Why “Pushing Through” Doesn’t Work During Grief

I lost my grandmother last week. She was beautiful, strong, and feisty. I was extremely close to her. She was an amazing woman who helped make me who I am today by giving me something so many people don’t realize they’re missing: a space where I was fully seen, supported, and celebrated. With her, I never had to earn love or prove my worth, it was just there.

Since losing her, I’ve felt grief not just in my heart, but in my body. My energy feels different. My motivation comes and goes. My workouts don’t look the same, my appetite fluctuates, and my nervous system feels like it’s constantly trying to catch its breath. And yet, the world often tells us to push through. It wants us to stay consistent, keep showing up, and not let life “throw us off track.” But grief doesn’t work that way. Grief isn’t a weakness or a lack of discipline. It’s a full-body experience that asks us to slow down, listen, and redefine what strength really looks like.

Grief Is a Physiological Experience

Grief activates the body’s stress response. Cortisol levels rise, sleep can become disrupted, digestion may slow or feel unsettled, and the immune system can take a hit. This is why you may feel exhausted even after rest, sore without intense movement, or mentally foggy despite trying your best. Your body is working overtime to process loss. Even when nothing looks different on the outside.

When we try to force productivity or intense training during this time, we’re often working against our nervous system rather than supporting it. This can lead to increased fatigue, burnout, injury, or illness. Pushing through doesn’t make grief go away. It often deepens the disconnect between mind and body.

How Grief Affects Motivation and Fitness

One of the hardest parts of grief is the loss of motivation. Activities that once felt grounding or empowering may suddenly feel heavy or meaningless. This isn’t laziness. It’s your brain conserving energy and prioritizing emotional survival.

Movement during grief doesn’t need to be about performance or progress. Some days, getting outside for a short walk, stretching on the floor, or simply breathing deeply is enough. Strength during grief may look like doing less and you must allow that to be okay.

Nutrition During Grief: Nourishment Over Perfection

Grief often affects appetite in unpredictable ways. You may feel less hungry, crave comfort foods, or forget to eat altogether. Rather than aiming for “clean” or “perfect” eating, this is a time to focus on nourishment and consistency.

Simple, gentle nutrition can be powerful:

• Warm meals that are easy to digest

• Protein to support muscle and immune health

• Hydration to support stress regulation

• Familiar foods that feel comforting and safe

Food during grief is not about control…it’s about care.

Mindfulness: Making Space for What Is

Mindfulness doesn’t mean being calm or positive all the time. It means allowing yourself to feel what is present without judgment. Grief comes in waves, like sadness, anger, numbness, gratitude, and even longing. Sometimes all in the same day.

Practices like breathwork, journaling, meditation, or quiet moments in nature can help regulate the nervous system and remind the body that it is safe. Even a few minutes of stillness can be grounding when everything else feels unsteady.

Redefining Strength During Grief

We often associate strength with discipline, consistency, and pushing past discomfort. But grief asks us to redefine strength as softness, patience, and self-compassion. Strength might be choosing rest over a workout. Strength might be asking for help. Strength might be honoring your body’s limits without guilt.

Grief doesn’t derail your health journey, it becomes part of it. Healing is not linear, and neither is wellness. When we allow ourselves to move through grief instead of around it, we create space for deeper resilience, awareness, and connection.

Final Thoughts

If you are grieving, know this: you are not broken, behind, or failing. Your body is responding exactly as it should to loss. You don’t need to push through to prove your strength. You are already strong. By simply allowing yourself to feel, rest, and heal.

Your health journey is still yours. It may just look different for a while and that’s okay.

My grandmother was a beautiful, remarkable woman. She taught me to love myself by reflecting back what I couldn’t always see on my own. Her grace, strength, and quiet confidence shaped who I am and who I continue to grow into. When she experienced grief in her own life, I shared many of these tools with her to help her navigate it. Now, I’m learning to offer that same compassion and care to myself as I grieve her. This blog is written in her honor. She loved my writing and was always my biggest fan. Her love will remain with me forever as will the loved ones you lost.