Navigating the Messy Middle of Disaster Recovery
Nine learnings from the disaster recovery field on healing during year two.
Posted March 3, 2026 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk
I’m a psychologist and an accidental disaster mental health specialist. Like many of us in this field, I arrived sideways through lived experience—in response to pressing needs in my community after megafire devastation and people with glassy, stunned eyes asking, “What now?”
The first year after a disaster has an urgent and galvanizing energy. There are declarations and promises and cameras and headlines. Compassionate volunteers and generous donations flow in, and the very best of humanity emerges. Mutual aid blossoms, and neighbors help neighbors get needs met with swift creativity . In the disaster field, we call this the “heroic” and “honeymoon” phases. They are deeply beautiful in the face of tragedy and sorrow.
Inevitably, media attention wanes and moves to the next crisis. The casseroles and supportive texts slow. Life continues, but the survivor’s world is still in shambles. What happens when the adrenaline burns off, financial and bureaucratic realities hit, and profound grief settles in?
Make no mistake, there is much hope and heart. Permits are pulled, and progress is a visible beacon of hope. Schools reopen, there are rebuilds and ribbon cuttings, and the steady hum of neighbors refusing to give up on their communities. Yet, a bone-weary exhaustion co-exists that surprises people. Survivors often ask me, “Why am I struggling more now ? Shouldn’t I be feeling better?” This is not a failure of resilience .
This is the settling and disillusionment phase.
Displacement stretches beyond what survivors can initially allow themselves to imagine. Sentiments of institutional betrayal arise, and survivors often feel abandoned in their plight. Financial clocks tick with mounting pressure and uncertainty. Marriages strain. Parents snap more easily. Sleep remains elusive. Kids languish because why does algebra or soccer practice matter when your world burned down, and your friends moved away? Isolation and loneliness creep in. Just functioning becomes like trudging through wet cement.
Without adequate systemic support, a legacy of collective trauma and suffering looms. What if we could call upon the knowledge of disaster-impacted communities to help reimagine recovery?
Based on experience, I humbly offer nine evidence-informed field notes:
No recovery follows a linear path. Every community must forge its own roadmap, but there are shared lessons in our humanity for how we can respond and adapt to adversity.
If year one is about survival, year two is about whether we build systems that allow people to flourish again. Relentless and imperfect progress is the way forward.
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Adrienne Heinz, Ph.D. , is a clinical psychologist and researcher at the VA National Center for PTSD Public Digital Health Innovation Program and Stanford University and co-founder of the non-profit, The After Collective. She focuses on climate change, trauma, and digital tools for mental well-being.
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