Different kinds of loss

When a marriage, relationship or close friendship ends, you may grieve the person, your shared routines and the future you had pictured together.

What can help

• Let yourself feel sad, even if you chose to end it
• Lean on friends who knew you before and after
• Name what you miss, and what you don’t
• Give yourself time before big new decisions

Losing a job, a career or money security is a recognized kind of loss. It can bring the same feelings as other grief: shock, anger, sadness and worry about the future.

What can help

• Keep a simple daily routine
• Stay in touch with work friends you liked
• Notice skills and strengths that are still yours
• Ask for practical help with money worries early

Leaving a home, neighborhood or community, for example after a move, can bring grief. You may miss familiar streets, neighbors, language, food and the person you were there.

What can help

• Bring a few familiar things into your new space
• Keep one tradition from the place you left
• Look for people who share your background or language
• Let yourself miss the old place while you build the new

Losing good health, or watching a loved one become seriously ill, is a common source of grief. You may grieve your old energy, independence, plans or body.

What can help

• Allow yourself to be sad about what has changed
• Focus on what you can still do and enjoy
• Join a support group for people with the same condition
• Tell your care team how you are feeling, not just your symptoms

People also grieve a dream, a plan or a future they hoped for, and youth or a stage of life that is over. Examples include children leaving home, retirement, or a hoped-for pregnancy.

What can help

• Name the dream out loud or on paper
• Ask which parts of it could still happen in a new way
• Mark the end of a stage with a small ritual
• Make room for new hopes when you’re ready

Pets give us company, routine and love without conditions, often through our hardest times. Few other relationships offer that kind of steady affection. So when a pet dies, it can feel like losing a family member.

Losing a pet is not necessarily less painful than losing a person, and for some people it is harder. Grief for a pet can affect your body as well as your feelings.

When others minimize it

• You may hear “it was just a dog” or “you can get another one”. These words can sting.
• Your grief is real, even if others don’t understand it.
• Look for people who do get it, like fellow pet lovers or a pet loss support group.

If you had to make the choice to end your pet’s life (euthanasia), you may feel guilt or doubt. Ending suffering is often the kindest choice. Making the decision together with your vet and family can ease some of that weight.

Helping children

• A pet’s death is often a child’s first experience of loss, so they may need extra support.
• Include children in what is happening, and give honest, simple answers.
• Let them see that you are sad too, and how you cope.
• Accept that their grief may come and go, and may come out as anger.
• If you get a new pet, explain it is a new friend, not a replacement.

Rituals and memorials

• Make a paw print or keep their collar and tags
• Put together a photo book or memory box
• Create a small memorial space in the garden, or plant a tree
• Make a collage with children, or share happy stories at dinner

The end of a marriage, relationship or close friendship is a real loss. You may grieve the person, the shared routines, and the future you had pictured together.

When an ex-partner or a former friend dies, grief can feel extra complicated. Others may not expect you to be sad, and you may feel mixed feelings like love, anger and regret all at once.

What can help

• Name the loss to yourself: “I am grieving this.”
• Talk to one person who knew the relationship, or a counselor
• Let mixed feelings exist side by side without judging them

A miscarriage can be very hard, both physically and emotionally. You may feel many emotions, including sadness and anxiety, and it can take time to come to terms with what happened.

Because others may not have known about the pregnancy, this grief can be very private. Partners grieve too, and their feelings are sometimes overlooked. Couples may grieve in different ways or at different times.

What can help

• Talk openly with your partner, family or friends about how you feel
• Ask your doctor about counseling
• Join a pregnancy loss support group, in person or online
• Mark the loss in a way that feels right, like naming the baby or lighting a candle

When a parent, sibling or relative you were estranged from dies, people may assume you don’t feel much. But you may grieve deeply, sometimes for the relationship you never got to have.

Feelings like relief, anger, guilt and sadness can all show up together. This is normal. Mixed feelings, and guilt about feeling relief, are a common part of grief.

Losing someone to suicide or overdose can bring shock, guilt, anger and many “why” questions. Because of stigma, people may not know what to say, and you may feel you have to grieve quietly.

Sudden losses like these can make grief harder to move through. That is why extra support matters so much.

Gentle ideas

• Remember the whole person, not just how they died
• Plan ahead for anniversaries and holidays, and change or pause traditions that feel too painful
• Find a support group for people who have lost someone the same way
• Talk to a counselor, especially if guilt or “what ifs” feel overwhelming

After a suicide, feelings can be overwhelming: shock and numbness, anger at the person or at yourself, guilt and endless “what ifs”, despair, confusion, and a painful sense of rejection, wondering why your love wasn’t enough. If you witnessed or found your loved one, nightmares and flashbacks can also happen.

Everyone grieves differently, and family members often cope in different ways. One person may want to talk about it constantly while another goes silent. One may visit the grave every week while another can’t bear to. These differences can cause tension, but they don’t mean anyone loves the person less.

Ideas for families

• Agree together on what you will tell people. Over time, most survivors are glad they were honest about the cause of death
• Prepare a short answer to “What happened?” that each person can use or adapt
• Help children and teens get ready for questions from friends and classmates, and keep talking openly at home
• Change or pause family traditions that feel too painful, and maybe create a new one together
• Let each person grieve in their own way and at their own pace. No one should be rushed by anyone’s idea of “long enough”
• Expect setbacks, even years later. Healing rarely moves in a straight line
• Consider family therapy to get through the worst of the crisis or adjust to life after the loss

Stigma can leave families isolated: friends may not know what to say, and some faith traditions limit the rituals available after a suicide. Support groups for suicide loss survivors, and AFSP’s Healing Conversations program, which connects families with trained volunteers who have also lost someone to suicide, can help.

A brother or sister is often the person who has known you longest: someone you shared childhood, family stories, jokes and fights with, and expected to grow old alongside. When a sibling dies, you lose not just them, but part of your past and the future you imagined together.

Grieving siblings are sometimes called “forgotten grievers”. People tend to ask how the parents, partner or children are coping, and may not think to ask the brother or sister. Adult siblings may get little time off work, and young siblings may try to stay quiet and “be good” so they don’t add to their parents’ pain.

Feelings siblings often describe

• Feeling invisible, or that your grief comes “second”
• Guilt about old arguments, rivalry, or simply being the one who is still alive
• Worry about grieving parents, and feeling you must be strong for them
• Confusion about identity: “Am I still a big sister?” or “How many siblings do I say I have?”
• Fear about your own health, if the cause of death could run in families
• Loneliness at family events, where their absence feels loudest

What can help

• Give your grief a name and a place. Your loss is real and big, whatever your age
• Find a sibling-specific support group, or a grief group for your age group
• Keep sharing stories, inside jokes or traditions you had with them
• Decide how you want to answer “Do you have brothers or sisters?” You can include them, always
• Talk to your parents about how you’re feeling if you can, or to another trusted adult or friend
• Teens: let a school counselor know, so teachers understand if you’re struggling

When a loss isn’t marked by a funeral or cards, it can help to create your own way to honor it. Rituals can ease grief, partly because they give back a sense of control.

Ideas

• Give yourself permission to grieve, out loud: “This mattered to me.”
• Light a candle, write a letter, or plant something in their memory
• Hold a small gathering with the people who understand
• Make a memory box or photo book
• Join a support group for your kind of loss

Whether the child was a baby, a teenager or a grown adult, parents grieve the child, the future they pictured, and their everyday role as that child’s parent. Many describe it as the loss that “shouldn’t happen”.

Grief after losing a child is more likely to stay very intense for a long time. That is not a failure. It is a reason to reach for extra support early.

Things parents often face

• Partners grieving in different ways or at different times, which can strain the relationship
• The painful question “How many children do you have?”
• Worry about surviving children, and trying to parent while grieving
• Friends who drift away because they don’t know what to say
• Birthdays and school years that mark the age the child would have been

What can help

• Groups for bereaved parents, where others truly understand
• Saying your child’s name, and asking others to say it too
• Deciding ahead how you want to answer “How many children?” Any answer is okay, and it can change from day to day
• Giving each partner room to grieve in their own style (see “Different ways of grieving” in Grief: understanding loss)
• Making sure surviving children get their own support (see Supporting someone who is grieving)

A parent may be the person who knew you first, held the family stories and gave you a sense of home. Many adults say they suddenly feel like an orphan, whatever their age.

Losing a parent can also shift your place in the family. You might become the oldest generation, start caring for your other parent, or have to sort out a house full of belongings. Old family tensions can rise to the surface during these tasks.

Feelings people describe

• Sadness that no one else remembers you as a child in quite the same way
• Regret over things unsaid, or relief if the relationship was hard
• Sudden awareness of your own age and health
• Missing their advice at big moments, like a new job or a new baby

What can help

• Collect family stories, photos and recipes from relatives while you can
• Share sorting tasks with siblings and make decisions slowly, together
• Keep one small tradition they loved
• If you were their caregiver, expect the empty hours to feel strange (see “Losses that follow a loss” in Life after a loss)

A partner is often the person you shared a home, money, plans and daily routines with. When they die, you lose your closest companion and the shape of your days at the same time.

Losing a partner can also bring other losses, such as a drop in income and big changes to daily life. Without support around you, coping can be harder.

Common challenges

• Learning tasks your partner used to handle, like bills, cooking or repairs
• Feeling like a “third wheel” with couple friends
• Loneliness at night, at weekends and at mealtimes
• Questions about dating again someday, and guilt about even thinking about it

What can help

• Try to put off big decisions, like moving or selling a home, until the first shock has passed
• Ask a trusted person to help with paperwork and money tasks
• Join a group for widowed people, often run by hospices, faith groups or senior centers
• Keep regular meals and a little daily structure, even if it is small

When a friend dies, others may not see you as a “main” mourner. You may get no time off work, no say in the funeral, and fewer people asking how you are. Grief that isn’t recognized can feel very lonely.

Friends often know sides of us that family doesn’t: the private jokes, the late-night talks, the person we were at 16. Losing that witness to your life is a real loss.

What can help

• Reach out to their family and share a story about them. Many families treasure these
• Gather other friends to remember them together
• Ask your workplace or school for time to attend the funeral
• Keep a shared photo album or group chat going in their memory

For many children and teens, a grandparent’s death is one of their first big losses. For adults, it can mean losing a link to family history, culture, faith or language.

Because grandparents are often older, people may say “they had a good long life”. That may be true, but it doesn’t make the loss hurt less. If a grandparent helped raise you, your grief may feel like losing a parent.

What can help

• Ask relatives to share stories about them
• Cook their recipes or keep one of their traditions
• Help younger children make a memory book or drawing
• Learn more about the places and culture they came from

Numbness, shock and disbelief are common after any loss, and especially after an unexpected death. Your mind may need time to catch up with what has happened.

You may replay the last conversation, or the moment you heard the news. Unfinished business, like an argument or plans you never got to make, can feel especially painful.

What can help

• Accept help with practical tasks in the first days, when shock makes thinking hard
• Tell the story of what happened to someone who can listen, as many times as you need
• Write down what you didn’t get to say (try the “A letter to someone I lost” worksheet in Grief: understanding loss)
• Expect the reality to sink in slowly, sometimes weeks later

Traumatic grief is when you are processing a loss and trauma at the same time. It can follow a death in frightening or unpredictable circumstances, like violence, a crash or a disaster.

Alongside grief, you may have upsetting images, nightmares or flashbacks, especially if you witnessed the death or found your loved one. You may feel on edge, or avoid places linked to what happened.

What can help

• A therapist trained in both trauma and grief
• Slow breathing and grounding (naming things you can see and hear) when images come
• Support groups for families affected by violence or sudden death
• Gentle routines that help your body feel safe again

When someone is seriously ill, the person and their family may grieve while still caring and hoping. The U.S. National Cancer Institute says about one in four patients with incurable cancer feels this kind of anticipatory grief.

After the death, some people feel numb, or relieved that suffering is over, and then guilty about the relief. Others are surprised that grief still hits hard, even though they “knew it was coming”. All of these are normal.

If you were a caregiver, you may lose your daily purpose and routine overnight. That is a loss of its own (see “Losses that follow a loss” in Life after a loss).

Research suggests that a person’s sense of control and self-esteem matter more than whether a death was sudden. People who feel some control over their lives often grieve in the usual way, even after an unexpected loss.

In a study of parents whose child died of cancer, parents who felt prepared for the end of life coped better socially in the first two years after the loss.

Small ways to regain some control

• Choose one small thing to decide each day, like what to eat or when to walk
• Learn about grief, so the waves feel less frightening
• Take part in planning the funeral or memorial, if you want to
• Ask doctors or nurses your questions, if understanding what happened would help

Boss describes one type of ambiguous loss as physical absence with psychological presence. Examples include a missing person, a soldier missing in action, or someone lost in a disaster.

Families can feel something similar when a loved one is alive but out of reach, for example because of prison, deportation or estrangement.

What can help

• Keep a place for them in family stories and conversations
• Mark special dates in a way that leaves room for both hope and sadness
• Find groups for families in a similar situation
• Let yourself enjoy life, even while you wait

The second type is physical presence with psychological absence. The person is with you, but parts of who they were seem to be gone, for example because of Alzheimer’s disease, addiction, chronic mental illness or brain injury.

Caregivers may feel as if a stranger lives in the house, or ride a roller coaster as the person seems to come and go. This uncertainty can be more stressful than the illness itself, and there is rarely a ritual to recognize it.

What can help

• Name it: “This is ambiguous loss. It is caused by the illness, not by anyone’s failure.”
• Enjoy moments of connection when they come, without needing them to last
• Join a caregiver support group, in person or online
• Make a simple written plan for who helps when, so you get regular breaks

Boss suggests swapping “either/or” for “both/and”. Instead of asking whether someone is here or gone, you can see them as both. This takes away the pressure to find a perfect answer that may not exist.

Examples

• “My mother is both here and gone.”
• “I am both a caregiver and a person with needs of my own.”
• “I am both sad about Dad’s illness and happy about the new baby.”
• “I both hope my brother comes home and grieve that he may not.”

Ambiguous loss can stop family gatherings and blur who does what. Rather than cancelling holidays, try simplifying them. Ask which traditions still fit, and include younger family members in deciding.

Talk openly about who handles which tasks now. Question unspoken rules, such as one person being expected to do all the caring. Sharing the load protects everyone.

Hope might move from hoping for a cure to hoping for a good day, a peaceful visit, or dinner with a friend. Planning things with clear, reachable outcomes, like a hobby or a regular coffee date, can bring back a sense of control.

Boss describes flexible guidelines, not fixed steps, for building resilience. You may circle back to the same feelings many times. That is part of the process, not a setback.