You Got Through It. But Are You Okay? Coping vs Processing After a Hard Time

You got through the redundancy. The house move. The diagnosis. The bereavement. The months of caring for someone you love.

And rather than falling apart, you moved straight on to the next thing, because there’s always a next thing.

We talked about this on a recent episode of our podcast, Tickety Boo, and it’s something I see in the therapy room all the time. Getting through something and being okay afterwards are not the same thing.

Coping isn’t the same as processing

When something hard happens, most of us go into practical mode. We make the phone calls, sort out the paperwork, look after everyone else, go back to work and keep the house running. That’s coping, and in the short term it’s exactly what we need.

Processing is different. It’s stopping long enough to ask what that thing actually took out of you, and what you need now. Most of us skip that part. We put it in a box marked “deal with that later”, and later never quite comes.

Being able to function doesn’t always mean you’re fine.

Coping on its own is fine for a while. The trouble starts when it goes on for months or years, and all your emotional processing has been switched off just to keep you going.

Why it catches up with you later

One of the strange things about a hard time is that the impact often doesn’t show up while it’s happening. It shows up afterwards, when everything finally goes quiet.

If you’ve spent a long time caring for someone, or holding a business or a family together, your whole identity can become about that situation. You stop going to the gym, stop seeing friends, stop doing the small things that keep you feeling like you. Then it ends, and you’re left with a strange empty space.

Our bodies tend to tell us before our heads do. These are some of the signs people describe:

• Sleep goes, even when you’re exhausted
• Your attention bounces all over the place
• You feel restless, like a cat on hot bricks
• A low hum of anxiety sits in the bottom of your stomach
• Old aches, stomach problems or infections come back when you’re run down
• You reach for junk food, chocolate or a drink to take the edge off

Being run down after a hard stretch isn’t a sign of weakness. It’s your body asking you to stop.

What gets in the way of stopping

Even when we know we need to pause, we often don’t. Guilt, habit and fear all play a part. There’s a voice that says you’ve already had time off, or that you’ll rest once this next thing is done.

I’m as guilty of this as anyone. After a really turbulent few weeks recently, rather than resting at the weekend, I sat down and rebuilt my website. I knew exactly what I was doing while I did it.

A client once described it to me as writing cheques his body couldn’t pay. It’s recoverable for a while. Keep going long enough, though, and your body ends up in overdraft.

The person who held it all together

We tend to celebrate the person who kept going. The strong one. The one who held everything together.

But we don’t often ask what holding everything together cost them. High functioning people are often the last to be asked if they’re okay, because everyone sees them doing and achieving. They get used to that role, and they don’t show the signs.

Not long ago I was getting my hair cut and telling the barber about a difficult week. He put his scissors down and said, “That’s a lot to go through. Are you okay?” Nobody else had asked, including me. That one question gave me permission to actually feel what I’d been through.

It’s okay not to be okay. It’s not okay to struggle in silence.

How to check in with yourself

This isn’t about digging up everything difficult that has ever happened, or treating every experience as something that needs fixing. It’s basic maintenance, the same way you’d look after a car after a long journey.

• Ask yourself the question. What did that take out of me, and what do I need now?
• Notice the feeling before you act. The brain likes to act first and feel later. Try it the other way round: feel it, be aware of it, then decide what to do.
• Put back one piece of maintenance. A walk, the gym, reading instead of scrolling before bed, a laptop that shuts at 8pm. Small and regular beats big and occasional.
• Do a debrief. Even if it was months or years ago, sit down and talk it through. You can do this on your own, with a friend who listens, or with a therapist.
• Let someone listen. It doesn’t have to be about finding solutions. Being heard is often what helps most.

If you manage people

The colleague who has come back after a bereavement, an illness in the family or months of caring may look like they’re coping perfectly well. Often they’re the one most likely to quietly carry on.

Check in a few weeks or months later, not just on the first day back. A simple “That’s been a lot. How are you doing now?” can open a door. If they tell you they’re fine, our guides on what to do when someone says “I’m fine” and what to do when someone on your team is struggling may help.

Helping managers and first aiders ask that question well is a big part of our First Aid for Mental Health training.

Questions people ask about coping after a hard time

You can hear more conversations like this on the Tickety Boo podcast.

This article is part of our practical guide to workplace mental health training for UK employers.