The Weight of Grief

Part One in the 5-part series Grief and the Body: Finding Steadiness in Loss

Series Preface

Grief is both universal and deeply personal. It arrives uninvited, rearranges what we thought we knew about love, destabilizes our sense of the world, and leaves us searching for solid ground in a world that suddenly feels unfamiliar.

In this five-part series, I’ll share what happens in the brain and body during grief: why it can feel so heavy, so confusing, and so endless, and how understanding these inner workings can bring both compassion and relief.

Drawing from neuroscience, attachment theory, somatic psychology, and mindfulness, these writings offer both insight and experiential practices that support healing. You’ll learn how grief engages the same neural pathways as physical pain, how emotion helps the brain integrate loss, and how small moments of grounding and connection can gradually restore a sense of safety.

I’m not sharing this as a roadmap for “getting over” grief, because grief isn’t something to overcome. Rather, it’s something we learn to move with. I hope this series can serve as your compassionate companion as you walk alongside grief. One breath, one memory, one moment of steadiness at a time.

Each article blends reflection, psychoeducation, and simple, body-based practices to help you understand and support your own healing process. My hope is that these writings remind you that your grief, in all its complexity, is not weakness or brokenness: It’s love finding its way forward in a changed world.
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• Note 1: The information shared here is intended for reflection and education, to support your understanding and healing. It is not a substitute for individualized counselling. If you’ve experienced a loss and are finding it hard to cope, please consider connecting with a registered counsellor or mental health professional who can help you navigate your unique experience with care and safety. You don’t have to walk through this alone.
  
  
• Note 2: In these writings, I may reference grieving the loss of a loved one to death. However, I acknowledge that grief wears many faces, such as the end of a relationship, loss of a job, retiring and the loss of identity that can bring, loss of wellness due to illness or injury, loss of a beloved pet, loss of an adult child who moves far away, etc. Whatever form your loss has taken, your grief is valid; may these words offer understanding and space for your experience.

Introduction

My journey through life has included many seasons of grief. Some arriving as new losses, others as lingering, persistent memories of earlier losses. It’s easy to believe that avoiding grief, like through distraction, busyness, or emotional suppression, might feel safer. Because sometimes coming up against the full reality of loss can feel like too much. However, my work as a Counsellor mandates that I do the work of healing so that I can show up with a regulated presence for others struggling with their own waves of grief.
This year, as summer transitioned to autumn, a new season of loss rolled in, and I found myself not only grieving again but also sitting with loved ones grieving our shared sudden loss. As I sat with my own emotions, I felt a deep pull to share what I’ve learned over the years in hopes that it might help others navigate the waves of emotion that accompany loss.

In the following 5 articles, I hope to shed light on some of the challenges you may be working through. I’ll offer nutshells of information and short guided meditations to assist you in being present with the emotions of loss. I hope this information helps you in finding a new footing.
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If you are going through a loss right now, please remember that we are social beings, and we have a great capacity for healing in the context of safe, nurturing relationships: if it’s an option for you, please consider working with a mental health professional as you grieve.

This series is written in honour of my cousin, Chris Di Staulo, and his family as they move through their profound grief as well as for all those who struggle similarly, stumbling through the dark nights of grief to reconcile their loss and find new footing in the world.

The Weight of Grief

Grief feels heavy. It’s a weight we feel emotionally and physically; it’s a weight on our thoughts and a weight on our hearts. And, that weight runs even deeper, at a biological level. When we lose someone or something deeply woven into our sense of safety, belonging, or purpose, our brain and body react as though we’ve been injured. Because in many ways, we have.

The Brain in Grief

Neuroscience research shows that the same neural pathways that register physical pain also light up during emotional loss (Eisenberger & Lieberman, 2004). When we ache for someone, as poetic as that sounds, it really isn’t a metaphor — it’s the brain’s pain network lighting up.

The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and insula (two regions involved in processing both physical and emotional pain) become especially active, much like they would if there were a wound on the body. The ACC monitors distress and signals when something important is missing, while the insula helps us register the internal sensations of that pain, such as heaviness in the chest, abdominal discomfort, a lump in the throat, and so on. It’s why heartbreak feels physically real. Our body and brain grieve together.

Grief also disrupts what neuroscientist Mary-Frances O’Connor (2019) calls the brain’s “map of safety.” This map represents the brain’s learned sense of closeness, an internal model of where loved ones are in relation to us. When a person dies, the brain continues to hold their representation, still expecting their presence. The amygdala’s threat-detection system becomes more reactive, while the prefrontal cortex (the part of the brain responsible for reasoning, emotional regulation, and perspective-taking) slows, leaving us disoriented.Over time, the work of grieving is the gradual updating of that internal map: of learning to navigate a world changed by loss while carrying forward the enduring bond of love.
This shift explains why grief can leave us feeling foggy, disoriented, and completely exhausted. Forgetfulness, low motivation, and difficulty concentrating aren’t signs of psychological weakness or avoidance. They are signs that your brain is working overtime to adapt to a world that no longer makes sense, acclimatizing to a world that’s changed.
At the same time, the brain’s dopamine-driven “seeking system”, which fuels attachment and motivation, keeps searching for what’s been lost, that person or situation that once brought comfort. It’s what drives those fleeting moments when you still expect to hear their voice, see their name light up on your phone, or glance toward the door thinking they might walk in.

This neurological mismatch, knowing someone is gone while still feeling they’re just out of reach, is what makes early grief so profoundly disorienting (O’Connor, 2022). The brain is trying to reconcile what the heart already knows.
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Please know that if you’ve been feeling unlike yourself lately (for example, distracted, numb, or irritable), this isn’t you “doing grief wrong.” It’s your nervous system learning to live in a world that’s been rearranged.

Why it Feels Like the World Tilted

​Grief alters our perception.

Colours appear faded. Sounds seem distant. That which once felt ordinary comes to feel foreign.

This sensory dulling, referred to as “emotional numbing”, is another protective mechanism. The body narrows focus to conserve energy while the nervous system learns to live in this new, unfamiliar territory. It’s not that you’ve stopped caring; it’s that your entire being is working to survive the absence. Even time itself can feel altered: the hours stretch, the days seem to blur together. You may find yourself thinking, “I should be doing better by now”. But, healing from grief isn’t a linear process; it’s cyclical, wave-like. The brain and body move between engaging with the pain and stepping back to rest from it. That oscillation, as disconcerting as it may feel, is how adaptation happens.

The same brain that grieves also heals (O’Connor, 2022). Over time and with care, new connections form, allowing love, meaning, and even moments of peace to return.

The Weight You Feel As the Love That Remains

The ache in your chest, the exhaustion in your limbs and slump of your shoulders, the tears that come without warning- I don’t view these as symptoms to get rid of, but instead as expressions of love metabolizing loss. Your body is remembering; your nervous system is reorganizing around an absence. This is the slow, sacred work of mourning.

Sometimes, people fear that if they heal, they’ll forget; that moving forward means leaving their loved one behind. Because of these often unspoken beliefs, it can feel as though remaining in pain is the only way to stay connected, the only way to honour what was lost. Please know that healing doesn’t erase love; it integrates it.
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As grief moves through you, it’s helping your system integrate the reality of loss. Not to forget, but rather to rewire connection in a new form. Over time, the pain that once swept you under becomes a steady current you can move with. The love remains: flowing differently, but still carrying you forward. Healing isn’t about leaving your loved one behind; it’s about allowing love to take new form. One that lives in memory, meaning, and how you continue to carry their presence within you.

A Grounding Practice for the Heaviness

If you’re reading this and feeling the weight of grief in your body, the ache, the fatigue, the fog, I invite you to take a moment to pause. You don’t need to force any of those sensations to shift. Just bring your attention to what is present in your body at this moment. What sensations do you notice?

Not trying to force any of those sensations to shift. Just bring your attention to what is present in your body in this moment. With kind curiousity, notice where the weight of grief is sitting. Perhaps in your chest, your throat, your shoulders, or your stomach. Just noticing.
Shift your awareness now to notice the support of your body in the chair, on the floor, or on the bed. Allow your awareness to rest here. Noticing how your body is being held, supported, where the bits of comfort are.

Take a deep, slow breath in through your nose, noticing the tickle of air at your nostrils. Then, exhale through your mouth, just naturally. Allowing the weight to fall just a little closer to the earth. No need to release it all, perhaps just softening the edges, allowing 1 % to shift.

And, with your breath slow and deep, could you name one small thing that connects you to the world around you? …perhaps a colour you can see in the room around you, a sound you can hear, or a scent that’s in the air. Just noticing with your senses, something that quietly anchors you.

Even in the midst of pain, these small moments of presence begin to reawaken the circuits of safety and connection in the brain.
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One breath, one grounding, one moment at a time. This is how healing begins.
When you feel ready, the next article explores how to gently make space for your emotions and offers practical ways to allow emotion to move through you with a compassionate presence.
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Part 2: Permission to Feel
Part 3: Living Alongside Loss
Part 4: Small Anchors for Dark Moments
Part 5: A Continuing Connection

References

• Boss, P. (2006). Loss, trauma, and resilience: Therapeutic work with ambiguous loss. W. W. Norton & Company.
• Coan, J. A., Schaefer, H. S., & Davidson, R. J. (2006). Lending a hand: Social regulation of the neural response to threat. Psychological Science, 17(12), 1032–1039.
• Eisenberger, N. I., Lieberman, M. D., & Williams, K. D. (2003). Does rejection hurt? An fMRI study of social exclusion. Science, 302(5643), 290–292.
• O’Connor, M. F. (2019). The grieving brain: The surprising science of how we learn from love and loss. HarperOne.
• Panksepp, J. (1998). Affective neuroscience: The foundations of human and animal emotions. Oxford University Press.
  
• Stroebe, M., & Schut, H. (1999). The dual process model of coping with bereavement: Rationale and description. Death Studies, 23(3), 197–224.
  
• Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking Press.