of the most heartbreaking experiences and sometimes we may need help to get through it. As much as death is part of the life chain, we are never sufficiently prepared to lose a person we love. Pain is inevitable and natural, as natural as overcoming grief after a while. If that doesn’t happen, if you can’t get over the death of a loved one, a psychologist can help you. As? In this article we tell you.
How to get over the death of a loved one
- Logically, you need time to get over the loss of a loved one and that time varies for each person. What does not vary and what all people need is to go through the mourning period in all its phases. A duel that can become as painful as the loss itself and in which you run the risk of stagnating.
- When a loved one dies, you will go through different phases such as denial when that death seems impossible or unreal. Anger at the injustice of being left without that person you love. The negotiation trying that this death never happened. Depression when emptiness overwhelms you and you see that the days go by without that person by your side. And acceptance of what happened. This is when you realize you have to get your life back on track.
- All these stages or phases of mourning are usually accompanied by the worst enemy when it comes to overcoming that duel or the loss itself: the feeling of guilt. First the guilt because each and every one of us thinks that we could have done something to prevent that death. And then the guilt for making an effort to resume our lives, to smile, to move on without that person, to be happy without that person.
- There is a moment when grief becomes pathological and you cannot get out of it. It is then when you have to seek the help of a psychologist, who is the professional who can best help you overcome the death of a loved one.
Why you need a psychologist to overcome grief
- Maybe you resist going to the psychologist thinking about the many people who have lost their loved ones and have not needed help to overcome it. Why are you going to need it? Do not get entangled looking for the reasons or looking at comparisons, because if you are installed in a pathological duel, the only thing you have to worry about is your health.
- And how do you know if you are in that blockade in which you will not be able to overcome the death of a loved one without help? A complicated duel that needs the help of a psychologist is observed when a few months have passed since the death and the feelings of sadness, anger, guilt and helplessness continue to cause a great emotional impact.
- It can also be pathological mourning when you feel unable to perform your daily functions, when you regularly see or even talk to the deceased person, when you have intrusive and obsessive thoughts about that person or about death. And when the very idea of getting over that death and recovering makes you feel bad because you think you don’t have the right to enjoy life.
- It is then that you can be sure that you should ask for the help of a psychologist to avoid settling into grief and depression. The psychologist is that professional specialist in emotions and in the human mind. There are no pills to overcome the death of a loved one, it is a personal job in which you face your emotions face to face. And to pain.
- The psychologist’s task to help you overcome grief is to teach you to identify your feelings in the face of loss and reposition them in your emotional universe. It also helps you to accept death by seeing reality from a less painful perspective and to adapt to this new life in which the deceased person is absent.
- You will not have to forget that loved one, you will have to relocate him in your world, leave him a privileged place in your memory. With the help of the psychologist, their absence will not determine your life, you will learn to manage the feeling of guilt and you will realize the right you have to be happy and enjoy your life without implying a lack of loyalty to the memory of that person.
Appropriate psychological therapies for overcoming a duel
It will be the psychologist who determines which therapy is the most appropriate for overcoming a duel, because each person receives the different techniques in a different way. But it is true that in psychology there is the so-called Grief Therapy that is designed for losses.
Grief therapy
It is specially designed to treat complicated and pathological duels. The psychologist will work with you on feelings, thoughts and memories so that you see death from a position of acceptance and not as a traumatic event that you have to carry forever.
Strategic Brief Therapy
It focuses precisely on the problem to be dealt with, in this case the grieving process. The psychologist helps you understand that the pain you feel is inevitable, but that you have to transform it, let it out, express it so that it doesn’t stay inside. With this therapy you will be able to live with the memory of the deceased person in a positive way and in some cases these memories become a motivational engine in life.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
- It is the most widely used therapy in psychology and is also effective in cases of complicated grief. The psychologist helps you to transform the thoughts that do not allow you to advance by other more useful ones. And he will also give you the tools to change behavior resulting from death. Hand in hand with the psychologist you will gently reach acceptance and he will provide you with all the tools you need to move forward on your own.
- A psychologist, whatever therapy you choose, will provide you with the resources you need to restore emotional balance after such a significant loss. It also makes you feel accompanied and understood at such a difficult time and can prevent you from falling into a life crisis. But above all, it will help you understand, express and manage that hurricane of emotions that causes the death of a loved one.
- The emotional exhaustion caused by the death of a loved one is important and places you in a state of certain vulnerability. For this reason, it is important that, for the moment, you put yourself in the hands of a psychology professional and stay away from alternative therapies. You will have time to try other things when you are psychologically stronger.
- And above all, stay away from gurus who promise to overcome grief with mysterious magic formulas and to develop your most spiritual side at this time. Decide to improve your emotional state at this delicate moment and later you can, if you want, investigate your spiritual abilities.
- And you? Have you gone to a psychologist to overcome a duel? Tell us about your experience in the comments and help other readers.
