The loss of a partner is a cataclysmic event that leaves the world feeling fractured and unfamiliar. In the disorienting aftermath, we naturally crave a map - a way to navigate the thick fog of sorrow. For more than half a century, that map has been the 'five stages of grief'.
Born from psychiatrist Dr Elisabeth Kübler-Ross's 1969 book On Death and Dying, the model of Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance has become the cultural shorthand for bereavement. We see it in films, hear it referenced in doctors' surgeries, and perhaps most damagingly, we use it as an invisible ruler to measure our own progress through pain.
But is it time to tear up the map?
Karen Sutton is the UK's first dedicated Widow Coach and knows the devastating world of widowhood only too well after losing her husband Simon ten years ago, when she was just 39. With two young children to raise and an overwhelming sense of grief and loneliness, Karen experienced the raw pain of loss firsthand and believes our cultural obsession with grief 'stages' might be doing more harm than good to the vulnerable and newly bereaved.
'The five stages weren't actually designed for the bereaved,' Karen explains. 'They were observed in patients facing their own terminal diagnoses. When we apply them as a prescriptive, step-by-step guide for those left behind, we create a sense of a right and a wrong way to grieve. And in the depths of widowhood, the very last thing you need is the feeling that you're somehow failing at grief.'
The 'five stages of grief' can make people feel as if they are doing things 'wrong', says Karen Sutton.
The appeal of the Kübler-Ross model is easy to understand. When your entire life has been upended, the idea that you are simply in the 'Anger' phase provides a fragile sense of order. It suggests that if you just keep going, you will eventually reach the comforting finish line: 'Acceptance'.
However, as Karen knows, real-life grief is rarely so polite. 'Grief is messy, circular, and utterly unpredictable,' she says. 'You might feel a sense of acceptance one Tuesday morning, only to be floored by white-hot anger or soul-crushing denial by lunchtime. To expect a straight line is to set yourself up for failure and confusion.'
When we take these stages too literally, we begin to judge ourselves harshly. Why am I still so sad? I thought I'd passed the bargaining stage? Did I skip anger altogether? This internal critic adds a heavy layer of shame to an already unbearable burden.
Furthermore, friends and family, often well-meaning but fundamentally uncomfortable with the enduring nature of loss, use these stages as a ticking clock. They may wonder why a widow isn't 'further along' or interpret her ongoing pain not as love, but as being 'stuck'.
If the five stages are too restrictive and prescriptive, how should we view the shifting landscape of loss? Karen points to alternative models that offer a far more compassionate and realistic perspective.
The first is Lois Tonkin's concept of Growing Around Grief. The traditional view suggests that grief is a circle that should get smaller over time until it eventually vanishes (the mythical 'closure'). Tonkin argued the opposite: the grief remains the same size, but you grow bigger around it.
'I love this because it honours the love,' Karen says. 'Your loss doesn't shrink; you simply build a bigger life. You learn to carry it. You find new hobbies, new friends, and new joys, but the core of that loss remains a part of your landscape. It isn't something to get over, but something to integrate.'
The second framework Karen champions is the 'Dual Process Model' by Stroebe and Schut. This suggests that grieving is a constant, healthy oscillation between two states: 'Loss-Orientation' and 'Restoration-Orientation'.
One moment, you are looking at old photographs, weeping for what has been lost (loss-oriented), the next you are figuring out how to fix a leaky tap or booking a solo holiday (restoration-oriented).
'This model gives us permission to take breaks from our sadness,' Karen explains. 'It acknowledges that it is okay, and necessary, to focus on the practicalities of living. It isn't avoidance, it's survival. Moving between these two states is the natural rhythm of healing.'
Drawing on her professional expertise and her own journey through widowhood, Karen has developed her own gentle framework: The Sunflower Support Approach. It is not a rigid sequence of emotions to 'master', but a compassionate unfolding of the self:
- 'I Can't': The early days. The darkness of the soil. Everything feels impossible, and survival is the only goal.
- 'I'm Learning': The first tender shoots. You are learning how to navigate this new, unwanted life. It is fragile and exhausting.
- 'I Can': The stem grows stronger. You find you can handle the finances, go to dinner alone, or smile without guilt. Strength and confidence slowly return.
- 'I Am': The full bloom. You aren't the person you were before the loss, but you are a deeper, more resilient embodiment of yourself. You are living fully again, often reaching out to support others who are still in the dark.
While Karen says we must credit Kübler-Ross for breaking the taboo around death in the sixties, we must also allow our understanding to evolve. She says, 'Grief is never one-size-fits-all. It is shaped by our culture, our personalities, and the unique DNA of the relationship we have lost. It involves physical exhaustion, "widow brain" (that terrifying cognitive fog), and a weakened immune system - elements the simple "five stages" model never touched upon.'
'We need to stop asking if we are grieving the right way,' Karen says. 'There is no gold medal for reaching acceptance by year two. Perhaps the most compassionate approach is not to measure our progress, but to honour whatever grief asks of us, however and whenever it appears.'