Disbelief

• It’s normal for loss to feel like it’s not real. For example, Taylor found after the death of her Nanna, thoughts like ‘I can’t believe it’s true’ were repeating. 

Concentration

• Mind wanders a lot.

• Hard to concentrate.

 Thoughts and Images

• Thoughts and images of the details or events around the loss can keep coming into your mind, including in dreams.

Feeling Bad about Yourself and Your Life

• You can feel bad about yourself following loss, or about life in general.

• Sometimes young people self-blame, for example, Jamie thought ‘it’s my fault my parents divorced’.

Meaning 

• Young people may feel what was important in life before the loss is no longer important, or the meaning of life is different after the loss.

Identity

• Many people find how they think about themselves changes, they may feel a bit lost.

Control

• Thoughts might include ‘I have no control’, or bad things are going to happen.

Thoughts, images and memories

• It is common to spend lots of time thinking of memories of how life used to be.

• Many people push away thoughts and images about the loss.