Episode
The Weird Things You Do When You’re Grieving
- Published
- Feb 16, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 574
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Summary
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit moonshotmentor.substack.com Career grief is not just an emotional experience. It’s a physiological one. Most of us expect grief to look like tears, sadness, maybe anger. But a lot of the time, grief shows up as: “What is wrong with me lately?” For me, it’s looked like this. I wore my pants inside out and didn’t realize until I was already out in the world. I left the faucet on. I ate an entire pizza by myself, and not because I was celebrating. Because I was trying to feel something other than what I was feeling. In those moments, I wasn’t thinking: “I’m grieving.” I was thinking: “I’m losing it.” What was really happening:. I was experiencing a normal brain and body response to loss. How Grief Shows Up Grief is the natural response to any kind of loss. Not just death. Any loss. A job. A role. A team. A dream. A sense of status. A version of your future you were counting on. When grief goes unnamed and unmourned, your brain often can’t organize the experience. It can’t file it neatly because it keeps trying to treat the loss like a problem you should solve, not something you need to metabolize. So your body starts speaking up. That can look like exhaustion. Headaches. Insomnia. Appetite swings. Stomach issues. Muscles that feel tight, wired, and braced. If the physical stuff is not loud enough, grief can also show up cognitively. Trouble concentrating. Forgetfulness. Confusion. Rumination. Intrusive thoughts. That looping reel you can’t shut off. And then it shows up in behavior. Withdrawing from others, losing interest in things that once brought joy, avoiding certain places or people, or self-medicating just to get through the day. None of this means you’re broken. It means something inside you is trying t…