Naming Your Grief: The Different Kinds of Grief and Why They Matter

Grief wears many faces, and not all of them are connected to death. While most of us recognize grief after losing a loved one, there are countless other forms of loss that shape our lives, some more visible, others hidden.

By learning to name the grief we carry, whether it’s ambiguous, disenfranchised, anticipatory, or collective grief, we begin to understand its impact, honour its presence, and create space for healing.

In this post, we’ll explore the different kinds of grief and why recognizing them matters for our personal and collective well-being.

Ambiguous Loss

Ambiguous loss occurs when you are not sure about what exactly you have lost, but a felt sense of loss lingers, and/or it may surface when something or someone has profoundly changes or disappeared.

There is a high sense of ambiguity when the deatils of the loss are unknown, or when you are uncertain if things will get better or return to "normal"/how they once were.

This type of loss often leaves people grappling with the feeling that things have forever changed, while they may also be holding onto hope that maybe one day things will return to "normal" again.

It often feels hard because we like to have answers, we like to solve problems and make sense of things. Many of us are uncomfotable with the unknown and that is what abignuous loss brings. The "not knowing" entangled with ambiguous loss is often deeply uncomfortable for most, and an uncertain place for many of us to exist within.

In our society, we are driven towards mastery, we want to find answers to our unanswered questions. The more mastery oriented we are, the harder it is to live with our unanswered questions and to be in the "unknown".

Examples of Ambiguous Loss:

• Grieving someone who is still aliveness

• Loss of closeness, physical proximity, separation, not able to be together in person

• Relatioship dynamics have chnaged an therefore you ha be grieving how your relationship once way

• your person may be physially present bu psychologically absense - such as in the case with dementia, alzheimers, mental health challenges, substance use, etc

• Disappearance

• No contact or estrangement

If this sounds like something you are navigating or that you're curious to learn more about, check out our blog post - Navigating Ambiguity: Loss without Closure

You may also like this book - Ambiguous Loss: Learning how to Live with Unresolved Grief

Non-Death Loss

Non-death losses are the related to the grief we feel towards the loss of anything signifcant, to your physical, psychological, spirtual, and/or interpersonal lives.

The way we meet grief isn't always through death. We grieve in quiet ways too - the job we outgrew, the friendship that faded, the hometown we chose to leave, the version of ourselves that we no longer recognize. These non-death losses ofte go unseen, and unspoken, but they have a way of rocking our foundation and shaping us in their own unique ways.

Throughout life, you may experience many forms of non-death loss, some of which feel bigger and heavier than others.

Examples of Non-Death Loss

• Identity and sense of self

• Loss of purpose or direction

• Loss of faith or spirituality

• Deep personal healing (grieving who you were before)

• The grief that comes with growth

• Break ups and divorce

• Betrayla, infidelity, or broken trust

• Estrangement from family

• Community and belonging

• Longing for eldership

• Life Transitions

• Loss of safety, security, faith, or something otherwise important to you

• Work or financial stability

For a more thoughrou exploration of Non-Death Loss, read our blogpost here - Non-Death Loss: or Navigating Heartbreak: Understanding Grief After a Relationship Ends

Disenfranchised Grief

Not all grief is loud. Some of it lives in silence, in the spaces where no one thought to look, in losses that aren't publically mourned, and in the endings no one noticed or bothered to acknowledge.

Disenfranchised grief is the grief that is not recognized by society. The kind that lingers quietly in the corners - unwitnessed, unnamed, and often invalidated.

From others you may hear things like:

• "It's not a big deal, you have lots of time"

• "It's been months, just start dating again"

• "At least..." (.. you know you can get pregnant, .. you have another kid)

• "They weren't family or they weren't even nice to you, why are you sad?"

This kind of grief often goes underground, but it doesnt diappear. It gets internalized, stored in the body, and echos in the soul. Grief (all kinds) longs to be witnessed, not fixed, rushed, or reasoned away. It wants to be held, in cirlce, in community, in the presence of another heart that says "I see your sorrow, and it matters".

Examples of Disenfranchised Grief:

• Pregnancy loss, miscarriage, or abortion

• Death of an ex, or an estranged loved one

• Breakups, friendships or romantic relationships

• Feeling deep sorrow after the ending of a toxic relationship

• Grief over chronic illness, or loss of ability

• Not becoming a parent/ longing to be a parent

• Identity shifts anf spiritual awakenings

• Loss of dreams, future plans, or imagined lives

Anticipatory Grief

I often refer to this type of grief as the grief that comes before the goodbye, or before the ending. Anticipatory grief is the kind of sorrow that doesn't wait for death or the final goodbye. It lives in the quiet in-between, when you know something is coming, but it hasn't ended or happened yet.

Maybe you're watching someone you love slip away, slowly (for any reason), or maybe you're mourning a version of your life that no longer feels possible or accessible. Maybe you're bracing yourself for change, but no one else seems to understand why you're already grieving.

Anticipatory grief is the loss that occurs before a potential loss occurs. Often surfacing when a situation arises that leads a person to think or consider that death (or loss) could be a real possibility. You may begin to anticipate the loss and grieve aspects of the loss before it even occurs.

This type of grief often brings up our deepest fears, we begin to imagine the unimaginableand plan for a future without our person. Often we keep these thoughts and feelings hidden inside because we fear what might happen if we speak those fears out loud.

You might experience or notice:

• Deep sadness or fear

• Guilt for grieving too early or while they are "still here"

• Hieightened anxiety or irritability

• A need to plan, control, or "do something"

• Emotional numbness

  
  

Grief doesnt wait for death, it begins in the space of impending change. You are not wrong for feeling this way. This grief is valid, you are not "jumping ahead". Grief is wise, your body and your heart often know much before your mind can catch up.

Examples of Aniticipatory Grief:

• Illness

• People engaging in risky behaviours

• Impending ending of a relationship

• Times of celebration - birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, that are missing someone significant

• Thinking about the inevitability of our own death or the death of a loved one

• Watching a loved one show signs of aging

• Fears of the unknown

• Relapse

Secondary Loss

Secondary loss refers to the layers that come with loss. When we talk about loss we often think of the "big" moment - the death, the break up, the ending, the rupture (this is what we call the primary loss). But grief rarely arrives alone, it brings with it quiet unpoken secondary losses.

Secondary losses are the ripple effects that follow the primary loss. They show up quietly, sometimes months or even years later, and they can hit just as hard.

When a primary loss occurs, many grieveing people find themselves grappling with the impact of many secondary losses that often go unacknoweldged. It may feel like a domino effect, one thing happens and then there is a range of other losses that follow (seen and unseen). Secondary losses can be extremely challenging, as they compound upon the primary loss.

Examples of Secondary Losses:

• The loss sense of self or of identity

• The shift in relationship, from partnered to single

• The end of future plans, hopes and dreams

• The fading of a sense of safety, home, or belonging

• Finacial loss or instability

• Loss of a job

• Shift in roles or expectations

• Loss of community

• Loss of faith and beliefs

• Loss of health

• Lost of time

• Loss of future hopes, dreams, and plans

Non-Finite Grief

Not all grief has a clear ending. Non-finite grief is the ongoing , living grief we carry when the loss we are experiencing is not abolute, when what we long for it still partially here.

Examples of Non-Finite Grief:

• A loved one is physically present but emotionally distant

• A chronic illness or condition reshapes your identiy, way of life, and way of being in the world

• A relartionship changs form, and youre left to mourn what used to be and what may never be again

• A dream dies slowly, but not all at once.

• Your idea of what day to day life is "supposed to" look like versus how it actually is

• the idea and expectations about the natural order of life events

• how the big events in our lives are or were "supposed ot" look, or how we wanted them to be - maybe its your graduation, your prom, your baby shower, your wedding, your best friends wedding, your 30th or 60th birthday, your retirement, celebration, funerals and celerations of life.. the list goes on and on.

• Uncertainty we hold about what is going to happen next

When things are looking the way we imagined them to in our mind, there can be a deep sense of grief that arises.

We may feel like we should be grateful for what we have, so we rationalize with ourselves that other people have it worse, and while these things may be true - that doesnt take away from the pain of these experienced. Your grief is valid regarldess of yor loss and regalrdess of what someone else may be going through.

Cumulative Grief

Grief doesnt always wait its turn. Sometimes, losses stack and compound, one after another, layer upon layer.

Cumulative grief is what we feel when multiple losses, big or small, pile up without time, space, or support to fully process them before the next loss occurs.

Cumulative grief or cumulative loss, speaks to the experience of suffering a new loss, before you have had a chance to grieve the first loss, and/or when you have experienced multiple losses in a short amount of time.

Often, there is a sense of cummulative grief that comes with any type of loss, beacuse as mentioned above, a primary loss comes with a range of secondary losses which can add to the pain and stress we are experiencing.

You might experience or notice:

• Feeling unusally heavy, even if the most recent loss seems "minor"

• A wave of emotion that doesn't quite match the moment

• Old grief resurfacing, even if you thought it was "done"

This is the weight of grief that never had a chance to breathe.

At Weaving Grief, we believe that no loss is too small, too big, too old, or too complicated to be honoured. It all belongs here. Cumulative grief calls us to slow down, to tend gently, and to give voice to what has been quietly carried for too long.

Collective Grief

Collective grief is the ache we carry together. It pulses through our communities, our cultures, and it is felt in our bones. It is the grief that is felt by a group. When a community, group of people, or a nation exprience an extreme change or loss, or experience the ripple affects of a massive change or loss.

Examples of Collective Grief:

• Natural disasters

• Death of a public figure

• Climate change and climate worries, and/or disconnection from the natural world

• War

• Genoc*de

• C*vid

• +++

Anniversary Grief

Sometimes it's the date on the calendar that reminds us, but not always. Our body remembers too. For many, the body often remembers before the mind does.

Maybe you experienced a sudden heaviness, a wave of exhustion, tears for "no reason", or a sense of dread, even when everything else seems "fine". Ony later to realize, oh... It's that time of year again. Our bodies remember. Even when we've tried to forget, and even when we're not consciously aware.

Grief is often experienced in waves, and the intensity and frequency of the waves may increase on or around anniversaries. You might notice that you feel more tired, more tender, or more irritable. You might wonder, why am I feeling like this AGAIN? The answer lives deep in your bones.

This is not a "set back", it is a rememberance. This is your body whispering, "this mattered, and it still does".

May you honour what arises here, you are not broken or moving backwards, you are being asked to witness and to be with what is as it arises. You may wish to check in with your tender heart during these times and ask, "what is my grief asking of me today?" and let it show you the way through.

Examples of Anniversary Grief:

• Date of death

• Date of a diagnosis

• Date of hospitalization

• Birthdays

• Holidays

• "The last day we.."

• Significant personal dates

• An ordinary day that was turned sacred by loss

• The day or moment that everything changes

Traumatic Loss

Some losses don't just break our hearts, they shatter our entire world.

My mentor, Dr Joanne Cacciatore explains traumatic loss as death that comes suddenly, violently, or our of the natural/expected order of life. These losses don't just bring sorrow and grief, they rupture our very sense of safety and belonging in the world.

Traumatic loss is often emotionally and existentially overwhelming, and arises when we experience unexpected loss, loss out of natural order, or when the nature of the death is violent, sudden, or otherwise traumatic.

Nature of the Death:

• Traumatic loss often involves unnatural, violent, or untimely eaths, such as homicide, suicide, or accidents. These are losses that strike with sharp, disruptive force.

• Even non-violent but unexpected deaths can be traumatic, such as the death of a younger person.

• The death of a child, at any age, is always traumatic forthe parent.

The emotional impact of tramatic loss shatters ones expectations and assumptions - about safety, the meaningfulness of life, and the reliability of the world. This type of loss may lead to feelings of disorientation,insecruity, and a sense that "nothing can ever be the same" - that the world you once knew is broken and forever changed.

Traumatic bereavement is often chracterized by a level of shock and disturbance that effectively overwhelms the indviudals ability to cope.

Examples of Traumatic Loss:

• Unexpected loss

• Loss out of natural order

• The death of a child at any age

• The death of a parent that is unexpected or sudden

• The death of someone "in their prime"

• The death of a partner or spouce that is unexpected or early

• Homicide

• Suicide

Gentle Reminders

When we expand our understanding of grief beyond death, we begin to see how deeply loss is interwoven into the fabric of being human. Naming our grief doesn’t mean we reduce it—it means we tend to it with reverece and care. By recognizing the many ways grief shows up, we open the door to compassion, self-awareness, and the possibility of moving through pain with greater tenderness.

Regardless of how grief has showed up in your life, grief is never something we simply "get over" or "move on from", it's an initiation into a new reality, one that calls for deep compassion, gentle presence, witnessing, and communal support. You will find all of that here, at Weaving Grief, it is our mission to ensure grieving hearts have the care and support they need to carry the pain of loss.

Whatever form your grief takes, remember that it matters, and so do you.

For More Grief Related Support, Read:

• Navigating The Storm: 6 Essential Strategies for Surviving Grief

• The Fear of Unravelling: Embracing Vulnerability in Grief Work

• Making Space for Grief: A Practical Guide

About Us:

Weaving Grief specializes in compassionate grief therapy for individuals navigating loss of any kind - death, breakups, relationship transitions, chronic illness, loss of self, and more. By addressing these profound experiences, Weaving Grief empowers clients to grieve freely and live fully. Through somatic practices and meaningful reflection, we’re here to help you navigate these tender moments and rediscover the fullness of life.

Specific areas of focus: death of a loved one (recent or past), life changing transitions, relationship transitions and break ups, pregnancy loss, grief around family planning, chronic illness, loss of Self, and supporting entrepreneurs through the grief that comes with growth.

To learn more about Our Team or to book a session, click here

---

In this blog post: Discover the different kinds of grief—including ambiguous loss, disenfranchised grief, traumatic grief, and collective grief—and how they shape healing.

types of grief | different types of grief | ambiguous loss | non-death grief | disenfranchised grief | traumatic grief | collective grief | anticipatory grief | secondary loss | non-finite loss | cumulative grief | anniversary grief | grief and loss psychology | grief education | kinds of grief | grief responses | grief support | coping with loss | understanding grief | naming grief | grief psychoeducation | kinds of loss