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Dr. Chrysoula I. Liakou MD, PhD
- Treated online: Yes, for assessment and support; grief itself is not an illness, and the consultation distinguishes normal grief from depression and prolonged grief, arranging support or referral only where it genuinely helps.
- What it is: the natural response to loss: waves of sadness, longing, numbness, anger, guilt and disbelief that gradually space out over months, with anniversaries restarting them for years.
- Grief or depression: grief comes in waves tied to the loss, with moments of comfort and connection in between; depression is flat and constant, with worthlessness and loss of interest in everything, and it is treatable.
- Prolonged grief: intense longing or preoccupation still disabling 12 months or more after the loss affects roughly 1 in 10 bereaved adults; grief-focused psychotherapy helps.
- Normal experiences: briefly hearing, sensing or vividly dreaming of the person who died, and physical symptoms such as poor sleep, appetite loss, aches and exhaustion, are common in bereavement and not signs of illness.
- Emergency: if you are having thoughts of ending your life, or someone's safety is in immediate danger, call 112 now.
Grief itself is never an emergency, but what it sets in motion sometimes is. If you are having thoughts of harming yourself, or feeling that life is not worth living, use the crisis information in the red box lower on this page now, not an appointment queue. If you have stopped eating and drinking, or cannot look after yourself, arrange urgent in-person help today.
Can an online doctor help with grief?
Yes, in a specific and honest way: not by treating grief as a disease, but by checking what the loss has set in motion. A video consultation can distinguish normal grieving from depression and from prolonged grief disorder, help with weeks of broken sleep, and refer you to bereavement counselling or therapy where it genuinely helps.[1]
How an online consultation helps after a loss
- Someone outside the circle: Everyone around you is grieving too, or managing you gently. A doctor is a private, neutral person you can be honest with, including about the feelings nobody says at funerals: relief, anger, guilt, numbness.
- The depression check: Loss can trigger genuine depression, which deserves treatment in its own right. The doctor knows the difference between mourning and illness, and tells you honestly which is happening.
- Sleep help without false promises: Weeks of broken sleep make everything harder. The doctor treats sleep honestly: habits and CBT-I first, with plain talk about what sleeping tablets can and cannot do.
- Routes to real support: Bereavement counselling, peer groups and grief-focused therapy exist across Europe; the doctor helps you find what fits and refers you where referral is needed.[5]
What does normal grief feel like?
Grief arrives in waves rather than as a steady state: ambushes of yearning, sadness, anger, guilt or numbness, set off by songs, smells, dates and nothing at all. Physical symptoms are normal too: chest ache, hollow stomach, exhaustion, forgetfulness. Briefly sensing, hearing or dreaming vividly of the person is common and not a sign of madness. There is no timetable.[2]
Between the waves, most grieving people can still connect, function in bursts, and even laugh, then feel guilty for laughing; the guilt is normal and misplaced. Culture shapes mourning profoundly, from how long is expected to how loudly it is shown, and there is no correct style. Grief also does not resolve so much as change size: the loss stays, and life gradually grows around it. Anniversaries, birthdays and the administrative cruelties of loss (the letters, the accounts, the forms) restart waves months or years later, which is normal and says nothing bad about your progress.
About the "five stages"
You will meet the famous five stages everywhere, and they deserve honest framing: they began as a description of facing one’s own dying, not a schedule for the bereaved. Real grief does not move through tidy stages, and missing one is not failure. Most people oscillate instead, between confronting the loss and getting on with life, and both halves of that oscillation are the work of grieving, including the days that look like avoidance.[2]
Is it grief or depression?
Grief comes in waves, with moments of connection and even pleasure preserved between them, and self-worth usually intact: the pain is about the person missing. Depression is flatter and more constant: little lifts it, worthlessness and guilt spread beyond the loss, and hopelessness attaches to everything, not just the absence.[1] The two can coexist, and loss is a common trigger for depression, especially with previous episodes.
The distinction matters because the responses differ: normal grief needs support, not treatment, while depression after loss deserves the same proper care as depression at any other time, described honestly on the depression treatment page. Thoughts are part of the check, said plainly: missing the person, even wishing you could join them, appears in normal grief; planning to harm yourself does not, and needs crisis support today, not a booked appointment.
What is prolonged grief disorder?
Prolonged grief disorder is a recognised condition in the WHO’s ICD-11: grief that stays at full intensity instead of changing size, with pervasive yearning or preoccupation most days, far beyond what your culture expects, usually identified when this has continued for a year or more and daily life cannot restart.[2] It is more likely after sudden, violent or premature losses, and after losing a child or partner.
Naming it is not medicalising love: people with prolonged grief are stuck in pain, not devoted, and grief-focused psychotherapy genuinely helps.[2] If a year or more has passed and every day still belongs entirely to the loss, that is the moment to talk to a doctor, because this particular kind of stuck rarely frees itself, and freeing it is not forgetting.
What kind of help fits your situation?
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| Presentation | Likely first step | Suitable for online care? | When referral or in-person care is needed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Recent loss, painful but you are functioning | Time, people and routines; support information if wanted; no medical treatment needed | A consultation is optional, for reassurance | If mood flattens into depression, or coping stops |
| Sleep broken for weeks since the loss | Online sleep assessment and an honest sleep plan | Usually yes | If exhaustion makes driving or work unsafe, or mood is falling |
| Low mood that no longer lifts, with worthlessness or hopelessness | Depression assessment; therapy referral, medication discussed honestly | Usually yes | Thoughts of self-harm need crisis support first |
| A year or more on, grief still dominates every day | Assessment for prolonged grief; referral to grief-focused therapy | Yes, for assessment and referral | Specialist psychotherapy leads treatment[2] |
| Thoughts of harming yourself, or that life is not worth living | Crisis support today | No: crisis support comes first | Call 112 in an emergency, or find your national crisis helpline at findahelpline.com |
Not sure which of these is you? A doctor can tell you in one consultation.
See available times →What the doctor checks in an online grief consultation
Mostly, the doctor listens; grief consultations are unhurried by design. Woven through the conversation, a careful assessment happens:
- The loss itself: who died, when, and how; sudden, violent and premature losses, and deaths you witnessed or could not be present for, carry higher risk of complicated grieving and are asked about gently.
- How the days are going: sleep, eating, work, washing, bills; function is the honest measure of how much support is needed.
- Mood, beneath the grief: structured screening for depression, because the overlap is real and the treatments differ.
- Time and trajectory: not to judge your pace, but because grief that is unchanged or intensifying after many months changes the advice.
- What you are using to cope: alcohol and sedatives creep up quietly in bereavement, and asking is routine, not accusation.
- The support around you: who is there, who checks in, and whether the support faded at the three-month mark, as it usually does, just when the numbness wore off.
- Safety: asked plainly and kindly, every time.
Treatment options for grief and bereavement
What helps most grieving people
Not treatment: scaffolding. Anchors hold the day up: regular meals, daylight, a walk, bedtime. Contact matters more than conversation, and telling the story of the person, repeatedly, to anyone patient enough, is processing, not wallowing. Bereavement counselling and peer support groups help many people, especially when the loss is isolating or the people around you are part of it; counselling offers a trained listener, groups offer people who actually understand, and neither requires anything to be wrong with you.[5] Writing to or about the person, rituals and visits help others. Two honest cautions: avoid major decisions in the first year where you can, because grief is a poor adviser with money and houses; and watch the nightly glass that becomes three, because alcohol postpones grief with interest, and wrecks the sleep you are drinking for.
Sleep support and medication, honestly
No medication treats grief, and normal grief should not be medicated: sadness after loss is not a disorder, and blunting it does not shorten it.[1] What a doctor can treat is what grief sets in motion. For the broken sleep of bereavement, the honest first line is behavioural: fixed wake time, daylight, no alcohol as a sleep aid, and the CBT-I approach described on the insomnia page.[3] Sleeping tablets are occasionally considered for a few nights at most; they are not a solution, they add grogginess to exhaustion, and controlled hypnotics such as benzodiazepines and z-drugs are not prescribed online. When genuine depression has taken hold, it is treated properly, with talking therapy and, after full assessment, sometimes an antidepressant, with reviews booked rather than assumed.[1] A prescription is never issued without a consultation.
When online support with grief is enough, and when you need in-person care
Supported online: the grief-or-depression question, answered honestly; broken sleep after loss; anxiety that loss has amplified, including health anxiety about the illness that took the person, covered on the anxiety page; referral to bereavement counselling and grief-focused therapy; and follow-up appointments, because the hardest month is often not the first one.
In-person care: thoughts of harming yourself go to crisis support now, via 112 or findahelpline.com, including mid-consultation; prolonged grief goes to grief-focused psychotherapy, with the referral made properly; grief with psychotic features, or where you cannot eat, drink or care for yourself, goes to urgent in-person care; traumatic bereavement with intrusive images and flashbacks goes to trauma-focused therapy; and bereaved children and teenagers are directed to specialist child bereavement services, which do this work best.
When to get in-person care
Get urgent in-person help today if grief has stopped you eating and drinking, if you cannot care for yourself, or if you are experiencing frightening symptoms such as seeing or hearing things beyond brief, familiar moments of sensing the person. If someone’s safety is in immediate danger, call 112 now.
If you are having thoughts of harming yourself, call 112 in an emergency. You can also find your national crisis helpline at findahelpline.com. You do not have to wait for an appointment.
How Mobi Doctor works
- Book a time that suits you: open daily 7am–11pm CET. You can see a doctor over video, usually within 15 minutes. No subscription, exact price up front.
- Speak to a licensed doctor about grief and bereavement: a private video call: you describe what you feel, the doctor asks what matters, and you agree the right plan together.
- Leave with what fits: reassurance that grief is grief, a sleep plan, a referral, or treatment where depression has truly taken hold, never imposed.
No sign-up needed
Grief affects people in different ways. Tick what you are going through to see each page that mentions it. A doctor can talk it through with you on a video call.
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Not sure this is the right page? Look up any symptom in the full symptom checker, or book and describe it to a doctor.
Frequently asked questions about grief and bereavement
What is grief?
Grief is the natural response to losing someone or something that mattered: a bereavement above all, but also a diagnosis, a relationship, a job or a home. It brings waves of sadness, longing, numbness, anger, guilt or disbelief, often with poor sleep and exhaustion, and it is not an illness; it is the cost of having loved.
What does normal grief feel like?
Normal grief comes in waves rather than a steady state: intense sadness or longing that arrives without warning, then an hour or a day of ordinary life. Numbness, disbelief, irritability, guilt, relief and even laughter all belong to it. Appetite, sleep and concentration suffer for weeks. Between the waves there are still moments of comfort and connection, which is one of the things that separates grief from depression.
Are the stages of grief real?
The five stages (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) were described in people facing their own death and were never meant as a timetable for grief. Most bereaved people do not move through fixed stages; they oscillate between facing the loss and getting on with life, and both are healthy. Not feeling a stage, or feeling them out of order, is not grieving wrongly.
How long should grief last?
There is no correct duration for grief, and cultures mourn differently. Most people find the waves gradually space out over the first year, though anniversaries and birthdays restart them for years, which is normal. The concern is not slow grief but frozen grief: when, 12 months on, the longing is still as intense and disabling as in the first weeks, that pattern deserves assessment.
Is it grief or depression?
Grief comes in waves tied to the loss, with moments of comfort, humour and connection in between, and self-esteem usually survives. Depression is flat and constant: nothing gives pleasure, worthlessness and hopelessness take over, and the low mood no longer tracks thoughts of the person who died. The two can coexist, and depression after bereavement is treatable, which is why the doctor screens for it.
What is prolonged grief disorder?
Prolonged grief disorder is grief that stays at full intensity: persistent longing or preoccupation with the person who died, with intense emotional pain and an inability to re-engage with life, still present 12 months or more after the loss and well beyond what their culture expects. It affects roughly 1 in 10 bereaved adults, and grief-focused psychotherapy has good evidence for it.
Do I need to see a doctor about grief?
Usually not: grief is not an illness, and most people come through with time and support. See a doctor about grief when sleep has been broken for weeks, when low mood stops lifting and hope drains from everything, when a year on the longing is as raw as at the start, when you are using alcohol to cope, or when thoughts of not wanting to be here appear.
Can a doctor prescribe anything for grief?
Not for grief itself, and an honest doctor will say so: sadness after loss is not a disorder, and no tablet shortens it. What can be treated is what grief sets in motion: depression, after proper assessment, and sleep, where a short, planned approach helps; controlled sedatives are not prescribed online, and grief-focused therapy does more than any medicine.
Is it normal to hear or sense the person who died?
Yes. Briefly hearing their voice, sensing them in a room, or dreaming of them vividly is common in grief and is not a sign of mental illness. It usually fades gradually. If experiences become frightening, constant, or are joined by beliefs others find impossible, or if you have stopped eating, drinking or sleeping, that is the point to see a doctor.
How can I cope with grief day to day?
Coping with grief means letting the waves come rather than fighting them, keeping some structure (meals, daylight, a walk, sleep at roughly the same time), saying the person's name and telling the story to people who can listen, accepting practical help, going easy on alcohol, which deepens low mood and ruins sleep, and expecting the hardest days to come later than others expect. Avoiding every reminder tends to prolong grief rather than protect you.
Can grief make you physically ill?
Yes. Grief raises stress hormones and disrupts sleep and appetite, so exhaustion, headaches, chest tightness, digestive upset, a weaker immune response and flare-ups of existing conditions are common in the months after a loss. Chest pain that is new, severe or comes with breathlessness still needs 112, because grief and heart problems can coincide, particularly in older people.
How can I help someone who is grieving?
Help someone with grief by showing up and staying: say the person's name, ask about them, listen without fixing, and offer specific practical help rather than 'let me know'. Keep contact going months later, when others have moved on and the hardest weeks often arrive. Suggest a doctor if they cannot sleep for weeks, stop eating, drink heavily, or talk about not wanting to be here.
What is bereavement counselling, and do I need it?
Bereavement counselling gives you a protected hour with a trained counsellor where the loss can be spoken about without managing anyone else's feelings. Not everyone with grief needs it; good support from family and friends carries many people. It earns its place when the loss was sudden or traumatic, when you have no one to talk to, or when grief is not easing months on.
- Depression in adults: treatment and management (NG222), NICE, National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, 2022.
- ICD-11, International Classification of Diseases, 11th revision (includes prolonged grief disorder), WHO, World Health Organization, 2022.
- Insomnia, NICE Clinical Knowledge Summaries, revised 2024.
- Guidance and resources on bereavement and mental health, European Psychiatric Association, accessed August 2026.
- Bereavement and grief, HSE, Health Service Executive (Ireland), accessed August 2026.
- Grief after bereavement or loss, NHS, National Health Service (UK), accessed October 2026.
This page is for information only and is not a substitute for a medical consultation. Guideline links are provided for transparency; treatment decisions are made with your doctor.
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