Grieving the Loss of Chosen or Complicated Family Members

Grieving the Loss of Chosen or Complicated Family: When Goodbye Isn't Straightforward

When we talk about family, we often picture the people we’re biologically connected to—parents, siblings, children. But life is rarely that simple. Some of the most important, impactful, or emotionally charged relationships we have are with people who fall outside the traditional idea of “close family.” These might be stepparents, stepchildren, in-laws, mentors, estranged siblings, or people we once called family but hadn’t spoken to in years.

And yet, when one of these people dies, the grief can still cut deep—or stir up a confusing mix of emotions. There’s often no clear script for how to mourn someone you loved in a complicated way, or someone who wasn’t technically “yours” but felt like family anyway.

If you’re facing this kind of loss, this post is for you.

Beyond Blood: The Many Shapes of Family

Family isn’t always about DNA. It’s about history, emotional ties, shared experiences, and the roles we’ve come to play in each other’s lives. Sometimes, the bonds we form by choice—or by circumstance—run deeper than those forged by genetics.

Consider these examples:

• A stepparent who raised you and taught you life’s hardest lessons

• A stepchild you helped raise, supported, and loved—whether or not the relationship was always smooth

• A cousin you barely saw but who always made you feel understood

• A former in-law who remained in your life long after a marriage ended

• A mentor or neighbor who was like a second parent

• A sibling you grew up with but hadn’t spoken to in years

And of course, there are many others who may not be listed here—people whose presence shaped your world, whose voice still echoes in your mind, and whose absence now feels quietly profound. Whether they were family by blood, bond, or brief but meaningful connection, your grief for them is real and valid.

The Complexity of Connection—and Loss

Grieving someone who wasn’t “immediate family” can feel oddly invisible. You might hesitate to express your sorrow out loud, especially if you worry others won’t understand why it hurts so much—or why it hurts at all.

You might also be navigating complicated emotional territory:

• Regret over unresolved tensions or lost time

• Guilt for not being closer or more present

• Confusion about how to talk about the relationship

• Relief, especially if the connection was strained or painful

• A deep, quiet sadness that lingers because the loss isn’t being openly acknowledged

This kind of grief doesn’t always come with casseroles and condolences. People may assume you’re okay—or that you “weren’t that close.” But grief doesn’t need a formal role or title to be valid. It simply needs to be felt.

You Have Permission to Grieve

Here’s something that’s important to hear:
Your grief is real. Your relationship was real. And you don’t need anyone else’s approval to feel what you feel.

Grief can be messy, contradictory, and nonlinear. It doesn’t care about legal status, family trees, or the last time you spoke. It only knows that something has shifted—and that part of you is trying to make sense of that change.

Whether your connection was loving, fraught, or both, you’re allowed to grieve in your own way and time.

Honoring the Loss, Your Way

There may not be a clear place for you at the funeral. Maybe no one else is talking about it, or maybe you’re the only one who really feels it. That’s okay. You can still honor the loss. Here are a few ideas:

1. Write a letter

Say the things you didn’t get to say. Share the impact they had on your life—good, bad, or both. Writing can be a powerful release.

2. Create a personal ritual

Light a candle. Visit a meaningful place. Look through old photos. You don’t need permission to mark the moment in your own way.

3. Talk to someone who gets it

Whether it’s a trusted friend, a therapist, or a support group, sharing your grief with someone who listens without judgment can be healing.

4. Name your emotions

It’s okay to feel sad, angry, grateful, numb, or all of the above. Naming what you feel gives it shape and helps you process it with more self-compassion.

When Relationships Were Difficult or Unresolved

Grieving someone you had a complicated or painful relationship with brings another layer of complexity. You might be mourning the relationship you wished you had, not the one you actually did. Or you may feel a strange sense of closure mixed with sorrow.

This too is valid.

Grief isn’t just about mourning who someone was—it’s also about grieving what could have been. And sometimes, letting go of that hope is the hardest part.

You Don’t Have to Navigate It Alone

The path through grief is never one-size-fits-all—especially when the relationship was outside the usual boxes. Depending on your circumstances, you may need support, structure, or simply space to be heard.

🌱 If you’re ready to explore this with guidance, I offer one-on-one sessions to help you process and find meaning in the messiness.
📆 Book a time with me [here] to begin.
🎥 Prefer to move at your own pace? My self-paced video-based training dives deeper into grief, mindfulness, and emotional healing:

You can explore the introductory Gentle Grief Bundle [here].

Or if you wish to go deeper into navigating your grief experience and transform it, you can find my master class Navigating Grief and Loss [here].

Whether you're grieving loudly or quietly, in public or in private, know this: your feelings matter. Your story matters. And your grief is worthy of care.

With compassion,
Yasemin Isler

Befriending Grief: A Mindful Approach to Living with Loss

Befriending Grief: A Mindful Approach to Living with Loss

Yasemin Isler

January 2025

As a grief companion, end-of-life doula, mindfulness teacher, and academic, I have come to understand grief not as a disruption to life, but as a natural—and at times, sacred—expression of love. Grief, in its many forms, is not something to move through quickly or fix, but rather to meet with care, presence, and a willingness to listen.

In a culture that often urges speed, resilience, and productivity, grief rarely finds the time or space it needs. But the truth is, grief doesn’t follow a timetable. It doesn’t respond to pressure. It asks something far deeper of us: to be witnessed, not rushed. To be honored, not solved.

Mindfulness, as both a contemplative practice and an evidence-based approach to emotional regulation, offers a powerful, gentle way to relate to grief. It invites us to stay present to what is unfolding, moment by moment, without judgment or resistance. And in this presence, we begin to discover something unexpected—not relief from grief, but relationship with it.

Grief as a Natural Response

Grief is not a sign that something has gone wrong. It is the emotional and physiological response to loss—whether the loss of a person, a relationship, health, identity, or a future we once imagined.

While our cultural scripts often try to frame grief as a temporary detour—something to “get through”—what I’ve seen in both clinical settings and personal practice is this: grief is not linear, and it does not vanish. It changes form, it softens, it integrates—but it remains a part of the human experience.

This is not something to fear. It is something to respect.

What Does It Mean to Befriend Grief?

To befriend grief is not to make it pleasant or welcome. It is to stop treating it as the enemy.

The word befriend implies relationship. It suggests that rather than exiling grief or forcing it to silence, we allow it a seat at the table of our inner life. We allow it to speak, even if only in whispers. And we commit to listening.

This approach doesn’t make grief easier. But it does make it less isolating. It transforms the experience from something we must endure alone into something we can explore with awareness and kindness.

The Role of Mindfulness in Grieving

Mindfulness is the practice of turning toward the present moment with curiosity and care. It allows us to notice what is arising—physically, emotionally, mentally—without trying to change it immediately. This is especially powerful in grief, which often shows up as waves: sudden, unpredictable, and strong.

A mindful approach to grief does not suppress emotion. Nor does it romanticize pain. Rather, it honors the full spectrum of what it means to feel deeply. Here are a few principles I share with those I support in grief, whether in hospice care, bereavement groups, or one-on-one sessions:

1. Grief Lives in the Body

Grief is not just a cognitive process. It lives in the body—tightness in the chest, restlessness in the limbs, the heaviness of fatigue. Mindful body awareness allows us to tune into these somatic expressions with compassion. Placing a hand on the heart, noticing the breath, or even simply naming physical sensations can create a sense of safety and support in the present moment.

2. Emotions Are Visitors, Not Residents

Through mindfulness, we begin to see emotions as passing weather systems—not permanent states. One moment may be filled with sorrow, the next with numbness, and the next with unexpected joy. None of these are wrong. They are simply part of the emotional landscape of loss. The more we allow ourselves to feel without judgment, the more these emotions can move through us, rather than become lodged within us.

3. No Timeline, No Comparison

There is no “correct” way to grieve. Some people cry easily; others rarely do. Some talk openly; others process quietly. Mindfulness teaches us to notice the tendency to compare our grief to others’, and gently return to our own experience. In the words of mindfulness teacher Jon Kabat-Zinn, “You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.”

The Power of Ritual and Reflection

In my experience as both a doula and a scholar, I’ve observed the deep human need for ritual—not as rigid tradition, but as meaningful pause. Ritual creates a container for the complexity of grief. It offers a structure in which we can acknowledge, remember, and release.

This might look like:

• Lighting a candle each evening in memory of someone loved

• Writing a letter to the person or version of ourselves we've lost

• Walking the same path each morning while repeating a quiet affirmation

• Practicing a weekly moment of silence or reflection

These small acts do not require any particular belief system. They require only intention. They help us remember that grief is not separate from life—it is woven into it.

Grief as a Companion, Not a Destination

Over time, many people discover that grief does not disappear, but transforms. It becomes less acute, less consuming—but more integrated. It becomes a quiet companion, reminding us of what mattered, of what shaped us, of how deeply we were able to care.

When we allow mindfulness to support us in this process, grief softens—not because we’ve willed it to, but because we’ve met it fully. We’ve stopped running. We’ve begun listening.

And often, what we hear is not just sorrow. It is memory. It is meaning. It is love, still echoing.

A Compassionate Invitation

If you are grieving—or supporting someone who is—my invitation is this:

Allow yourself to slow down.

Allow yourself to feel without needing to fix.

Allow yourself to honor what was, even as you begin to reorient toward what is.

You don’t have to do this all at once. You don’t have to do it perfectly. Mindfulness is not about performance. It’s about permission—the permission to be exactly where you are, with exactly what you feel.

Grief is not a weakness. It is a measure of our capacity to love.

Closing Reflections: Walking with, Not Away From

As a mindfulness practitioner, I often return to the words of poet Rainer Maria Rilke, who wrote: “Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.”

Grief invites us into that truth. It reminds us that we are not machines, but beings capable of profound connection and loss. And while we may not choose grief, we can choose how we relate to it. We can meet it with mindfulness, with breath, with ritual, and with the quiet courage it takes to stay present.

This is not a path out of grief—but a path through.

And if we can walk it gently, with awareness and care, we may find that grief does not only mark an ending—but also reveals the depth of what it means to live, to love, and to remain human.

Yasemin Isler is a certified mindfulness teacher, end-of-life doula, grief guide, and academician  in the field of contemplative practice and grief, and the creator of the MCCG framework. With a background in Mindfulness Studies, integrative thanatology, trauma-informed facilitation and somatic healing, she supports individuals and communities in navigating loss with presence, integrity, and compassion.

Through one-on-one guidance, workshops, and writing, she offers practical tools for living—and grieving—mindfully. Yasemin believes that grief, when met with care, becomes not a weight to carry alone, but a bridge to deeper connection, meaning, and growth.