Psychodynamic therapy and its role in breaking the cycle of grief

Losing someone we love is one of the most devastatingly painful events that we can go through in life, and sometimes it feels that we are trapped, unable to move on. Indeed, if this huge loss has been complicated by factors such as a difficult relationship with the lost loved one, or by the fact that we also suffered other losses at a very young age which we were not able to fully process, then we can feel stuck in a very painful cycle which can seep into all parts of our life, making the day to day very difficult to bear.

Quite often, what has happened is that the mourning process which we need to go through in order to readjust to not having that person in our exterior worlds anymore, has not been able to be completed. When this occurs, we need help to untangle the knots that are blocking the grieving process, so we can uncover buried thought processes and emotions that lay trapped and begin to grieve and slowly the pain can begin to subside, making the world less alien to us again.

Healing from the inside out, with the help of the right therapist for us-  somebody who makes us feel listened to, not judged and who can help us to find the words for emotions that we have never felt fully able to feel or express-  can help us to feel lighter, and less weighed down by something that has been difficult to define. Unknown emotions, which we have unconsciously locked away because we have felt that they were too painful to acknowledge, can often dictate our thoughts and behaviours without us realising, creating negative cycles and difficult relationships with others and their repression can even lead to physical symptoms such as headaches, insomnia, backache and addiction.

Having a skilled, empathetic therapist to help us construct a narrative about our grief, allows us to construct a new internal relationship with our lost loved one, in turn releasing our body from some of the stress that it has been enduring as well as giving us the space and energy to focus more on the present. Psychodynamic therapy also aims to equip the client with the tools they need to be able to navigate the world in the future, when, as life often dictates, more losses might occur so that they feel more robust and more able to process their emotions and therefore, it truly can be life-changing and very long-lasting.

Sometimes, people do not feel ready to unlock what lies below the surface, but when they do, psychodynamic therapy can be very helpful in breaking the cycle of grief that they feel trapped, profoundly affecting the relationship that they have with not only themselves but with everyone else in their life too. When we are able to heal what has felt so broken inside us, obsessive, obtrusive thoughts that often plague those trapped in grief and which can paralyse them from living in the present, start to dissipate and the energy that we have been using to just keep our heads above water so that we can cope with our daily lives, can now be freed and used to start connecting with life again.