Grief Reaction Solicitors - Accident Compensation Claim Lawyers

If you have been injured in an accident and you want to make a compensation claim for personal injury and loss just complete the contact form, email our lawyers offices or use the solicitor's helpline. Our grief reaction solicitors offer legal advice at no cost without further obligation. If our grief reaction solicitors deal with your claim it will be on a no win no fee basis, compensation is paid in full and you do not have to fund or finance your compensation claim.

Grief Reaction

Grief reactions are also called grieving or bereavement. Grief reactions are normal reactions to loss or death of a loved one. Any kind of loss can contribute to grief reactions or bereavement and what some people grieve over, others do not. Grief can occur due to a loss of a job or having an illness for which there is no cure or having a chronic condition that affects a person's life quality. If you have a significant relationship that ends, you may also have a grief reaction. Grief itself is a painful and unhappy emotion.

Grief is felt differently by different people. There are, however, common stages in the process of grieving that begins with recognizing the loss the person is experiencing and continues through different stages until the person accepts the loss. Depending on the circumstances of the loss or death, the grief responses will be different. For example, if the death was somewhat expected, as in a chronic illness, the person's suffering will be believed to have come to an end and there may be some relief within the grieving process. If the death was accidental, violent or unexpected, it may take longer to come to a stage of acceptance.

Most people recognize five stages of grief. They do not necessarily occur in the same order and not everyone has each stage of the grieving reaction. The important thing is to recognize that they exist and to know when you're in a specific stage. The stages of grief include:

• Denial, numbness and disbelief - you do not accept that death has occurred or the loss has occurred and you may feel that the whole thing is unreal. The feeling of being unreal is very common.
• Anger, blaming others - the anger can be at no one but God or at no one in particular or it can be at the doctors who failed to save the person's life. Anger and blaming can be at just about anything related to the loss or death.
• Bargaining - you often bargain with God or with others to try and get you out of the grief. If you are a smoker, for example, you may say that if you are cured of the cancer, you will never smoke again. You believe this and cling to it as a way of getting through the grief.
• Depression, sadness and crying - you are overwhelmed by the loss and can think of nothing else. You cry frequently and are sad much of the time.
• Acceptance or coming to terms - you are in the final stages of accepting a loss and you begin to go on with your life, knowing that the loss is in the past and you can live even though it has happened to you.

Common symptoms of a grieving reaction include crying spells, mood swings, lack of productivity, trouble sleeping and problems with interpersonal relationships.

The doctor or psychiatrist can diagnose a grieving reaction by talking to you, doing a physical examination and doing a Beck depression scale that can see how depressed you are as a result of the loss.

The treatment of grieving reactions includes talk therapy with a psychotherapist to try and come to terms with the loss. Some people need antidepressants, sleep medication or anxiety medication to come to a better state. Other people to talk to include self help groups, clergy and social workers. They tend to help best in the first, acute phase of grief reactions, which lasts about 2 months. Milder symptoms can occur for up to a year or more. Some people need psychological counseling for a long period of time, especially if they can't get through all the stages of the grief reaction.

Support groups are very helpful in grief reactions. They help you overcome the stress of grieving and help you through the stages of grieving. The members of the support group are often at different stages of grieving but share common experiences with you and your problems. It can take up to a year or longer to overcome strong feelings of depression, grief and sadness but it does eventually happen.

Complications of grief reactions include problems with your physical health, depression and alcohol or drug abuse. Grief that lasts for more than two months and is severe may mean that you have an underlying depressive disorder that needs medical treatment. Antidepressants are prescribed in such cases.

Grief Reaction Solicitors

If you have suffered physically, mentally or financially, you should consider making an accident compensation claim. For telephone advice at no cost from specialist personal injury solicitors just call the helpline. Our grief reaction solicitors will assess the strength of your claim and will advise you on your potential award of compensation without any further obligation.

The author of the substantive medical writing on this website is Dr. Christine Traxler MD whose biography can be read here