Supporting Young People Through Grief
With Understanding, Presence, and Compassion
Watching someone you care about navigate grief, feeling unsure of what to say or do, and worrying about whether you’re doing it “right” can feel overwhelming. When that someone is a young person somewhere between childhood and adulthood, it can feel even more complex. They are trying to find their place in the world, develop their identity, and build independence, all while grief has unsettled everything around them. Grief is messy, non-linear, and sometimes contradictory. One moment your young person might be withdrawn and quiet; the next, they’re laughing with friends or taking risks they wouldn’t normally consider. It can be tempting to want to fix things, reassure, or solve. But here’s the first truth to carry: your young person doesn’t need their grief fixed. They need someone to witness it, stay present, and hold space, especially when it’s uncomfortable.
Being supportive is about presence, not solutions. It’s about walking alongside them, offering stability, and creating space for their grief.
Truth and Honest Communication: Building Safety Through Words
Honest communication helps young people feel safe and seen after a loss. Clear, truthful, and compassionate answers, even about uncertainty, build trust, calm fears, and respect their capacity to process grief. Avoiding truth can leave them confused, isolated, and unsure whom to rely on.
Continuing Bonds: Keeping the Connection Alive
Continuing bonds let young people keep those they’ve lost close in heart and memory. Through letters, stories, keepsakes, or small rituals, they find comfort, guidance, and a way to carry love forward. Supporting these connections shows that remembering can heal, not hinder life.
Normalisation: Validating Their Experience
Grief can make the world feel upside down, and young people may worry their feelings are “wrong.” Reassuring them that emotions like anger, laughter, numbness, or relief are all valid helps lift shame, reminds them they’re not alone, and validates their experience.
Agency and Empowerment: Restoring a Sense of Control
Agency helps young people reclaim control in a world made unpredictable by loss, letting them choose how to grieve, remember, or express themselves. By offering guided freedom and trusting their instincts, adults restore dignity, voice, and a sense of steadiness.
Looking after yourself is not a detour from supporting a grieving young person, it’s part of the path. Your presence, patience, and steadiness are strengthened when you tend to your own well-being. In caring for yourself, you create a safer, calmer, and more compassionate space where grief can be witnessed, felt, and processed.
This guidance is for anyone supporting a young person through grief - teachers, youth workers, mentors, and parents. Some of you may be grieving your own loss, perhaps even the unimaginable pain of losing a child. Others may be walking alongside someone else’s grief while navigating your own emotions. Either way, attending to your own wellbeing is essential: it allows you to stay present and provide the steadiness that young people need.
Continuing the Journey
Grief doesn’t end; it changes shape, just as we do. As you support a young person, you’re part of a shared human story of love, loss, and growth. Keep learning, reflecting, and tending to your own heart as you walk beside them.
“What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.”
— Helen Keller
Explore Additional Resources for Adults – books, podcasts, and trusted websites to deepen your understanding and care.