Recognizable questions
- Why can I grieve for someone who is still alive?
- Why does grief sometimes come in waves, even though I thought I was doing better?
- Can I grieve a faith, community, identity, or future that no longer exists?
- Why can I miss someone and still know that stepping away was the right choice?
- Why does a loss sometimes seem so much bigger than just the disappearance of one person or relationship?
- Can relief exist alongside grief?
- Why does grief last longer for one person, or look different, than for another?
What is grief?
Grief is a natural response to loss. That can be the death of someone, but also the disappearance or change of something to which a great deal of meaning was attached: a relationship, health, job, community, belief, identity, future outlook, or sense of safety.
Grief is therefore not only about who or what is gone, but also about everything connected to it.
LOSS OF SOMETHING
IMPORTANT
↓
feelings
thoughts
physical reactions
practical changes
↓
gradual adjustment
to a new realityThere is no fixed way someone is supposed to grieve.
Grief is more than sadness
Sadness is probably the emotion most often associated with grief, but grief can include many more feelings: missing someone, anger, guilt, relief, confusion, fear, loneliness, gratitude, emptiness, or even moments when someone feels almost nothing.
GRIEF CAN BE
sadness
+
anger
+
missing someone
+
relief
+
guilt
+
love
+
confusionContradictory feelings do not mean someone is grieving incorrectly.
Why does loss take so much energy?
Our daily lives are built on expectations and habits. We know whom we call, who we spend the holidays with, what our week looks like, and what future we imagine for ourselves.
When something important disappears, it is not only emotions that vanish, but sometimes all kinds of assumptions as well.
BEFORE THE LOSS
this is what my life looks like
↓
loss
↓
old expectations
no longer fit
↓
new reality
has to be builtThat adjustment often takes time and mental energy.
Grief does not unfold in fixed stages
The familiar idea that everyone goes through fixed stages of grief in order is too simplistic.
People may experience emotions in different sequences, not have some reactions at all, and later be affected again by something they thought they had already processed.
GRIEF IS NOT:
stage 1
↓
stage 2
↓
stage 3
↓
done
GRIEF MAY BE MORE LIKE:
sadness
↕
daily life
↕
memories
↕
adjusting
↕
sadness againA hard day after a good period does not automatically mean someone is “back to square one.”
Why does grief come in waves?
Grief is strongly tied to memories, relationships, and situations. A song, birthday, smell, family gathering, street, or unexpected photo can suddenly bring the loss close again.
MEMORY
↓
connection
becomes felt
↓
missing someone
↓
grief rises
againThat can happen months or years later. It does not necessarily mean recovery has failed.
Grieving someone who is still alive
A special kind of loss occurs when someone is still alive, but the relationship is no longer accessible or the same.
This can happen, for example, in long-term family estrangement, divorce, dementia, addiction, emigration, or other situations in which the person exists physically but the former relationship is largely gone.
This is often associated with ambiguous loss.
THE PERSON IS STILL THERE
but
THE RELATIONSHIP AS
IT WAS NO LONGER ISThat can be especially complicated because there is no clear farewell or definite end.
Why can living loss be so confusing?
With death, it is clear that someone is not coming back. In a broken family bond, the person may still live somewhere, celebrate birthdays, and have an everyday life.
As a result, hope and loss can continue to exist side by side:
‘I miss you’
and
‘You’re still there’
and
‘Maybe things will
change someday’
and
‘Right now
I don’t have you’That does not make this kind of grief any less real.
Grieving a relationship is often grieving much more
After a divorce, someone may grieve a partner, but at the same time also shared friends, daily routines, holidays, family ties, a place to live, and a future that had been imagined together.
LOSS OF A RELATIONSHIP
↓
may also mean loss of:
daily routine
social circle
role
home
security
future outlookThat is why the scale of grief is often easily underestimated from the outside.
Grief over identity
Sometimes not only something outside you disappears, but the picture you had of yourself changes too.
For example:
‘I was a husband.’
‘I was an elite athlete.’
‘I was part of this community.’
‘I thought this would be my lifelong faith.’
When such an identity falls away, the question can arise:
‘Who am I now?’
OLD IDENTITY
↓
loss or change
↓
‘What still belongs
to me?’
↓
new or broader
identityThat too can be part of grief.
Grief for a future that will not come
People can also grieve something that never literally existed, but that they had counted on for years.
For example, a future with a partner, a career, children, restored health, or a religious expectation.
EXPECTED FUTURE
↓
felt real
and meaningful
↓
turns out no longer
possible or believable
↓
lossThe grief is then not about a memory from the past, but about a future that someone had already psychologically taken into their life.
How can this show up among (ex-)Jehovah’s Witnesses?
For some people who leave Jehovah’s Witnesses, a change of faith can touch on several losses at once.
That can involve, for example:
family contact
+
friends
+
congregation
+
daily routines
+
religious identity
+
certainty
+
future expectationsFor someone who believed for years that he could live forever on a paradise earth, a change in beliefs can, for example, also mean that an important vision of the future has to be reconsidered.
That does not have to feel like loss for everyone. Some experience mainly freedom or relief. Others experience loss and relief at the same time.
Not everyone who leaves loses the same things
The circumstances differ greatly.
One person keeps contact with nearly all family members and already has an extensive social network outside the congregation. Another loses several important relationships at once.
PERSON A
faith changes
family stays
friends stay
stable daily life
PERSON B
faith changes
family contact decreases
friends disappear
identity changesThat is why recovery after the same kind of change in faith does not have to look the same.
Leaving voluntarily can still cause grief
Making a choice yourself does not protect you from sadness.
Someone can end a relationship and still grieve. An employee can consciously resign and miss colleagues. Someone can voluntarily leave a faith community and feel sad about what is lost in the process.
‘I CHOSE THIS’
≠
‘SO I MUST NOT
MISS IT’A decision can be right for someone and still have painful consequences.
Relief and grief can exist at the same time
After ending a difficult situation, someone can feel both peace and loss.
‘I’m glad
I’m freer’
and
‘I miss the people
I love’One feeling does not make the other any less genuine.
When others do not recognize your loss
Some losses are naturally acknowledged. After a death, people usually understand why someone is grieving.
Other losses are less visible.
Someone may hear, for example:
‘But you left on your own, didn’t you?’
‘But he’s still alive, isn’t he?’
‘You can just find new friends.’
When the environment barely recognizes a loss, it is sometimes called disenfranchised grief (disenfranchised grief).
I EXPERIENCE LOSS
↓
environment barely
recognizes it
↓
less space
for grief and supportThat can make the experience lonelier.
You do not have to choose between grieving and going on with life
Modern grief research describes that people often move back and forth between attention to the loss and attention to recovery and daily life.
LOSS-FOCUSED
missing
remembering
feeling sad
↕
RESTORATION-FOCUSED
working
new connections
practical matters
new experiencesSo you do not have to be constantly focused on the loss in order to grieve ‘properly’.
An evening of laughter or a nice vacation does not mean you no longer miss someone.
A continuing bond does not have to be unhealthy
Grief does not always have to end with completely ‘letting go’.
People can maintain a lasting inner bond with someone or something that mattered: memories, values, stories, rituals, or photos.
GOING ON
does not have to mean
FORGETTINGYour relationship to the loss can change without disappearing completely.
Grief and guilt
After a loss, thoughts like these can easily arise:
‘If only I had done more.’
‘If only I had handled that conversation differently.’
‘If I had made a different choice, maybe this would not have happened.’
Some of these can lead to healthy reflection. Others turn into persistent self-blame.
A helpful distinction is:
WHAT COULD I
ACTUALLY INFLUENCE?
and
WHAT DO I JUDGE
IN RETROSPECT WITH KNOWLEDGE
I DID NOT HAVE THEN?Grief does not have to be resolved by blaming one person.
Grief and anger
Anger is also common in loss.
Someone may be angry at a family member, doctor, ex-partner, religious organization, themselves, God, or simply at the fact that the situation exists.
Anger does not automatically mean someone is stuck. Sometimes it points to something that mattered or to experienced injustice.
The main question is what someone does with that anger.
Grief and meaning
Loss can shake fundamental beliefs:
‘How did I think life worked?’
‘Where did I belong?’
‘What gives my life meaning now?’
That is why recovery is sometimes not only about feeling less sad, but about rebuilding meaning.
WHAT WAS MY
LIFE LIKE UP TO NOW?
↓
WHAT HAS CHANGED?
↓
WHAT DO I WANT
TO TAKE WITH ME OR BUILD NOW?Grief does not have to be ‘finished’
The thought ‘I should have processed this by now’ can create extra pressure.
Major losses can take a lasting place in someone’s life story.
Recovery does not necessarily mean:
‘I feel nothing anymore.’
It can also mean:
‘I can live with it without the loss determining everything every day.’
When is professional help advisable?
Many grief reactions are normal responses to loss and do not require treatment.
Professional support may be useful when someone is severely stuck for a long time, barely functioning, remains constantly overwhelmed, or when grief is accompanied by severe depressive, anxiety, or trauma symptoms.
In the case of death, there is also the recognized diagnosis prolonged grief disorder, which has specific criteria. Intense grief on its own does not automatically mean someone has this disorder.
What can you do with this?
Don’t start only with:
‘Why am I still sad?’
but with:
WHAT EXACTLY
HAVE I LOST?
a person?
a relationship?
a community?
an identity?
certainty?
a future?
several things at once?When it becomes clearer what the loss truly consists of, it also becomes clearer what support may be helpful.
Losing a social network, for example, calls for something partly different than losing a belief or vision of the future.
New connections do not replace the past
New relationships can help enormously, but they do not have to ‘replace’ old relationships.
NEW CONNECTION
can add something
without
UNDOING
THE OLD LOSSYou can build a new social network while still grieving people who are no longer in your life.
Questions to think about
What exactly have I lost: a person, relationship, community, identity, certainty, or vision of the future?
Which parts of my loss are visible to others and which are barely visible?
Do I miss someone who is still alive but no longer truly available?
What feelings exist alongside grief — for example anger, relief, or guilt?
Am I imposing a timeline on myself for something that may not have a fixed deadline?
Which parts of my former life do I want to keep in my new life?
What new forms of connection and meaning are possible without pretending the old loss does not exist?
Summary
Grief is a natural response to losing something that had meaning attached to it.
That does not have to be a death.
GRIEF CAN BE ABOUT
a person
a relationship
health
family contact
a community
an identity
a belief
a vision of the futureGrief does not follow one fixed pattern. Sadness can come in waves and coexist with relief, love, anger, or new joy.
For some former Jehovah’s Witnesses, a change of faith can touch multiple losses at once: relationships, community, identity, and expectations for the future. For others, the impact is much smaller or relief predominates.
The key question is therefore not only:
‘What has disappeared?’
but:
‘What did what I lost mean for my life — and how can I build a new reality in which that loss is allowed to have a place?’
Sources and further reading
Margaret Stroebe & Henk Schut – The Dual Process Model of Coping with Bereavement: Rationale and Description, 1999. Describes how people during grief move back and forth between loss-oriented focus and restoration-oriented adjustment.
Margaret Stroebe & Henk Schut – The Dual Process Model of Coping with Bereavement: A Decade On, 2010. Further development of grief as a dynamic process rather than a fixed sequence of stages.
Pauline Boss – Ambiguous Loss: Learning to Live with Unresolved Grief, 1999. About loss in which someone may be psychologically or relationally absent while there is no clear, definitive ending.
Kenneth J. Doka – Disenfranchised Grief: Recognizing Hidden Sorrow, 1989. About grief that is insufficiently recognized by those around you or is given little social space.
Dennis Klass, Phyllis R. Silverman & Steven L. Nickman – Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief, 1996. About the idea that a lasting inner connection with what has been lost does not have to be unhealthy.
George A. Bonanno – Loss, Trauma, and Human Resilience, 2004. About different trajectories after loss and the fact that people show widely varying grief and recovery patterns.
Read also
Delayed grief – When sadness only becomes clear or intense later on.
Resilience – How people can adapt after setbacks without pain necessarily having to disappear.
Need for meaning – How loss can raise questions about direction, identity, and the future.
Social identity – What happens when an important group is part of who you think you are.
Loyalty conflict – When loyalty to yourself clashes with your connection to people you love.
Self-blame – When loss keeps bringing you back to the question of what you should have done differently.
Post-traumatic growth – When some people, alongside loss, also experience changes in values or life direction.
