The Quiet Ways Grief Reshaped Me
and What I’ve Seen in My Clients Too
Grief doesn’t always look like sobbing on the floor or wearing black for months. Sometimes it sneaks in as forgetfulness, as overstimulation, as feeling like you’re no longer yourself and not quite sure how to come back.
I used to think the most intense part of grief would be the beginning; the funeral, the days I couldn’t stop crying, the raw heartbreak after losing my dad and then my long-term relationship unraveling not long after.
It's been 5 years today. Looking back now I can see that it was years two and three that truly undid me.
At that point, the world around me expected me to be “better.” I was functioning; working, traveling, seeing friends, even laughing again. But inside, my nervous system was wrecked. I didn’t have the language for it at the time, but what I was experiencing wasn’t weakness or brokenness…it wasn’t just grief. It was compound grief and it was living in my nervous system.
I thought I was becoming someone different; more forgetful, irritable, numb. But in truth, these weren’t personality changes… they were my nervous system doing everything it could to protect me from what felt unbearable.
What is Compound Grief?
Compound grief happens when multiple losses occur before you’ve had time to process the first. It can be deaths, breakups, career loss, big life shifts; anything that forces a part of you to grieve. And when they stack one after another, your nervous system doesn’t get a break. It doesn’t get to settle or integrate. It simply tries to survive.
That doesn’t make you fragile. It means you’re carrying more than anyone ever should.
Looking back now, I realize that the fog I was living in…the forgetfulness, the disconnection, the exhaustion were all survival responses. My system had gone into protective mode. And these are some of the little ways grief reshaped me that I didn’t really expect.
I become forgetful
Names, dates, simple tasks slipped through my fingers like sand. I’d forget what I was saying mid-sentence. I wasn’t “scatterbrained”. I was overwhelmed.
I couldn’t tolerate noise
Sounds I used to tune out now made my skin crawl. Overstimulation felt unbearable. I needed silence, space, and so much more rest than I was giving myself.
I overthought everything
Every conversation, every decision; I replayed them in my head on a loop. I didn’t trust my own judgment anymore.
My Memory became jumbled
Time felt distorted. Moments blurred together. I couldn’t always remember what happened when, or how it felt.
I was always exhausted
Not just tired… deeply, systemically depleted. My body was working so hard to just keep going.
My tolerance was so low
Things that never used to bother me suddenly felt overwhelming. I felt raw and easily flooded.
I emotionally shut down
When I began to feel too much, I’d go numb. Dissociation became my default. It was safer not to feel.
I started to expect the worst
Life felt fragile. I found myself bracing for something else to go wrong. Joy felt risky.
I struggled to connect
Especially with people who hadn’t experienced deep loss. There was a gap, like we were speaking different emotional languages.
What the Nervous System Has to Do With It
What the Nervous System Has to Do With It
Grief activates your stress response system. The same one that responds to trauma. Your body doesn’t just know you’re sad…it feels that something is no longer safe.
When that grief is compounded, your system gets stuck.
You might move through life in a state of freeze, dissociation, hyper-vigilance, or shutdown; not because you’re doing something wrong, but because your body is trying to protect you.
The truth is: your numbness, forgetfulness, or disconnection are not failures.
They are survival.
Your body is doing what it must to keep you alive in a world that’s lost too many pieces.
What I Know Now…After Healing
Now, with time, support, a lot of therapy and somatic work, it’s a lot easier to see how, when, and where healing happened.
Grief didn’t ruin me. It rewired me.
And in some ways, it brought me home to myself, but in a deeper, softer, more attuned way.
I now hold space for others in these quiet, confusing middle chapters; the in-between seasons when life keeps moving, but you still feel stuck. When you’re still carrying what no one can see.
If that’s where you are:
You’re not broken.
You’re grieving.
And your nervous system (your body, your mind, your heart) is doing its best to love you through it.
And If You’re Still in it
If you're in the thick of it…forgetting things, withdrawing, bracing for more loss, or wondering why life feels so heavy when you're "supposed" to be okay by now; please know you're not behind. You're not doing it wrong. You're simply carrying a kind of pain the world isn’t built to understand.
There is no timeline for this work.
There is only tenderness, truth, and time.
Your nervous system is wiser than you think. Remember: It’s not broken, it’s protecting you. And even if your healing looks quiet, slow, or non-linear, it’s still happening.
But here's the beautiful part:
Healing doesn’t just soften the pain. It can restore what felt lost.
You start to remember things again.
You start to trust joy again.
You begin to feel more like you again.
Maybe not the same version, but a wiser, deeper, more embodied one.
One who carries both grief and grace.
You don’t need to rush your way back to joy.
You just need space to be human again, with people who can meet you in that place.
This is why I do the work I do.
To hold space for the invisible layers of grief, for the heartbreak that doesn’t announce itself, and for the nervous systems trying to find their way home.
You're allowed to be soft.
You're allowed to be uncertain.
You're allowed to heal in your own way.
And you don’t have to do it alone.