Grief
Sustained emotional suffering with a specific loss — usually bereavement — as its cause, moving in waves rather than sitting at one constant level. Often mixed with relief, anger, or guilt in the same episode.
How it shows up
Grief tends to follow the death of someone loved, though people grieve other profound losses too, and it often comes in waves: ordinary hours, then a song or a date brings it crashing back. Relief, anger, guilt, and even laughter can sit alongside it. There is no correct timetable, and the older idea of fixed stages is now widely questioned. Its tie to a specific loss and its wave-like rhythm set it apart.
How it differs from Sorrow
Sorrow is a quiet, sustained sadness without a specific bereavement; grief is the suffering that follows a particular loss, moving in waves.
Notice
If grief is present, notice what tends to bring the waves, and what the quieter stretches between them feel like.
Where it is felt
Felt most in the chest, throat and stomach.
Based on Nummenmaa et al. (2014), bodily maps of emotions, and related research. The map shows where people report bodily sensation, on average; individual experience varies.