Coping with Cultural Bereavement During Year-End
Cultural bereavement can result in sadness, pain, and a yearning for the past.
Posted December 12, 2025 | Reviewed by Tyler Woods
As we prepare for the holidays, decorate the house, and plan gatherings and visits, we also reflect on past years. We remember good times, meals, festivities, and past rituals. These reflections may prompt us to bring out our old photo albums and reminisce. We might feel homesick for the homes, communities, and societies that now only exist in our memories. As we reflect on the past, we miss those who are no longer with us. Such loss can lead to both personal and cultural bereavement . Cultural bereavement is experienced when we long for food, music, rituals, and customs that shaped our earlier lives. Cultural bereavement is particularly powerful among immigrants, but everyone goes through periods when they miss the ways of the past, where they long for people, places, and times that are longer exist or if they do, they are no longer available to us. Cultural bereavement often occurs alongside personal bereavement, presenting unique challenges for older adults who retain deep memories of previous eras and traditions.
Cultural bereavement is experienced when ways of life have irrevocably changed. It could result from the loss of a loved one, the loss of health, the loss of community through a move, the loss of a country due to migration and immigration, the loss of social trust due to political change, and the loss of a way of life due to social change. When, for whatever reason, we must cope with a new and transformed cultural reality, we experience a degree of cultural bereavement. It is a reaction of grief experienced when that which is familiar no longer exists (Eisenbruch, 1990).
Acknowledging our grief and honoring our loss is an adaptive and healthy response to cultural transformation. However, our feelings of grief and loss can also lead to complications that undermine our enjoyment of the present. This is especially true during anniversaries and holidays, times of stress that intensify our memories of the past. Cultural bereavement can result in sadness, pain, a yearning for the past, and even survivor's guilt . It can even provoke anger and despair about the present. How can we cope with the emptiness, loss, and sadness we feel when we experience cultural bereavement? How can we enjoy the present while honoring the past?
Rituals and festivities lighten dark winter days. Long-standing traditions evolve. For older adults, family elders, bereavement for what is lost, and memories of past years can be bittersweet. In addition to missing past rituals and practices, elders may struggle to find their place in a new family and/or social structure. They may also experience loneliness and isolation, two widespread conditions (Cacioppo and Cacioppo, 2018).
Increased global longevity has made it more important to explore how people cope with transitions and loss in late life. If we live long enough, each of us will experience multiple losses, including cultural bereavement. Grief, mourning, and bereavement can lead to psychological health concerns such as depression , anxiety , loneliness, and isolation, and physical health concerns such as an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, and other chronic conditions (Tahmaseb McConatha et al., 2023). This time of year can be particularly stressful as they tend to lead to a re-emergence of intense personal and cultural grief. Memories of the past can keep us from fully enjoying the present. In such situations, our distress can threaten our sense of self and our place in the world, even our meaning and purpose in life.
Coping with cultural bereavement, which encompasses personal and social loss, is a complicated and nonlinear process (Neimeyer, 2001). Those who are mourning struggle to enjoy new or revised traditions and rituals as they also mourn those of the past. In order to be adaptive and resilient , coping strategies need to include loss-oriented coping, allowing time to mourn that which is lost, and restoration-oriented coping (Lundorff and team 2019). Restoration coping emphasizes being open to new or modified ways of celebrating. Such coping means being present and open to developing skills and roles that are adaptive to current realities.
Small steps can be transformative. Leaning on those who are willing to lend a helping hand. Asking for time to tell one story of the past. Finding small ways of honoring the past while validating the present. Stories have a unique ability to link the past to the present, foster connections between generations, and strengthen current social and cultural bonds. Stories of past rituals can also encourage renewed engagement in revised roles and traditions. Being open to transformations in rituals can lead to resilient and effective ways of managing the painful feelings associated with mourning and bereavement. The mourning process, both in its acute and chronic stages, can lead to feeling marginalized, silenced, invisible, vulnerable, and powerless; therefore, being open to new ways of understanding and redefining meaning and purpose can serve as an important buffer. Finding ways to be in the present while honoring the past and mourning those who are no longer with us is an important way to nurture connection, meaning, and continued healing.
Cacioppo, J. T., & Cacioppo, S. (2018). The growing problem of loneliness. Lancet (London, England) , 391 (10119), 426. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(18)30142-9
Eisenbruch M. (1991). From post-traumatic stress disorder to cultural bereavement: diagnosis of Southeast Asian refugees. Social science & medicine (1982) , 33 (6), 673–680. https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(91)90021-4
Lundorff, M., Thomsen, D. K., Damkier, A., & O'Connor, M. (2019). How do loss- and restoration-oriented coping change across time? A prospective study on adjustment following spousal bereavement. Anxiety, stress, and coping , 32 (3), 270–285. https://doi.org/10.1080/10615806.2019.1587751
Neimeyer, R. A. (Ed.). (2001). Meaning reconstruction & the experience of loss. American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/10397-000
Tahmaseb McConatha, J., Ford, K., Cusmano C., Lyman N., McConatha, M. (2023). The Healing Power of Green Spaces: Combating Loneliness, Loss, and Isolation. International Journal of Geriatrics and Gerontology, 7(1), 1-5. www.doi.org/10.29011/2577-0748.100076
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Jasmin Tahmaseb-McConatha, Ph.D. , is a professor at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. She researches aging and well-being.
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