? Isn’t that possible?
“Can’t I believe this happened to me?
? Can’t that be true?
“Did I ever imagine it?
“Am I not prepared for this?
? Are you wrong?
“When I get home, are you going to tell me it didn’t happen?
? Don’t leave me now
These thoughts and many others come to mind when we have just heard the worst news, in the face of a death, a disaster, an accident, an attack?
In fact, these thoughts are mechanisms of protection of our psyche, in situations that we cannot bear, that we did not expect and, therefore, we were not willing to accept.
It is denial; is nature’s way of protecting itself from excessive pain and suffering from loss. It’s an adaptive strategy that helps us cope with the situation to survive and measure impact and pain.
Denial is necessary, because we save time to assimilate reality gradually, at doses acceptable to our psyche, this allows us to survive in a world full of unexpected changes, facts and circumstances that we never imagined and for which we would never be prepared.
In turn, with denial we enter the first stage of the grieving process, where other stages occur that help us continue to recognize pain until we overcome it and accept it. .
Along with denial, anger and revolt, we seek someone to blame for what happened, as if it were a negotiation, through which we would do anything to change reality. Sadness and emptiness in the face of loss continue, and finally acceptance allows us to get on with our lives. Even with regret, we accept that this is a reality and that we must continue to live.
Since grief necessarily involves going through the different stages, it is important to know that denial is the first to go out, and to continue with others to overcome the pain and suffering of loss.
If this is not the case and we are stuck in denial, it becomes an inadequate mechanism that will paralyze us in the past, preventing us from resuming present life. By not accepting reality and immersing ourselves in limited suffering, we can find ourselves in a mood disorder.
Hence the importance of living each stage of grief, starting with denial and culminating in the incorporation into the new life, into the new reality, accepting the fact that occurred, making suffering and pain disappear.