From the Desk of Dr. Melanie

Navigating grief can feel overwhelming. And if you've ever searched online for ways to cope, you already know what happens next. Multiple articles with lists appear. Usually with the same ten recommended items. Journal. Exercise. Join a support group. Practice gratitude. Get more sleep. Try meditation. Eat well. Talk to a friend. Set boundaries. See a professional if needed. Every item on the list is legitimate. And for most grieving people, the list itself can become its o

There is a particular kind of loneliness that shows up in faith communities, one I don't think gets talked about nearly enough. It's the loneliness of grieving in a room full of people who love and trust God, and quietly believing that your grief means something is wrong with your faith. I have felt it myself at different points in my faith journey. The instinct to apologize for tears in a place that is supposed to hold them. The pressure to arrive at peace faster than peac

I recently spoke with a college student who was deciding whether to change her major entirely. She was trying to make that decision clearly and carefully while also quietly grieving the recent death of her grandparent. Nobody helping her navigate the academic decision had asked whether grief might be part of why it suddenly felt so difficult to think clearly about her future. There was no obvious opening for her to discuss how grief and academic uncertainty might be affecting

A friend of mine is in the final stretch of a major professional milestone, the kind that takes years of sustained, exhausting effort to reach. She is also, right now, working full-time. And underneath both of those things, she is grieving three losses at once: the end of a romantic relationship, a best friend she is no longer close to, and her therapist, who died recently. Only one of those is a death. None of them come with bereavement leave, a card from HR, or a single d

We talk about grief almost entirely as an internal experience. Something that happens inside a person: a wave of sadness, a wound that needs healing, a series of stages to move through. That framing isn’t wrong. But it is incomplete, and the missing piece may help explain why some people seem to disappear after a loss, even when they are surrounded by people who love them. Here is what I have come to believe after years of studying social networks and living through my own si

A layoff is often described in business terms. A restructuring. A reduction in force. A realignment. A cost-saving measure. A difficult but necessary decision. But for the person receiving the news, it can feel like life has been interrupted. Not just work. Life. Your calendar changes. Your routine changes. Your sense of security changes. Sometimes even your sense of identity changes. The plans you were quietly building around that paycheck, that title, that team, or that fut

As the anniversary of my son's death approaches, I think about another version of myself — the woman who, in the rawness of those first weeks, was expected to return to work after loss and simply carry on. My family and I had just moved to a new city. I was months into a new role at a new company — still learning colleagues’ names, still finding my footing. And then I lost my 15-year-old son. My world stopped. My inbox did not. The expectation communicated to me was that I wo