The emotion of grief is not the same in every person. We think of people grieving as a normal process of anguish when a person has died or when some loss has occurred. Some people grieve for the loss of a valued person. These people may question whether they did enough to help or rescue the person who died.
Yet other people who experience loss grieve for themselves. They may even be angry with the deceased person for leaving them. They may also feel victimized by the inconvenience of losing another. Actual sadness may be absent or less intense in such people.
Do not assume another person’s grief means the same as your own grief. Ask questions to learn why and what another person experiences when he or she shows grief.
We therapist sometimes lose track of ‘start where the client is’ and, the fallible human beings that we are, interject our own interpretation. This is an important reminder from Christine Adams to avoid these assumptions …
Thanks for your comment. These are assumptions or projections we all make. But we fare better if we can avoid doing so.