Feeling profound grief years after a loved one has died could affect our own longevity
By Carissa Wong
25 July 2025
Losing someone we love can affect us in many ways
Vidar Nordli-Mathisen/Unsplash
People who experience long periods of intense grief after the death of a loved one seem to have a higher risk of dying within the next decade than those who come to terms with their loss more easily.
Numerous studies have linked bereavement to poor health outcomes, such as raised blood pressure. But most of these only tracked the bereaved for a few years after their loss, says Andreas Maercker at the University of Zurich in Switzerland, who wasn’t involved in the latest research.
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Now, Mette Kjærgaard Nielsen at Aarhus University in Denmark and her colleagues have examined how grief is linked to mortality up to a decade later.
The researchers used a national registry to obtain information on people who were being treated for a terminal condition. They then recruited more than 1700 of these people’s loved ones, such as a parent or partner, to complete a series of surveys – taken before their death and six months and three years after. These asked the loved ones – who were aged 62, on average – questions, like whether they were trying to avoid reminders that the person was ill or dead.
The team found that 670 of the loved ones were persistently experiencing low levels of grief after the death, such as feeling slightly confused about their role in life, while 107 of them were persistently experiencing high levels of grief, such as overwhelmingly feeling this way. The remaining participants experienced either grief that declined or delayed grief that kicked in some time after their loss.