What happens in your brain when someone you love dies? How can understanding the science of grief help you cope with loss?
The Grieving Brain, a book by Mary-Frances O’Connor, explores the neuroscience behind loss and healing. Drawing from her research at the University of Arizona’s GLASS Lab, O’Connor reveals how our brains create maps of loved ones and must literally rewire themselves after a death.
Continue reading to discover why grief feels the way it does and find practical insights for navigating this universal human experience.
The Grieving Brain Book Overview
The human brain responds to loss in ways that surprise, confuse, and often distress us, which can make it difficult to navigate the grieving process. The Grieving Brain, a book by Mary-Frances O’Connor, explores the neurological basis of grief and how our brain’s learning systems grapple with understanding and adapting to the permanent absence of someone we love. O’Connor emphasizes that grief is not simply an emotional state to “get over” but rather a complex learning process in which our brains must literally rewire themselves to accommodate a new reality.
O’Connor is a professor of psychology at the University of Arizona. She’s the director of the Grief, Loss and Social Stress (GLASS) Lab, and she has published extensively in academic journals about the brain’s response to grief, complicated grief, and the physiological effects of bereavement. Her work has helped establish grief research as a distinct field within neuroscience.
In our overview of this book, which was published in 2022, we’ll explain how grief works in the brain and how it manifests in our lives and our thoughts. We’ll also provide insights into how you can make navigating grief easier.
The Neurological Basis of Grief
Before we discuss how grief affects our brains, we must first understand the evolutionary origin of grief. O’Connor explains that our brains have evolved to keep track of our loved ones. In order to do this, we create neural “maps” to understand where they are in relation to us. These are virtual representations of our surroundings that make it easier for us to navigate through the world. For example, you don’t have to relearn the layout of your office every day you go to work—that would be energy- and time-consuming and would make it harder for you to function in that space. Instead, your brain builds a map of that space, and you use this map every time you go to the office to navigate through what you know—or expect—will be there.
According to O’Connor, the brain’s mapping system evolved first to help creatures find food, but it later adapted to tracking social connections and loved ones. Beginning in infancy, our brains form attachment bonds to our caregivers, and we learn that they will be there for us when we look for them. If they’re not there, we know that they’ll soon return. This expectation becomes hardwired into our brains, and as we form attachments with other people, they come to occupy spaces in our neural maps. The brain identifies a pattern (for example, coming home from work and seeing your spouse) and makes predictions based on that pattern (“When I come home from work, I’ll see my spouse”).
This mapping system is important because without it, we wouldn’t be able to understand that our loved ones will return if they’re not currently here. To illustrate, O’Connor describes how pair-bonded Emperor penguins must spend months incubating their eggs while their partner goes to find food. If the incubating penguin believed their partner wouldn’t return, they’d have to go find their own food, leaving the egg to die. The maps in the penguin’s brain allow it to wait for the return of its partner. They served the same function for evolving humans—without these maps, if our caregiver or mate left to get food for us, we’d assume they’d be gone forever and wouldn’t wait for their return. We’d be unable to function the way we need to in their absence.
How Death Affects the Brain’s Maps
According to O’Connor, death presents a unique challenge to this mapping system because it requires us to comprehend that someone no longer exists in time or space—a concept that doesn’t fit with our brain’s basic operating principles. Just as it would be incomprehensible to wake up and find that water no longer exists, our brains struggle to process the permanent absence of someone who was integral to our mental map of the world.
This is why grief healing takes time: It’s not about the passage of time itself, but about accumulating new experiences that gradually update our brain’s predictions and maps. Each day without the person provides new data that slowly helps our brain adapt its expectations. This learning happens automatically, regardless of our conscious intention, which is why going about daily life—even without actively “grieving”—contributes to the healing process. In the same way that you can’t jump from learning the basics of a new language to immediately being fluent, this learning process of grief healing can’t be rushed.
How Grief Affects Our Thoughts
We’ve explained the neurology behind grieving, but grief also manifests psychologically—in our thoughts. O’Connor explains that grieving represents a transformation in the way our brains work. This causes different types of thinking that may feel uncontrollable, confusing, or unhealthy, but most of the time they’re a natural part of the grieving process. Understanding why these thoughts happen can help us feel less controlled by them and better able to deal with them. We’ll examine contradictory beliefs, intrusive thoughts, counterfactual thinking, and rumination as responses to grief.
Contradictory Beliefs
O’Connor explains that grieving people often maintain two contradictory beliefs simultaneously: the knowledge that their loved one is dead, alongside a persistent feeling that the person will return. This can make it difficult for the grieving person to adjust to life without their loved one. For example, they may struggle to get rid of their loved one’s belongings, believing on some level that their loved one will return and need those belongings again. O’Connor explains this phenomenon through both evolutionary and neurological perspectives.
From an evolutionary standpoint, the belief that loved ones will return served an important survival function. Those who maintained this belief were more likely to stay with and protect their young while waiting for their partner to return with food, which made their offspring more likely to survive and continue to pass on these traits.
The neurological basis for these contradictory beliefs lies in different types of memory and knowledge systems in the brain. Episodic memories, such as the specific moment of learning about or witnessing a death, exist alongside implicit knowledge, or knowledge gained from experience, which guides our thoughts and behaviors without our awareness. The conflict between explicit episodic memories (knowing your loved one has died) and implicit knowledge based on predictions from our brain’s attachment maps (believing your loved one will return) creates an internal contradiction that takes time to resolve.
Intrusive Thoughts
O’Connor also discusses intrusive thoughts about the deceased, which often come unexpectedly during everyday activities. These are involuntary thoughts that catch us off guard emotionally and can be upsetting because they remind us of our loss. For example, you may be doing laundry as you do every week when suddenly the memory of your lost spouse forces its way into your awareness.
In contrast, says O’Conner, voluntarily remembering lost loved ones can have a soothing effect. For example, you may deliberately reflect on or recount a fond memory of something funny your spouse once said. Intrusive thoughts may seem more frequent than voluntary thoughts, but research shows that they’re just as common—they only feel more frequent because they catch us by surprise.
O’Connor explains that intrusive thoughts are actually a normal brain function, similar to how we naturally think about living loved ones throughout the day. The brain continues its pattern of regularly reminding us about the deceased person, which becomes painful because these thoughts now conflict with reality. Understanding intrusive thoughts from this perspective helps normalize these experiences as part of the brain’s learning process rather than viewing them as signs of poor coping.
Counterfactual Thinking
Counterfactual thinking involves imagining alternative scenarios that could have prevented the death. These are thoughts such as “If I had done something different, my loved one might still be alive.” While this type of thinking feels compelling and can help distract us from our grief, it’s ultimately illogical and doesn’t help us adapt to loss. O’Connor suggests that people engage in counterfactual thinking because believing we had control over a situation, even if we failed to prevent a death, feels better than accepting that bad things can happen for no reason.
Rumination
O’Connor explains that rumination is another common aspect of grieving. Rumination involves spending time thinking over your memories or negative feelings, and it can be helpful or harmful, depending on the type of rumination. O’Connor discusses rumination as a type of avoidance—known as the rumination as avoidance hypothesis (RAH)—and suggests that engaging in repetitive thoughts about the loss is a way to avoid the emotions associated with the loss.
O’Connor distinguishes between two types: reflection and brooding. Reflection involves purposefully analyzing your thoughts and feelings to solve problems, while brooding is passive, repetitive negative thinking that you can’t easily stop. Research shows that reflection can actually lead to decreased depression over time, while brooding predicts increased depression.
What you ruminate on can also affect how helpful it is in your grieving process, explains O’Connor. Ruminating on how you feel about the loss can help lessen your grief over time. However, ruminating on how other people have reacted to your grief (such as others’ suggestions that it’s time for you to move on) or on how unjust the death was is associated with less reduction in grief.
O’Connor also explains the concept of co-rumination—the practice of discussing problems and negative feelings at length with close friends. While this can strengthen friendships and provide emotional support, research shows it can also increase depression and anxiety, creating a cycle where people seek more co-rumination as they become more depressed.
Models of Grief
Now that we’ve explained how grief works in the brain and how it affects our thoughts, we’ll explore the ways the grieving process can manifest in our lives.
O’Connor explains that most people’s understanding of the grieving process comes from the five-stages model developed by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in 1969: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Kübler-Ross developed this model from interviews with terminally ill patients, cataloguing the feelings they described and incorporating those into her five-stages model. While there are merits to this model, there’s no empirical proof for it, and it has since been misapplied as a rigid formula for how people should grieve. Thus, people whose grief doesn’t follow these five stages often feel that they’re grieving incorrectly.
Instead, O’Connor advocates the dual process model of coping with bereavement, developed by Margaret Stroebe and Henk Schut. This model identifies two types of stressors: loss-oriented (emotional responses to the death) and restoration-oriented (practical challenges of life without the deceased). The model’s key insight is that people oscillate between facing these two types of stressors, and this flexibility is crucial for healthy grieving. The dual process model challenges earlier beliefs that grieving requires constant confrontation with loss, suggesting that taking breaks from grief can be beneficial for long-term adjustment.
For example, after losing a spouse, you may spend one day or part of a day immersed in memories of your loved one and all the feelings that come with that (loss-oriented stressors). Then, later, you go see a movie (that you might previously have gone to with your spouse) with a friend (restoration-oriented stressor). You’re spending part of your time confronting your feelings, and part of your time adjusting to life without the deceased without focusing on your feelings.
Four Trajectories of Grief
In addition to discussing the models of grief, O’Conner also discusses how depressive symptoms can manifest during the grieving process.
Depression and grief can look similar, but the key difference is that depression permeates every part of life, while grief is specifically focused on the loss of the loved one. O’Connor identifies four distinct trajectories grieving can take in relation to depressive symptoms. These are: 1) resilience, where people never develop depression after their loss, 2) chronic grief, where depression begins after the loss and persists, 3) chronic depression, where pre-existing depression continues or worsens, and 4) depressed-improved, where pre-existing depression actually improves after the loss.
The five stages model assumes that everyone experiences depressive symptoms during grief. However, research shows that resilience—the first trajectory—is the most typical response to loss.
Complicated Grief
In some cases, grieving seems to go on longer than is typical, to the point that it becomes chronic. This type of grief is often referred to as prolonged grief disorder, though O’Connor prefers the term “complicated grief,” as it suggests complications in a natural healing process, similar to complications that can occur in physical healing. People experiencing complicated grief feel fixated on their yearning for their lost loved one, and they exhibit symptoms of trauma as a result of their loss. O’Connor emphasizes the importance of careful diagnosis of this condition, warning against over-applying the term “complicated grief” to normal grieving processes that simply take time to resolve.
While it’s unclear what causes complicated grief, O’Connor cites research showing that people experiencing complicated grief had lower brain volume and performed slightly worse on cognitive tests than people experiencing a resilient grief trajectory. Based on this, some scientists have concluded that cognitive impairment predisposes people to complicated grief. However, O’Connor notes several issues with this research, including its reliance on averages (meaning the data can’t be generalized to specific cases), limitations in sample populations (the research focused on older adults specifically), and attributing causation (she argues that complicated grief might contribute to cognitive decline instead of being caused by it).
O’Conner writes that treatments such as Complicated Grief Therapy (CGT), developed by Kathy Shear, can help people through this condition. CGT helps people address both loss-related and restoration-related stressors through exercises such as revisiting memories of the death, imagined conversations with the deceased, and developing new meaningful activities. If you think you may be experiencing complicated grief, consider seeking out CGT or other grief-oriented therapies.
Dealing With Grief
Though understanding how grief works neurologically and psychologically can be helpful, people often desire more concrete advice for how to navigate their grief. O’Connor acknowledges that there are many limitations to grief advice: Even though everyone experiences grief, no one can provide a universal roadmap of how grief will feel to anyone else or how to handle it. She explains that while she can share scientific knowledge about grief and her personal experiences, each person must find their own way through grief based on their values and beliefs. Just because your grieving doesn’t seem to mirror the path you think it should take doesn’t mean you’re grieving “wrong.”
Still, O’Conner offers some potential ways people can better navigate through what they’re feeling after a loss. These include living in the moment, connecting with others, and embracing grief as a type of learning.
Live in the Moment
We’re often tempted to try to numb our feelings after a loss and avoid thinking about the present, as the grief can feel so overwhelming. While it may initially be unbearable to face reality, the present offers possibilities for healing and connection. O’Connor argues that attempting to avoid painful feelings by disconnecting from the moment also blocks positive experiences and learning opportunities. Instead of tuning out of what’s going on right now, she recommends that you try to be mindful in the moment and stay aware of your surroundings and the people around you.
This doesn’t mean you can’t spend time thinking about the past or the future. Choosing to engage with the present doesn’t mean forgetting the deceased, O’Connor explains. Rather, healthy grieving involves maintaining the ability to move between memories of the past and engagement with the present, without using either as a way to avoid the other. Remember your loved one, but also spend time thinking about the bonds you have now and the things you can look forward to.
This may sound difficult, but according to O’Connor, doing it deliberately will help rewire your brain to make the grief easier to handle. Research shows that practicing awareness in the moment can strengthen connections between different brain networks, potentially helping with adaptation to loss. She emphasizes that while it’s natural for thoughts to wander to the deceased, developing the ability to return attention to the present is a skill that can be cultivated.
Connect With Others
O’Connor also recommends connecting with others through your grief. Loss can make you feel profoundly alone, but everyone experiences grief, and understanding that can make it feel less lonely. She suggests that shifting your perspective to recognize our common human experiences can help you feel closer to others, even during intense grief. This connection can provide comfort and support during the grieving process.
You can also work to cultivate bonds with new people. O’Connor acknowledges that it can be challenging to form new relationships after a loss: She explains that new relationships often trigger fresh grief and uses the concept of loss aversion to explain why new relationships might not feel as satisfying initially—psychologically, we view losses two times more intensely than gains, so a new relationship would have to feel twice as good as your relationship with your lost loved one in order to feel equally satisfying. She emphasizes that the goal isn’t to replace the deceased but to create new meaningful connections that are different but still fulfilling.
Embrace Grief as Learning
O’Connor asserts that grief is a form of learning, but one that’s particularly challenging. When someone dies, our brains must update countless predictions and habits that involved the deceased person—reworking our neural maps. We must learn that they no longer exist in the physical dimensions we expect and find new ways to maintain our bonds with them; we must also learn to stay grounded in the present while maintaining a transformed, dynamic relationship with the deceased that reflects our current self and the wisdom gained through grieving. Understanding this process can make it easier to undergo it.
O’Connor recommends taking on a growth mindset—the belief that you have the capacity to learn and improve—to help you develop a set of tools to get you through the grieving process. O’Conner explains that everyone can learn and grow through grief, regardless of their starting point or intellectual abilities. When you’re feeling stuck, she recommends seeking new strategies from others who have experienced and learned from their grief, while recognizing that each person’s journey is unique.
