Whether your loss was sudden or expected, the first days and weeks can feel surreal, like the world is still spinning while you’re standing completely still. Louise shares her own honest and tender experience of losing her son Matthew, offering listeners reassurance that every reaction in grief is a normal one.

This episode explores:

• What those first hours and days after a loss can feel like
• The shock, numbness, and disbelief that often protect us in the beginning
• Why anticipatory grief doesn’t make the final moment any easier
• How emotions in early grief move in waves - sometimes tsunamis
• The fog, exhaustion, and confusion of that first week
• The strange push-and-pull of practical tasks in the middle of heartbreak
• The loneliness that can appear even when you’re surrounded by people
• The moment when the world seems to 'move on' while your grief is still raw
• The importance of glimmers, those tiny sparks of relief, laughter, or peace
• Why healing isn’t about forgetting, but about growing around your grief

This episode reminds listeners that grief has no timeline.

There is no right way to feel.

Early grief is not meant to be solved - it is meant to be survived, one breath and one step at a time.

Connect with your host Louise Bates: https://linktr.ee/louisebates

If this episode moved you, please consider leaving a review and sharing it with someone who might need it.

You help this show reach others walking their own path through grief.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this solo episode, I explore a side of grief that is often overlooked but profoundly important: the way grief shows up in the body.

We tend to think of grief as emotional or psychological - but our bodies feel it just as deeply. From exhaustion and sleep changes to physical tension, aches, heaviness, digestive issues, and that sense of being stuck, the body often speaks before the mind can make sense of what’s happening.

Drawing on personal experience, therapeutic insight, and the somatic wisdom explored in The Body Keeps the Score, Louise gently explains how grief impacts the nervous system and why these physical symptoms are not signs of weakness, but natural responses to profound loss.

In this episode, you’ll hear about:

How grief affects the body

• Stress responses like elevated cortisol, racing heartbeat, and weakened immunity
• Physical expressions of grief: tightness, heaviness, insomnia, aches, digestion changes
• Why symptoms like globus sensation (a lump in the throat) can appear during grief
• How tension, pain, and sensation can reflect emotional states
• Why the body remembers what the mind tries to manage

I lead listeners through a gentle body scan, inviting awareness of breath, tension, and sensation without judgment, without needing to fix anything.

Somatic tools that help grief move

• Gentle yoga for grounding, breath awareness, and emotional softening
• Breathwork to calm the nervous system and create emotional space
• Somatic therapy to help release stuck grief
• Everyday movement, as simple as walking or swaying, to help your body process loss

I share my own personal experience of using EFT tapping (Emotional Freedom Techniques) and EMDR therapy.

Somatic tools that help to regulate the nervous system, release stuck emotion, and reconnect with a sense of inner safety.

Recommended Reading:

The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk

Connect with your host Louise Bates: https://linktr.ee/louisebates

If this episode moved you, please consider leaving a review and sharing it with someone who might need it.

You help this show reach others walking their own path through grief.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, I speak with Vanessa May, a London-based writer, holistic grief coach, and certified grief educator.

As a bereaved mother and widow, Vanessa has endured more loss than most could imagine in one lifetime, yet she’s transformed her pain into purpose.

After losing her son Harry, her husband Anthony, and her father in quick succession, Vanessa dedicated her life to helping others navigate the landscape of grief.

Known for her raw honesty, compassion, and wisdom, Vanessa embodies the 'wounded healer', reminding us that grief isn’t something to get over, it’s something we learn to live alongside.

This episode dives deep into the spiritual beliefs that continue to support her, including soul contracts and signs from the other side.

Books:

Finding Meaning by David Kessler

Journey of Souls by Michael Newton

It's OK That You're Not OK by Megan Devine

Groups:

The Compassionate Friends: https://www.tcf.org.uk/professional/

Therapy:

Havening: https://www.havening.org/

EMDR Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing

Breath Work

Yoga for grief

Connect with Vanessa:

Author website: https://www.vanessamay.co.uk/

Holistic Grief Coaching: https://wellbeingandnutrition.co.uk/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/may.wellbeing.griefsupport/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/holisticgriefsupport

When Grief Takes Everything: A Survival Guide To Devastating Loss:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1068196106/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.FTjfx4BGEGh5OtMwWsPp3QyzSIQ13pdbJDMjYetAwlXGjHj071QN20LucGBJIEps.oR8DgquK--qkSNuoU9m646vmb259bZaIqyEVSJyWt8c&qid=1760187628&sr=1-1

Connect with your host Louise Bates: https://linktr.ee/louisebates

If this episode moved you, please consider leaving a review and sharing it with someone who might need it.

You help this show reach others walking their own path through grief.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.