How the Grief Pathfinder System Is Different

When people think about grief, they often think about the five stages of grief. These stages were written up by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross in her 1969 book, On Death & Dying. These five stages (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) were first written for individuals facing a terminal diagnosis and were never meant to be considered a linear path. And yet, here we are with these stages taught in psychology courses and most practitioners thinking that they are the only way through grief.

The five stages are helpful, but they are not the be-all, end all- to grief. And, they have by many reports been over applied. I prefer an approach that respects where you are and where you are going without the limitations of only having five stages and of thinking you can only move in one direction through them. The truth is, there are a vast number of emotions that you may feel when you lose a pet or know you are going to lose a pet and you may feel any of them or all of them at once or none at all.

The second issue I find with the stages of grief is that they imply a time when your grief is healed, when you no longer feel sadness at the loss of a pet. Though our grief changes and can lessen with time, I think it’s fair to say that most people, even a decade or more after the loss will still feel some amount of sorrow at the loss of a loved one. I don’t say this to discourage you, and I don’t say this to try and dismiss the other work that’s done. Instead, our lives change. Grief becomes a part of our life, and we learn to companion it.

This is where the grief pathfinder system can really be helpful. Instead of looking at grief as a series of steps to “get through” to find an other side, the grief pathfinder system helps you to discover what the other side of grief might look like and how you can find it, even when you are in the midst of grieving.

The grief pathfinder system doesn’t tell you that you have to “get over” grief or that it is something you need to suppress or ignore. The grief pathfinder system tells you that it is okay to grieve, that it is perfectly normal, and that you can thrive even while you are grieving and it might not feel like it.

My focus is on you, your relationship to your pet, and what you would like to remember and even take away from your relationship with your pet. What did your pet teach you? What qualities did you enjoy in yourself and in your pet? What would you like to remember? It is those things which will signpost your path with grief and this is how the pet grief pathfinder system differs from the five stages of grief.