Though painful, grief is an important step in the healing process that must happen after a loss. Grief is experienced by different people in different ways. Men and women are often taught to deal with emotions differently. Women are traditionally more expressive, while men often show less emotion, especially the emotions of sadness and fear. However, each person is unique and each feels losses in his or her own way.
Some people find it helpful to understand grief as happening in four emotional stages.
The order and length of these stages may vary with each individual. Some stages may be experienced more than once, while not everyone experiences all four stages. Numbness, shock and denial usually happen immediately Following the loss. At this time, a person may feel that the loss did not actually occur. In addition, an individual may feel like a spectator rather than a participant in their own life.