The Five Stages Of Grief In 'Drums, Girls, And Dangerous Pie'

Many people don’t think about what it would be like to have their sibling or someone they love to be diagnosed with something that can kill them. For many, it would completely devastate them and others would find a way to deal. Even though it happens in many ways, many people go through the five stages of grief. In Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick, Jeffrey (Steven’s little brother) is diagnosed with leukemia. This illness affects Steven and all of his family, but throughout the book, Steven shows many signs of the 5 stages of grief. The first stage to this is denial. For example, Steven tries to convince himself that the diagnosis they gave to Jeffrey was wrong. He believed that Jeffrey was just eating Philly cheesesteaks …show more content…
For instance, Steven begins to get angry and yell at his parents after he finds out that his mom quit her job to take care of Jeffrey. He says that Jeffrey and their mom are just leaving Steven and his dad with nothing when Jeffrey has to be taken to CHOP (Sonnenblick 43). This shows that even though his mom quit her job to support Jeffrey, Steven thinks no one cares about him and it’s all just for fun. He shows anger by really yelling at them for things that need to be done and can’t be changed. Another example is shown where Steven gets angry about having to do all of the schoolwork his teachers give him while his brother is dying. He even states, “And I was angry. Mindlessly, relentlessly angry every minute of every day” (Sonnenblick 132). So even though his teachers are just giving him the work everyone else gets and that they don’t mean to bother Steven, he takes it out on them because he doesn’t want his brother to have cancer. Since he can’t get angry at the illness itself, he shows his anger by getting angry at other things and this stage was showed …show more content…
For example, Steven remembers the story Jeffrey told him about the kid that made him feel bad for being bald because of his chemotherapy. Steven then decides to shave his head in hopes that it would make Jeffrey feel better about himself and his lack of hair (Sonnenblick 203). This shows he accepts what’s going on because he tries to fix it. If he still denied that Jeffrey had cancer or had strong feelings about the cancer, he wouldn’t have tried to fix it because he would think that nothing’s happening or that it doesn’t matter. He does this to make Jeffrey feel better about his baldness, which forces Steven to accept the illness. My last example is that Mrs.Galley got a book about childhood Leukemia for Steven. Steven then proceeds to read about it so that he knows what is going on with his brother (Sonnenblick 241). This shows acceptance because he wants to learn more about it. He knows Jeffrey has this illness and can accept that fact, so he reads to find out what is going on. Both of these examples show acceptance towards the