Feeling Stuck? You Might Have a Case of Constipated Grief

Constipated grief might sound gross, but I use it to describe how an internal blockage from avoided grief can become a real barrier to growth and progress in people’s lives. In my therapy practice, I see this “condition” all the time. Whenever a loss occurs, or even upsetting or traumatic life events, it needs to be fully processed. If the grief goes untouched or unacknowledged, it gets stuck, which can look all kinds of ways: feeling unable to move on from a relationship, angry outbursts that are hard to explain, feeling frozen and unsure about next steps in life, or struggling with decision making, among many others.

So What is Grief Really Anyways?

Grief is one of the most misunderstood experiences in our culture. Perhaps the biggest misconception is that grief only happens after experiencing death. Grief can occur around any form of loss: the end of a relationship, miscarriage, trauma, regret, abandonment, and even what I like to call “necessary losses,” which are the things you must leave behind in order to grow.

So what does it even mean to have or experience grief when it can come from so many sources? It first means figuring out how to tolerate and grapple with some sadness. I frequently see in my therapy practice how tough it is for folks to really allow for their sadness. Sadness can be a destabilizing emotion. People fear it will consume them, make them unable to function, or be “too much” for the people around them. In therapy, I can be the stable base for my clients so that it can feel safe to be sad without it being too much for me or worrying that I might show my difficulty tolerating their sadness by immediately trying to fix it. When the sadness has passed, it makes space for perspective, insight, and integrating the experience so one can truly move forward.

What Happens When Grief Gets Stuck?

When grief gets stuck, it means that someone is stuck in the earlier stages of grief: denial (not wanting to acknowledge the loss or its significance), anger (protecting more vulnerable inward feelings by choosing an outward target), and bargaining (forming a belief that had you done something differently, the loss would not have occurred).

Bargaining can be particularly sticky because often these “bargains” are created by fear and shame around a core belief a person has about themselves. For example, a bargaining thought could be, “I would have finished my degree like everyone else if I hadn’t been such a screw up and partied all the time.” This bargain could be based on that person’s fear that they aren’t smart enough and partying was a distraction from actually applying themselves to the task and facing potential failure. All of this can be buried beneath the shame that person feels about not being good enough and perhaps not capable of success.

While what I’ve just described is someone’s innerworkings, they’re likely not consciously aware without help from a therapist that this is what’s happening. On the surface, this person might find their way into my office because they’re experiencing panic attacks or indecision about the next phase of their life.

So How Do You Move Forward?

After we’ve found the grief, together we can look at where it got stuck and not only have space for sadness, but also untangle how it got stuck around an earlier wound. Like in the example of the person who feels shame around not completing college, we would spend time in therapy with how they developed the idea that they’re incapable of success.

Once there has been space for the feelings around those wounds and some healing, there can be an opportunity for integration, which I believe to be a more accurate final stage of grief than acceptance. I don’t philosophically believe “everything happens for a reason,” but I do believe that when we can accept all of our experiences, even painful ones, as parts of ourselves, we have the choice to create the meaning we want to keep from those experiences. In my opinion, the most powerful way forward is through keeping what we want from our painful moments and releasing what we don’t need to keep holding.