What Grief Does to Your Brain (And Why It Feels So Strange)

Grief isn’t just emotional, it reshapes your brain and impacts your body in unexpected ways. In this episode of DEAD Talks, Mary-Frances O’Connor, author of The Grieving Body, explains why loss feels so disorienting and how our minds struggle to accept it.

From memory and perception to heart health and immune function, grief is a full-body experience. Understanding these effects can help us process loss and adapt more healthily.

Mary-Frances O’Connor is a leading researcher on grief, focusing on why some people have difficulty adjusting and the biological responses that make moving forward so challenging.

Get Mary-Frances' book The Grieving Body here: https://a.co/d/aH2tDne

Follow Mary-Frances on Instagram:   / doctormfoconnor  

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Chapters:

0:00 – Intro
2:12 – The Physical and Emotional Impact of Grief
5:50 – The Broken Heart Syndrome
8:30 – The Brain’s Struggle to Process Loss
14:00 – Protest and Despair
16:43 – Talking About Death Is Helpful?
23:00 – Seeking and Solving
28:20 – Grief as a Learning Process
31:38 – The Role of Stress in the Grieving Process
35:50 – How Perception Affects Grief
39:40 – How People Participate in This Studies
41:30 – Other Types of Grief
47:47 – Finding Love Again After Loss
49:46 – Final Thoughts & Mary-Frances Book

DEAD Talks with David Ferrugio engages death a little bit differently. Each new guest shares their experience with grieving or perspective on death in a way that shatters the “don’t talk about death” taboo. Grief doesn't end; it evolves. Having lost his father on September 11th when he was 12, he learned the importance of discussion and sharing other people's stories. DEAD Talks Podcast hopes to make it a little easier to talk about grief, loss, death, mourning, trauma, or whatever it may be. You may cry, but you also may laugh.

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