Coping with grief and loss in the long term
While grief is a natural and necessary response to loss, it can be a long, heart-wrenching journey that can impact every area of your life. Even when you feel like you’ve worked through the most intense emotions, it’s completely normal for difficult thoughts and feelings to come up from time to time.
Having realistic expectations around your healing process can help you navigate the ups, downs, and unexpected twists and turns with a bit more ease.
When grieving, it’s important to:
- Be kind and patient with yourself
- Remind yourself that things will feel better with time
- Allow yourself to feel both happiness and sadness without guilt
- Acknowledge the challenges of your journey and celebrate your strengths.
Wherever you are on your journey, keep in mind that ‘healing’ doesn’t mean forgetting or letting go. It’s about finding ways to accept the loss, cherishing memories, and allowing yourself to continue living your life. For example, using the TEAR process to work through your grief.
Remember - you’re allowed to experience genuine happiness while grieving. Experiencing joy in your day-to-day life doesn’t diminish your loss or love; you deserve to feel joy at any point in your journey.
On this page, you’ll find information on coping with grief in the long term and tips for finding support.
Scroll down to learn more.
Tips for coping with grief
As you continue on with life, it’s natural for your grief to come up in certain situations, with specific people, milestones, or during holidays. For example, leading up to a significant anniversary, you might find yourself feeling a deep sadness, experiencing anxiety, or struggling to sleep.
Reminders of loss can appear unexpectedly. While many grief triggers are tied to places, events, or objects connected to your loss - like a visit to a cemetery, a birthday, a certain song, or the smell of perfume - it’s also normal for feelings of grief to arise without a clear reason. If your loss involves trauma, grief triggers may lead to flashbacks, nightmares, or panic attacks.
On top of learning and leaning on strategies for managing emotions, it can be helpful to explore coping strategies like the ones suggested below.
- Revisit the TEAR grieving process
Remember, grieving is a process and it doesn’t have a fixed timeline. It’s normal to need to revisit the TEAR grieving process.
The most important thing is that you’re being patient and compassionate with yourself as you navigate your grief journey.
- Lean on a support network
- Explore therapy options
- Find healthy outlets for expressing your emotions on an ongoing basis
- Honour the memory of who (or what) you lost
- Find hope through stories of others
When to reach out for professional support
If you feel like your grief is impacting your daily life, relationships, or mental and physical health, it’s important to reach out for help.
You can:
- Book an appointment with a GP and ask about getting a Mental Health Treatment Plan to access subsidised professional mental health therapies
- Speak with a counsellor from support services like Griefline, Beyond Blue, or Relationships Australia.
- Contact Lifeline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week via 13 11 14, text, and chat to speak with a crisis supporter
- If life is in danger, call 000.
In the article below, you can learn tips for finding the therapist that's right for you.
Seeking help is a brave and positive step.
Click here to learn more about support services that can help with grief and loss.
