Maladaptive Grief responses
- This occurs when an individual is unable to progress satisfactorily through the stages of grieving to achieve resolution and usually gets stuck with the denial or anger stages.
- Prolonged response- preoccupation with memories of the lost entity for many years. May experience functional disorganization and intense emotional pain.
- Delayed/inhibited response- the individual becomes fixed in the denial stage of the grieving process. May experience anxiety disorders such as phobias, sleeping, and eating disorders.
- Distorted response- Fixed in the anger stage of grieving and all normal behaviors associated with grieving like helplessness, sadness, anger, guilt, etc., are exaggerated.
