What is the Bargaining Stage of Grief?

Your feelings of grief may feel like they grow or shrink in intensity over time. The process of overcoming grief isn’t linear, and you may feel you are moving between the five stages of grief which can be challenging and exhausting, to say the least. However, as a memorial jewellery brand, we believe it can become just a little bit easier when you know more about grief and understand the key phases you are likely to experience.

5 Stages of Grief

There are five known stages of grief, according to Elisabeth Kübler-Ross:

● Denial

● Anger

● Bargaining

● Depression

● Acceptance

In this post, we will discuss the complex bargaining stage of grief in more detail, but you can learn about the other stages of grief in our previous post What Are The Stages of Grief.

The Bargaining Stage of Grief

After the initial shock and anger, you will enter the bargaining stage of grief will likely cause complex feelings of hyperactivity, guilt and overthinking.

Before the depression stage of grief, the bargaining stage will occur as your mind tries to regulate and define your feelings. Your mind will use this stage how to decide to proceed into the last two phases of grief.

In this stage of grief, you may struggle to accept the loss and come to terms with the reality of how this affects your life. You may relive the scenario that caused your grief and attempt to review what happened and think about what could have happened. However, you may also experience helplessness as you understand your lack of control over the situation.

Past and Present Bargaining

The bargaining phase will vary depending on the situation causing your grief.

You may bargain with the present and try to force yourself to act a certain way to prevent further loss or even make a deal with a higher force to attempt to regain control and limit the damages.

You can also bargain with the past and go over ‘what if’ scenarios in your head or with others.

Symptoms of the Bargaining Stage

● Guilt and feelings of responsibility or that you let others down

● Insecurity or anxiousness

● Playing over ‘what if’ scenarios

● Self-sabotage, punishment or self-destructive behaviours

● Attempting to predict the future and act to prevent future loss from occurring

● Comparing your grief to others’ grief or your feelings of grief in the past.

How long Does the Bargaining Stage Last?

This stage of grief looks different for everyone. It will be very situational dependent as, by nature, the bargaining phase may result in you deciding what you or others should have done differently to prevent the loss. Therefore, you can not expect to predict how long this stage of grief will last, and you may even experience this stage more than once before moving into the acceptance phase.

How to Cope With the Bargaining Stage of Grief

We also have some articles on our Inscripture website to help you cope with grief, find bereavement support and help others with grief and offer suggestions on commemorating a loved one with them. For example, you can also gift them a piece of Photo Jewellery or Handwriting Jewellery to help them cope with their loss. Many people often find that the jewellery helps them remember that they have people to turn to when they are in the darkest places of their grief.