Baby Boomers Guide to Mourning Depression: The Long, Dark Tunnel of Stage Four Grief

20 Sep Baby Boomers Guide to Mourning Depression: The Long, Dark Tunnel of Stage Four Grief

Kubler Ross: Stages of Grief

Elderly Problems by Boomeryearbook.com

Stage four of grieving is the worst. For the person who is suffering through the grieving process, stage four involves mourning for the person who is gone and sometimes sinking into a deep depression as the loss is faced up to and seen as something that cannot be fixed.

Baby boomers are demonstrably enthusiastic people; a generation famous for its ability to embrace change. Grieving, however, can present a challenge in this respect. Oftentimes, when people make a long term commitment to a partner, they believe it is for life and the possibility of death does not often enter into the equation. Nobody enters a marriage or long term relationship on the basis of it continuing up to the end of life and then stopping abruptly. Most baby boomers do not even think about the possibility of defeat and therefore contemplating death is a defeatist attitude.

For such people, death can represent a final failure to achieve. Long term lovers who have spent an entire lifetime together can sometimes fall apart when presented with the inevitability of the permanent separation brought by death.

As the knowledge of death sinks in, depression can be a feature of the grieving process and cause friends and family the most discomfort as they try to deal with a person who determinedly refuses to be jollied out of a dark mood.

The symptoms of depression are easy enough to recognize. For someone who has achieved success in giving up drinking or smoking, they might resume the habit to the annoyance of everyone around them. Many baby boomers are retired so are able all too easily to give up hobbies and pastimes and fall into a routine of lying in bed until late morning.

Some grieving baby boomers roam around the house all day in their pyjamas and bathrobe, watching TV and avoiding anyone who might want to cheer them out of their depression. The fact is they do not want to be cheered up; they do not want to start leading their life again: they want to be left alone!

So what do you do about someone in this stage of grieving? It depends on the person. Most psychologists will allow a period of ‘wallowing’ but if it continues for too long, the effects can be hard to reverse. There is no doubt that the depression is an intrinsic part of grieving and is a recognized stage of the process.

Some people in a depression will simply slouch about the house feeling gloomy for a while; others will physically harm themselves in the depths of depression. There is little doubt that this stage of the grieving process requires professional intervention if it continues for too long.

As the fourth and unhappy stage of grieving comes to an end, the light at the end of the long, dark tunnel is the fifth stage, which represents a healthy moving on and a clean up after death and the stages of the grieving process.

The Psychological Article on Depression: The Long, Dark Tunnel of Stage Tour Grief is part of Boomer Yearbook’s continuing series of baby boomers psychological coaching tips and how to alleviate elderly problems. We believe knowledge is power. We’d love to hear what you think.

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