Why Mental Health Awareness Should Include Grief

Grief is rarely part of the mental health conversation, but it should be.

We talk about anxiety, depression, and burnout — but not the loss underneath so many of them. The quiet grief that follows endings we didn’t choose. The one that lingers long after condolences fade.

Grief doesn’t only arrive when someone dies. It can follow divorce, illness, identity shifts, or the slow disappearance of a life you thought you’d have. It rewires how we think, sleep, eat, and connect. It changes our capacity to cope — and sometimes, just to function.

If we truly want to build awareness around mental health, we have to acknowledge how deeply grief runs through it. We have to stop treating it like a temporary detour and start seeing it as part of the human condition.

For anyone supporting someone in grief — or navigating it yourself — knowing what to say and how to show up makes a difference.

Download the Grief Etiquette 101 Guide — a gentle starting point for learning what helps, what hurts, and how to offer real support.