Grief is a natural response when a loved one dies. How you grieve depends on your personality, life experiences, the nature of your loss and your coping style. While there is no right or wrong way to grieve, there are healthy ways to cope, survive the pain and find your new “normal” as you continue on your life’s journey.
When a service member dies, this guidance can help you process the loss so that you can move toward healing and begin to rebuild your life.
Connecting with a casualty assistance officer
The casualty assistance officer (CAO) serves as a liaison between the family and the service branch. Make the most of your relationship with your CAO. They understand the military environment and is aware of available support from various resources. Assigned exclusively to you for an indefinite period – until you determine that assistance is no longer needed – your CAO helps with:
Transportation and burial expenses
Mortuary and funeral honors assistance
Benefits and entitlements (explaining both and assisting with applying for and receiving them)
Personal effects, records, reports and investigations (receiving)
Legal matters (tax issues) and relocation assistance (shipping household goods)
Benevolent, philanthropic and federal agencies (information, referral and coordination)
Emotional and spiritual support
Accessing long-term care
Eventually, your CAO will return to his or her primary job full time, but not until matters relating to a survivor’s case have been answered and all entitlements and benefits are being received. However, assistance to you does not stop there; for longer-term support:
Your CAO should connect you with your service’s long-term case management program, which will have expert case managers and counselors available to assist in the coming years.
You may access support groups, grief counseling, benefits assistance, milestone management and financial counseling to assist with budgeting, investing, estate planning, tax issues and other long-term benefits.
To find your service’s long-term case management programs, contact:
Becoming an active griever
The Department of Veterans Affairs encourages the bereaved to be active, not passive, participants in grief and to consider these four tasks of grief, developed by psychologists William Worden and Therese Rando:
Accepting the reality of your loss. The first task of grief is breaking through the denial to understand that the death has occurred and can’t be reversed.
Mourning the death of a loved one. Although distracting yourself from the pain might temporarily make you feel better, a broken heart must heal. If you don’t allow yourself to grieve, your sorrow may return in more painful ways.
Adjusting to the environment in which your loved one is missing. It can take time to fully appreciate the new roles you’ll need to take on and the skills you will need to learn. Reach out for support when you need it.
Forming a new identity. Be patient with yourself as you develop new social connections and slowly try to create an identity that is not intertwined with your loved one.
Source: U.S. Department of Defense
