• Feel alone or abandoned.
• Feel powerless in the face of larger forces.
• Play the ‘what if?’ game in their head as they imagine ways in which the bereavement never happened.
• Scrabble for ‘solutions’, a new pet, a new career, new relationship.

All of which are natural. Being bereaved is natural and can be a healthy process, but we can become stuck in it and end up in an unhealthy state of bereavement.

Healthy bereavement and grief

It is natural to be sad when we lose someone or something. In a healthy bereavement journey a person experiences upsetting feelings and then reaches a point where they emotionally accept the change. This process of emotional acceptance may involve;

• Bereavement rituals; funeral, clearing out of unrequired materials.
• Emotional release, typically crying.
• Thinking and dreaming about the lost person (or whatever the loss maybe).
• Talking extensively with friends, family or a therapist about the loss.
• An active process of construction of a new, different, life.

Through these means emotional acceptance gradually grows. The bereaved person is likely to find that when they remember what they have lost it is with a gentle fondness. And these golden memories become a source of strength. However, for various reasons some people become stuck in bereavement.

Stuck in grief

When a person cannot process their grief, they often become stuck in it. There are a number of reasons why this would occur;

• They never had the chance to say a proper goodbye.
• Unfinished business. Things left unsaid, issues not resolved, etc.
• Fear of the power of the emotions or the instability which will be unlocked by admitting that their world has been changed.
• Other things going on in life which prevent functional processing, typically being too busy in one way or another to grieve.
• The inability to conceive of a new life.
• Pressuring, either from themselves or from wider society, to get over it, move on etc.

Any one of these could be a reason for a person to not be able to move from grief to emotional acceptance and the responses to them may be different.

How can therapy help?

There are a number of ways in which a therapist can help someone with grief;

• If the grief is recent the therapist can provide the supportive space to work through the various elements of that bereavement.
• They can facilitate the expression of trapped emotion.
• Provide the cushioning required to engage with powerful feelings.
• Help perceive what a new life might look like and address barriers to that.
• If grief rituals have been missed, they may help to develop ones that meet this need even though the traditional ones may no longer be available.

A therapist will listen to you and in so doing help to identify which elements of the bereavement experience have been missed, inhibited or interrupted in some way. Having done so they will look to help you move those areas forward.

The author

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapists in Birmingham (UK) with over 25 years experience. He is a member of both the NCH and BSCH.

The post Therapy for bereavement and grief appeared first on Matthew Krouwel Hypnotherapist.

Healthy jealousy

A small amount of Jealousy can be healthy as it motivates action to protect what we feel is ours. In a relationship, healthy jealousy may mean that we look to create moments of bonding. At work, it may mean we put a bit more effort in to guarantee we get that promotion.

Unhealthy jealousy

A strong sense of jealousy can result in behaviours that are counterproductive. People with strong relationship jealousy will often adopt controlling and demanding behaviours of their partner. These behaviours can take the form of;

• Demanding frequent ‘Check-ins’ when their partner is out.
• Monitoring their partners communications for incriminating evidence.
• Making threats, which can be anything from, “cheat on me and I’ll leave you” to “cheat on me and I’ll kill you” .
• Using pressuring language like “if you loved me…”.

In work situations this may result in behaviours such as;

• Sabotaging competitors at work.
• Bad mouthing colleagues or friends new friends.

All of which is bad for the partner but may also be bad for the jealous individual.

The consequences 

One of the most common outcomes of unhealthy jealous behaviours is to create the outcome they were attempting to avoid. In relationships this can result in;

• Partners feeling controlled.
• Partners feeling untrusted.
• Stress for the jealous partner.

At work;

• Being found out sabotaging colleagues.
• Colleagues getting a sense of them as an untrustworthy gossip and thus not becoming close with them.

These can then translate into behaviours which fuel the jealous partners insecurity as the non-jealous partner starts reacting to the pressure upon them. For example;

• A controlled partner may start finding ways to avoid and resist the control. Eventually the jealous partner will become aware of this and assume the partner is cheating on them and escalate things.
• The controlled partner may try to placate the jealous person. The jealous person will eventually notice that they are being placated, feel that this is fake behaviour and assume the person is hiding infidelity.
• The jealous persons own stress will tire them out making them more likely to fall prey to their own emotional tendencies.

All of these patterns, and there are many more, set up a cycle of perpetual escalation in the person who has unhealthy jealousy which can result in;

• A ruined relationship.
• Partner abuse.
• The physical symptoms of stress; hypertension, cognitive impairment, burnout, and many more.

Why do people develop unhealthy jealousy?

There are two primary reasons for a person developing unhealthy relationship jealousy;

1. An experience of being betrayed by a friend or cheated on by a partner.
2. Feeling unworthy in some respect of the partner or friend they have

Often both of these will be present.Career and work jealousy often follows similar developmental tendencies with past experiences of being overlooked and insecurity over their ability to get the role often present.

What can be done ?

As a therapist I see many people who are aware of their jealous tendencies and wish to address them. We work through their past relationship traumas, often with the aid of EMDR, and through the use of techniques like parts therapy, visualisations, hypnotic CBT and traditional hypnotic suggestions we look to give them an enhanced sense of personal safety.

The author

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapist based in Birmingham (UK) with over 25 years experience working with emotional, relationship and physical issues. he is a member of the BSCH and NCH 

The post What is jealousy ? appeared first on Matthew Krouwel Hypnotherapist.