What They Didn’t Teach Us About Grief in School
Grief is a human experience that touches everyone at some point.
Yet, we are often unprepared for its full impact. From the outside, your life might appear successful and calm.
You may have told yourself, "I've gotten over it" or "it wasn't that big of a deal."
The truth is, grief is not a simple, linear process. It is the body's natural response to loss, and it can be a messy, confusing, and overwhelming journey. In school, we learn about the stages of grief, but we are never taught about the full biological and psychological toll it can take on us. For women, this journey is often shaped by societal expectations to be strong, to nurture others, and to keep going no matter what.
This article is for you if you are feeling the invisible weight of grief. We will explore what grief truly is, how it affects your body and mind, and why healing is possible.
Understanding Grief: The Many Faces of Loss
When we hear the word grief, we often think of losing someone to death. While that is a central part of the grieving experience, grief is a response to many different types of loss. You can feel grief for many reasons, including:
The death of a loved one
This is the most common association with grief. It can also include the death of a pet, a friend, or an extended family member. The loss of a child or a partner, in particular, can be a world-shattering event that challenges your entire sense of reality and purpose.
A life transition
This can be a breakup or divorce, a child leaving for college, or a major move. It is the loss of a life you once had, a daily rhythm that is now gone. The loss of a friendship can be just as devastating as a romantic breakup.
The loss of a job or a career
This can shake your sense of identity and purpose, especially if you have spent years building your professional life. It can feel like a part of you has been taken away.
A major diagnosis
This could be a new health diagnosis for yourself or a loved one. It is the loss of a future you once imagined. You grieve the loss of your health, your dreams, and the life you thought you would live.
Trauma
This can include a car accident, an assault, or any other event that left you feeling unsafe or helpless. You grieve the loss of your sense of safety, your innocence, and your trust in the world.
Grief is a normal and healthy process, but it can also be very difficult to cope with. Our bodies and minds do not just feel sad. They undergo a series of changes that can affect our overall well-being.
The Biology of Grief: What Happens to Your Body
Grief is a full-body experience. When you experience loss, your body undergoes a series of changes that can affect you physically. These are not imaginary symptoms. They are the biological changes that occur when your nervous system is overwhelmed by stress.
Changes in the brain: Your brain releases stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline in response to loss. These hormones can lead to changes in your mood, sleep, appetite, and energy levels. The parts of your brain that regulate emotions and social connection are activated, which can make you feel more isolated or irritable. This constant state of alert can also make it difficult to focus or remember things. You may experience what is sometimes called "grief brain," a state of fogginess and confusion that makes simple tasks feel impossible.
Changes in the immune system: The sustained stress of grief can weaken your immune system, making it harder to fight off infections. This is why many people find themselves getting sick more often when they are grieving. The body's resources are being redirected to dealing with the emotional and physical stress of loss.
Changes in the cardiovascular system: Grief can increase your heart rate and blood pressure, which can increase your risk of heart disease or stroke over time. This is a real physiological response. Studies have shown a link between intense grief and a condition called "broken heart syndrome," where extreme emotional stress leads to temporary heart muscle failure.
Changes in the digestive system: The stress of grief can affect your digestive system, leading to indigestion, diarrhea, or constipation. This is a direct result of the fight-or-flight response, which redirects blood flow away from non-essential functions like digestion.
Grief can also lead to inflammation and a weakened immune response.
At the same time, grief can lead to changes in brain activity, with different regions of the brain involved in processing emotions, memories, and social interactions.
This is why grief can feel so exhausting. Your body is working overtime to process what has happened.
Working with a competent and trained therapist can help address these changes and get back to life.
The Psychology of Grief: Beyond Sadness
Grief is more than just feeling sad. It can be a chaotic mix of emotions that can feel overwhelming and contradictory. You might experience:
Anger: You might feel angry at the person who is gone, at the situation, or even at yourself. This anger is a normal part of the grieving process. You may feel angry at the world for continuing on as normal while your world has stopped.
Guilt and Regret: You might find yourself replaying conversations or events, wishing you had done or said something differently. This is a common part of grief as you try to make sense of what happened. You might feel guilty for feeling happy or for moving on with your life.
Anxiety and Fear: Grief can create a sense of anxiety about the future. You may worry about your own health, the well-being of your loved ones, or how you will cope without the person or thing you have lost. It is a natural fear that if you lost one important thing, you might lose another.
A Sense of Being Lost: Grief can challenge your sense of identity. If your identity was tied to your role as a partner, a caregiver, or an employee, losing that can leave you feeling lost and without a clear sense of purpose. You may feel like a ship without a rudder, drifting without direction.
Difficulty Connecting: You might feel isolated from your friends and family. It can be hard to talk about your grief, or you may feel that others do not understand what you are going through. This isolation can be one of the most painful parts of the grieving process.
How Women Experience Grief Differently
Grief is a human experience. However, societal conditions have affected the way men and women grieve.
Societal expectations often place unique pressures on women in the face of loss. You may find that your grief journey is affected by:
The Caretaker Role
Women are often expected to be the emotional anchor for their families. They may put their own grief on hold to care for their children, their partners, or their aging parents. This can lead to a feeling of having to be strong for everyone else, while your own pain goes unaddressed. You may be the one organizing the funeral, making meals for others, and comforting everyone, all while your own heart is breaking. This is a heavy burden to carry.
Emotional Labor
Women often do a significant amount of emotional labor in their relationships. This means managing everyone else’s feelings and making sure they are okay. In a time of grief, this pressure can be immense. You may feel like you have to be the one to hold it all together, even when you are falling apart inside. This can lead to a feeling of resentment and exhaustion.
Suppressing Emotions
While women are often seen as more emotional, they can also feel pressure to be a stoic and steady presence. You may struggle to express your emotions openly for fear of being a burden or of being seen as "too emotional." This can also be a learned response from a childhood where your emotions were not validated.
Coping Mechanisms
This pressure to be strong can lead to unhealthy coping mechanisms. You may turn to overworking, over-scheduling, or over-nurturing others as a way to avoid your own pain. These behaviors can temporarily distract you from your grief but do not allow for healing. They can also lead to burnout and a loss of personal identity.
Shifting Identity
Grief can be especially difficult for women whose identity was tied to their role as a wife, a partner, or a mother. The loss of that role can feel like losing a part of yourself, leading to a deep sense of disorientation and a crisis of identity. This can also be true for a woman whose identity was tied to her career or her health. You have to redefine who you are without that key part of your life.
Why Healing Feels Impossible
It makes complete sense that you may have struggled to get help for your grief. The very nature of grief can create powerful barriers to healing.
Minimizing Your Own Loss: You might tell yourself, "it wasn't that big of a deal" or "I've gotten over it." This is a way of minimizing your own pain, but it doesn't allow for healing. It is a way of protecting yourself from the full force of your emotions. You may have heard others say these things to you, and now you say them to yourself.
Fear of Being Overwhelmed: The thought of opening the door to grief can feel terrifying. You may worry that if you start crying, you will never stop. A good therapist will create a safe space for you to process your emotions without the fear of being overwhelmed. They will help you learn to tolerate and regulate your emotions so you can move through them, not get stuck in them.
Shame and Blame: You may feel a deep sense of shame that you are still grieving. You might feel that you should be "over it" by now, or that you are a burden to others. A therapist understands that grief is a process and will never make you feel like you are doing it wrong. They will help you release the shame and see your grief as a normal and healthy response to loss.
Lack of Words: Sometimes, the experience was so overwhelming that you simply do not have the words to describe what happened. This can make traditional talk therapy feel frustrating. Many trauma-informed therapies can help you heal even if you cannot articulate what happened. They work with the parts of the brain that do not use language.
A Path to Healing: How Therapy Can Help
The pain and harm that grief inflicts are real, but so is your capacity to heal. Trauma-informed therapy can be a powerful tool for processing your loss and moving forward with your life. Two effective methods are EMDR and Brainspotting.
How Brainspotting Therapy Can Help with Your Grief: Brainspotting therapy uses eye movements to help you access and process memories and emotions. During a session, the therapist helps you identify a specific memory or emotion related to your grief. The therapist then guides your eye movements to a spot on your body, called a brainspot. This helps you access the memory more fully and begin to process it. Brainspotting is especially helpful if you find it difficult to express your emotions or find the right words to describe your pain. It allows you to heal on a deeper level without having to talk extensively about the event. It is a gentle process that works with your body's natural ability to heal.
How EMDR Therapy Can Help with Your Grief: EMDR therapy (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a type of therapy that is effective in treating a wide range of emotional issues, including grief. During an EMDR session, the therapist helps you to focus on a distressing memory while engaging in a series of bilateral eye movements or other forms of bilateral stimulation. This process helps your brain to reprocess the traumatic memory and reduce its emotional charge. EMDR can help you to:
Access and process your emotions more fully.
Release the pain of loss.
Integrate the past and move on with your life.
Both Brainspotting and EMDR can provide a structured and focused way to process and integrate emotions. They can help you develop healthy coping mechanisms for dealing with grief and provide you with the tools you need to move forward in a positive and meaningful way.
It is important for you to seek individualized support, as everyone's experience of grief is different.
Trauma-informed therapy can provide a safe and supportive environment for you to heal from your grief.
Key Takeaways
Grief is not just one event. It is a series of subtle hurts that affect your nervous system and create lasting patterns in your life.
Grief is a full-body experience. It affects your brain, immune system, and cardiovascular system. These physical symptoms are real and are a direct result of the stress of loss.
Women often face unique challenges in grieving. They are often expected to be the emotional anchor for their families, which can lead them to suppress their own pain.
Healing is an act of courage. It is about moving from a life of survival to one of peace, connection, and authenticity.
Trauma-informed therapies, like Brainspotting and EMDR, can help you heal from grief even if you do not have the words to describe your pain.
You have the strength to address your pain, and it is always worth it. If you are ready to explore how you can put down this invisible weight and start living a life that feels authentic and free, I invite you to take the next step.
I offer a free, no-pressure consultation call to talk about your unique situation.
We can discuss your journey and see if working together might be the right path for you.
