After a loss

When someone close to you dies, the weeks afterward can be hard to get through. Here's some company for those days, and how to tell when it's time to call your doctor.

The days after a death

Someone you loved has died, and the rest of the week still has to happen. The trash goes out on Tuesday, the mail keeps coming, and the cashier at the store asks how you're doing as if it's an ordinary week. Maybe it was a parent whose voice you've known your whole life, a brother or sister, or a friend you never had to explain anything to. People sometimes say a parent lived a long life, as if a number should settle the matter. You're allowed to miss them as much as you do, however long they lived.

If you've lost a husband or wife, the page on widowhood fits that loss more closely. If the hard part is the date coming around again a year or more later, read anniversary of a loss. This page covers the weeks and months after any death that hit you hard, and every one of those griefs counts.

Grief and a low mood

Grief and depression can look alike from the outside. Both can keep you home, put you off your food, and make tomorrow feel like a chore. Feeling sad after a death is a normal part of losing someone. Still, if the heaviness stays for weeks, doesn't ease with sleep, or starts to frighten you, tell your doctor. Sorting grief from depression is their job, and you don't need to figure it out on your own first.

You can still be raw while the errands go on. Their coat might still hang in the closet, and their number might still be in your phone. You don't have to put on a brave face to make other people comfortable, and if a neighbor needs you to be fine, that's for the neighbor to handle.

Medicine, and how long grief takes

If you take an antidepressant or any other prescribed medicine, keep taking it as prescribed. A death isn't a reason to stop, skip, or change a dose. Crying a lot doesn't prove the medicine has failed, and you don't need to come off it to grieve properly. If you have questions, write them down and take them to the doctor who prescribed it.

No one can tell you how long grief should last or which feelings are the right ones. Relief and sadness can show up on the same afternoon, especially after a long illness, and feeling relief doesn't make you a bad person. If the relationship was complicated, you're allowed to be sad without tidying it into gratitude first. When a voice in your head says you should be further along by now, you can answer it gently and carry on with your day.

Getting through the day

A few small habits can help you get from morning to evening while you and your doctor look after the bigger picture. Eat at the table, even if it's a small plate. Say the person's name out loud once, to a friend or to the empty kitchen. Then tell one person the truth: "Today is hard, and I'd like some company more than advice."

If the hardest part is the long evening with no one to talk to, try the loneliness room, especially long evenings at home. If it's the first hour of the day that gets you, read heavy mornings.

If you need care

If you're in crisis in the United States, call or text 988 (https://988lifeline.org/) now, before you read any further. You don't need a good reason or the right words, and you don't have to decide whether your grief counts. If you're outside the United States, call your local emergency number or a local crisis line. A real person can stay on the line with you.

If you're not in crisis but the heaviness keeps hanging on, tell your doctor what the days since the death have been like. Keep any prescribed medicine as it is until you've talked it over together. There's more in the depression room, short definitions in the glossary (including depression and adjunct to care), and short answers in the FAQ. Nothing on this page is for sale. This page is not yet medically reviewed.