Loss is a part of life—inevitable, painful, and deeply personal. I have gone through it. More than once. And each time, it left behind a hollow that no words, no rituals, no reassurances could immediately fill.

What I remember most is how quickly the world wanted me to “get back to normal.” Friends and family were kind, but uncomfortable. They changed the subject when I brought up a memory. They distracted me with outings, advice, even jokes. I know it was all well-intentioned—they didn’t want me to drown in sadness. But maybe it was also their own fear. Maybe they didn’t know how to deal with my grief because they hadn’t dealt with their own.

And so, I carried it quietly. In those days—the nineties—grief was something you endured privately. There was no talk of therapy or support groups. Certainly no breathing exercises, visualisations, or affirmations. I didn’t know such techniques existed. I coped the way many of us did—through silence, prayer, the rituals I had grown up with, and the sheer passage of time. I got through it. But I often wonder: if there had been space to speak, to cry freely, to be heard without being fixed—would the healing have been gentler?

The medical response wasn’t much better. Grief, if it lasted too long, was often treated like a clinical problem. There was talk of antidepressants, sleeping pills—anything to quiet the mind and sedate the heart. But grief isn’t an illness. It’s an ache of love with nowhere to go. And numbing it only hastens its return.

Today, thankfully, there’s a growing recognition that healing from loss requires more than medication. Practices like breathwork, meditation, journaling, and trauma-informed therapy are slowly gaining acceptance. They offer ways to stay with the pain instead of running from it. I haven’t personally used them for bereavement, but I’ve explored some of them in recent years—and I can see how they might have helped back then. It gives me hope that those grieving today have more tools, more compassion, and more understanding available to them.

And yet, in India, formal support for the bereaved remains rare. Grief support groups are few and far between. Most people still rely on religious teachings—karma, rebirth, surrendering to God’s will—for solace. These beliefs can be powerful. They offer perspective and a sense of continuity beyond death. But faith alone cannot carry the entire burden of grief. We need safe, secular, shared spaces too—where pain can be voiced without shame, and sorrow can be shared.

What we need is not to be told that “life goes on,” but to be reminded that it’s okay to pause, to cry, to remember. That mourning is not a weakness, but a way of honouring love. That healing doesn’t mean forgetting. It means learning to carry the memory with grace instead of pain.

I have made peace with my losses—not by moving on, but by making space for them in my life. Grief, I’ve learned, softens over time, but it never disappears. It becomes part of who we are. And if we let it, it can deepen our compassion—for ourselves, and for others walking the same silent road.

(Dr A.L. Sharada Trustee, Population First.  She can be reached at alsharada518@gmail.com)