Years ago, when I ran grief groups the Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy way, many people who came wondered if I would ever do it again. Due to the recent rash of overdose deaths, I would like to use the Swiss-American psychiatrist Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. In her famous book, “On Death and Dying,” she identified the five stages of grief. Here are her stages and my interpretations.

≤ Denial: Father Joseph Martin, in his famous lectures states that denial is simply “spiritual anesthesia.” It is our way of being numbed to the shock of death. We refuse to accept the devastating fact of death, so we are not devastated also. At this time, many going through grief drink more, shop more, consult psychics with the idea they can speak to the dead, isolate more and do a multitude of other irrational beliefs based on little evidence of facts. One of the major thinking issues is, “God gives and God can also take away.” This is based upon faith and can keep grieving people in denial until they move through the denial.

In groups, people must decide to talk to the living people in their group, that are experiencing the same thoughts and feelings that they are. This is not easy and takes patience and courage to trust others with their thoughts and feelings about denial. Mourning death requires that we accept the truth of human finitude.

Anger: Anger is a natural response to grief. If the person who is angry at God, the deceased, people that “don’t understand,” doctors, nurses, counselors, dwell on this point 100%, healing becomes irrational and counterproductive. Somehow, we have been taught to believe what no scripture ever taught us: that anything short of a long, healthy, happy life is a betrayal by God. God gets a bad rap often for not answering prayers from demanding people that feel they have to “control” everything. Death is the greatest test of faith for a believer. Believers know that the only spiritual antidote to grief is hope and the only source of hope is heaven and the only reason to believe in heaven is God. Whether we believe in heaven or the worms, all of us mourn basically the same way.

Another object of anger is our loved one. Our loved one has left us and we are angry at our abandonment. We loved them and needed them and now they are gone. In some cases, they left us because of bad choices, in other cases bad luck or illness.

Bargaining: Bargaining takes two different forms. Before death, bargaining takes the form of “spiritual bribery.” We offer to do anything if God will let our loved one live. After death, bargaining takes the form of guilt. We need to know, and we can never know, if we could have done something to avoid the death of our loved one. We believe that some action on our part could have prevented death. The frightening fact is that this could be true and the word “if” only could freeze us. The last words at funerals are “God has given and God has taken away.” Many times, grieving people just don’t want to hear this.

Depression: The fact that death is final and forever sinks into us and all our denials, anger and bargaining cannot change this fact and two reactions can occur: we can give up or we can move on. These are not earth-shattering ideas, but what one is willing to do to move on is. Acceptance is moving on. The level of depression is directly related to the level of love we had for the loved one. The stress level can equal 100% stress.

I can relate to this because of the death of my brother Jerry in 1968 and my first wife at childbirth in 1972. My image of my depression following these deaths was that I was like a cork driven under water by a wave. I could not breathe, but I believed in the love of God and spirituality that kept me alive. My behavior at this time didn’t always reflect what I believed in. I got through it, not over it. I remember using AA slogans, like “one day at a time,” such as “I can’t breathe today, but maybe I will be able to breathe tomorrow.” Then after awhile I woke up and was able to breathe again.

When you’re looking for help, check out who people say is someone to see. Therapists with compassion, yet who have discipline and truth. You will get a feeling if these mental health experts know what they are dealing with or not. If it’s not, dump them and keep looking. You do not need to be messed up more by irrational thinking and treatment.

Acceptance: There is no end to memory, but there is an end to mourning. That can be less than a year or more than a lifetime. There are signs when you begin to heal that are hidden, but real. Acceptance has come when we can smile again, tell a joke again; be in love and make love again and dance again; love an animal again and serve others beyond yourself again. Acceptance does not mean that things are OK again. It simply means that we can live with the way things are now and forever without punishing ourselves.

I’ve had clients that were up to two quarts of vodka per day, who simply gave up. Then I’ve had clients that adopted the slogan “no pain, no gain.” They went through the pain and guess what? They got better and came back to life.

In recovery I have used these five ideas of Kubler-Ross for dealing with their chemical dependency. I’ll give you an example:

When someone is diagnosed with either alcohol dependence or drug dependence, the initial reaction is denial, then anger. Statements like, “I don’t drink or drug that much and these counselors are stupid” and on and on. Next when they are told that they must abstain, (the way it used to be) they begin to bargain with statements like, “OK, I won’t use heroin, but just smoke a little weed.” This type of bargaining never works and before long they are back shooting heroin. Following this step is depression by many, being unable to imagine a life without alcohol or other drugs. Overdoses and suicide are very prevalent at this time because of being unable to understand how they are able to replace their chemical use. Finally similar to the acceptance of death, they may get into a program (AA, counseling) that helps them understand that chemicals are not for them. This isn’t easy but is doable. As the program of AA states, “You are going to find a new way of living. You won’t shut the door on the past, but you won’t dwell on it. To thine own self be true.”

Mike Tramuta has been a counselor for more than 30 years. Call 983-1592 for more information.