Fight for Your Right to Mourn | griefministerdotcom

In a?grief support group.? The session has already begun.

Beverly was beaming and seemed to be impatient as she waited for her turn to share the news of her past week between sessions with other members of the grief support group.? Beverly had come to the group three months after the death of her 79 year old mother Ellen. Her mother had died after a long struggle with Alzheimer?s Disease.? Beverly, an only child, had been her mother?s caregiver for almost six years.

Beverly moved forward and nodded her head as I said her name and asked how her past week had been.? ?I have had a very hard week, but a good one.? Remember last week how you said that we have the need to grieve our loved one, and we don?t need anyone else?s permission to do so??

?Right.? All mourners have the need to remember and memorialize their loved one on a continuing basis,? I replied.

?Well, last week I remembered what you had said because my husband had forbidden me to come to this group at all.? He thinks that the best way for me to deal with my mother?s death is to grieve briefly and get over it,? Beverly said her lips tightening and her face becoming red with anger.

?My husband had even told me after we came home from the funeral three months ago that I had six weeks to grieve and that he didn?t want to hear any more about my mother after that,? said Ellen?s only child.? She continued with determination in her voice, ?Well, I told him last week that he had no right to tell me to never mention my mother again.? I told him that I still loved her, missed her and needed to keep her memory alive. I told him I didn?t need his permission to come to the support group and grieve for my mother in a healthy way.? That?s what I told him.? And he hasn?t been on my case about my mother since then.??

Beverly smiled at the group.? All of us sat in awe and silence as we witnessed a turning point in our fellow mourner?s grief journey.? As a counselor I had known and stated the right and need to express grief to hundreds of clients.? I had never realized until Beverly was in my group that sometimes as a mourner you have to fight for your right to mourn your loss.

Our death denying culture continues to send the message to mourners that the healthiness of an individual?s grief is to be measured by how quickly and proficiently the mourner ?gets over? the loss and moves into a productive life.?

The average leave for bereavement in the business world is three days.? THREE DAYS of leave are allowed only if the person who died is a member of the employee?s immediate family.? If a grandparent, aunt, uncle, other distant family member or friend dies, no official bereavement leave is given.? The mourner takes vacation days or time off without pay for those losses.? ?Prolonged? grief and lowered productivity beyond a specific ?normal and acceptable grief? period in the workplace are often seen as malingering, pathological and a reason for termination.

Mourners have the right to remember and express grief in a healthy, healing way for a loved one who has died without having to face the judgment or ridicule of others or a society?that doesn?t seem to understand death, dying or bereavement.? Grief is overflowing love for a person no longer physically present.? That love needs to be expressed as grief in order for person to progress in the grief journey.

Grief is not a mental or emotional disorder or an?illness?to be diagnosed or medicated out of existence.? Grief is not a bad attitude or perspective that needs to be changed, fixed or corrected.? Grief is a natural transition that all human beings experience after the death of a loved one.? Why can?t society?simply let?those who have lost a loved one to death?mourn and heal no matter how long it takes?

From (c) 2011, Larry M. Barber, LPC-S, CT in ?Love Never Dies: Embracing Grief with Hope and Promise? Available on http://grief-works.org/book.php. Also available on Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, and your local bookstore. Available now for Nook and Kindle.

Watch the Love Never Dies YouTube video http://youtu.be/-T0zt0ZSsNE. Follow me on Twitter @griefminister01.

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Director, GriefWorks & CounselingWorks Licensed Professional Counselor Certified in Thanatology (Study of Death, Dying & Bereavement) by The Association of Death Education and Counseling Member, International Christian Coaching Association Watch the Love Never Dies YouTube video http://youtu.be/-T0zt0ZSsNE

Source: http://griefminister.com/2012/03/11/fight-for-your-right-to-mourn/

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