WPSU Grief

11/01/2025

“It was very heavy time. The air in our house felt very heavy and very empty too, because he was gone.”

Darin Jensen’s husband, Daniel, died in 2015. Darin is now sole-parenting their three children, Ella, Jack, and Max.

His story is part of Speaking Grief, a multiplatform public media initiative aimed at creating a more grief-aware society.

For more: speakinggrief.org.

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

10/31/2025

Grief is a part of life.

It’s normal and natural to grieve.

If we can accept that, it becomes a lot less scary.

For more, visit: https://speakinggrief.org

10/30/2025

10/29/2025

"One of the things that I recalled was somebody saying to me, ‘You'll get over it eventually.’ I'm sure that they meant well, but it wasn't the right thing to say, because there's no timeline with grief. It's not that one day you wake up and you say, ‘Huh, guess what? I'm done grieving now.’ That's not the way it works."

Beatriz McKee's brother, Oscar, died in 2017.

“You wake up and, if you make it through a day without crying, then you had a great day.”

For more insight on grief: https://speakinggrief.org/get-better-at-grief/understanding-grief/grief-is

10/28/2025

“People will say, ‘Let me know what you need.’

That's not helpful.

Expecting the person who's bereaved to be able to identify what they need from you is like giving a non-mathematician a very complex math problem and telling them, ‘Figure out the answer and then let me know what it is.’

What the bereaved need is that friend, that neighbor, that family member to say, ‘Hey, I'm gonna pick up the kids today,’ or ‘I’m going to bring food.’

So, being very concrete about the help that's being offered would truly help the bereaved as opposed to just saying, ‘My deepest condolences. Let me know if you need anything.’”

Cristina M. Chipriano, LCSW-S, director of Equity & Community Outreach at Dougy Center, is featured in Speaking Grief.

For more from Cristina, visit: https://speakinggrief.org

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

10/27/2025

No two people will grieve the same way. We need to hold space for the many different ways grief shows up for people.

For more, visit: https://speakinggrief.org/experts/ted-rynearson

10/26/2025

“Grief can really take a toll physically on people. Grief can make you feel exhausted, like you really can't get out of bed. Grief can change your appetite. Grief can also cause inflammation in the body, so you often hear of individuals having issues after the death of a loved one, and we believe that there may actually be a biological cause to that.” - Julie Kaplow, Executive Director of The Trauma and Grief Center at The Hackett Center for Mental Health

For more insights from Julie: https://speakinggrief.org/experts/julie-kaplow

10/25/2025

“There are elegant ways to manage awkward and uncomfortable situations.”

Megan Devine, psychotherapist and author of “It’s Ok That You’re Not OK,” offers a formula for offering support while respecting boundaries:

“A great way to do that would be ‘I’m going to offer some things and you let me know if that's something you would like.’ Things like, ‘I want to make things as easy as possible for you. I would love to come over on Tuesday and pick up the recycling. Would that be OK with you?’ Or, ‘In situations like this, I get nervous and I clean. I would love to come over and clean your house for you, would that be OK?’

What a gift that is to come up underneath somebody and give them support exactly where they are so the only thing that they have to do is fall apart.”

For ideas of help you can offer, visit: https://speakinggrief.org/get-better-at-grief/supporting-grief/support-ideas

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

10/24/2025

When it comes to grief support, we have it backwards. We think if we talk about the person who died, we are going to make the grieving person sadder. But what we’re actually doing is giving that person a chance to remember someone they love—and to show them that we remember, too.

Talk about the person. Share a memory. Say their name.

For more: speakinggrief.org

10/23/2025

Grieving can interfere with normal cognitive functions.

“If you think that the mind as having 100 circuits of energy, grief takes up 99 of those. Grief is like your brain turning this information over and over and over and trying to find a place where it fits. It’s not going to fit, but your mind is trying to make it so. It’s trying to make this story work out in a way that is acceptable. How do you make this death acceptable? You can’t, but your brain's working on it, which means that you have one unit of energy left for everything else.” - Megan Devine, Psychotherapist and Author of Its OK that You’re Not OK

“Grief is enervating. It draws energy from people as they're going through it. It takes time for people to process and to remember and to come to term not only psychologically, but physiologically in terms of what's going on in the brain during this whole process.” - Ted Rynearson, M.D., Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Washington

To learn more about the experience of grief, visit: speakinggrief.org

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

10/22/2025

Cognitive effects of grief are sometimes referred to as “grief brain” or “grief fog.” Grief can impact our ability to concentrate and make decisions. It can be difficult to think clearly and remember things. Items might be misplaced more often. Names forgotten. Tasks undone.

Be gentle with yourself.

Be gentle with the grieving people in your life.

For more, visit: speakinggrief.org

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

10/21/2025

Grief ebbs and flows. It can catch you by surprise at the most unexpected of moments.

If you’re grieving, try to be gentle with yourself when your grief catches you off guard.

If you’re supporting someone who is grieving, try to be mindful that even if they seem like they are having a good day, their grief is still there.

For more, visit: https://speakinggrief.org

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.