On Navigating Parent Loss While Stepping Into Young Adulthood: There Is No Expiration Date on Grief
There is no right way to grieve, and there is certainly no right time to lose a parent. Losing a parent in young adulthood carries its own particular complexities, where you are stepping out of adolescence, maybe leaving home for the first time, trying to figure out who you are and what your life is going to look like.
Just as you are beginning to build something, the ground shifts beneath you. This is something I understand firsthand. When I was 17, my dad passed away and I felt so incredibly alone.
When One Loss Becomes Many
When a parent dies, the loss rarely stops there. You lose one parent and often, in some way, you lose the other too—swallowed by their own grief, changed, or simply no longer present in the way they once were.
And the losses keep coming.
How loss ripples through your world:
Family Shifts: Siblings drift. The family system you grew up in, whatever it looked like, is permanently altered.
Friendships Changes: You start to notice who shows up and who doesn't, who has the capacity to sit with you in it and who disappears.
The Silence: People tend to rally in the first few weeks and then, slowly, life goes on for everyone else. The calls stop. People stop asking. Not out of cruelty, but often because they don't know how. This silence can feel like its own abandonment.
Grieving the Future: For some of us, you may be grieving the future you imagined together—the milestones, the phone calls, and the life you thought you would share together. For others, you may be grieving something quieter. Simply, the world in which they still existed.
There Is No Right Way to Grieve
Grief does not look the same for everyone.
It may look like crying openly and often. It may look like going back to class or work the next week, head down, just moving. It may look like turning the pain inward in ways no one else can see. It may look like a debilitating shift in your big feelings, your mental health, your relationships, your ability to function.
Grief is not a one size fits all experience. It is messy and it is complex and it is devastating.
Sometimes it looks like not feeling anything at all. Sometimes it looks like feeling everything all at once. And yet, so many of us carry this quiet fear that we are doing it “wrong”—that it has been “too long” or we should be further along by now.
And for those whose loss is complicated by estrangement, a difficult relationship, or a death that others don't fully recognize or validate, the isolation can run even deeper. This is disenfranchised grief. The loss that doesn't get acknowledged. The grief you are left to carry alone.
Life Grows Around the Loss
There is no expiration date on grief.
It does not spoil, it does not become less valid with time, and it does not shrink the longer it sits. What changes is everything around it.
The psychologist Lois Tonkin described it this way in her model of Growing Around Grief: grief stays the same size, but life begins to grow around it. For young adults navigating parent loss, that can feel impossible to believe in the thick of it.
But it is possible.
I have written about this model in a previous blog and I keep coming back to it because it is one of the most honest descriptions of grief I have yet to encounter.
You do not get over it. You do not move on. But slowly, if you allow it, life begins to expand around the loss.
New experiences, new relationships, new versions of yourself begin to take shape alongside the grief rather than in spite of it. And there is something both beautiful and painful in that.
You grow. You change. You grow into new versions of yourself that person will never know. They will never see who you are becoming. That is its own grief, held right alongside the life that continues to grow.
young adults don’t have to Manage the loss of a parent Alone
If any of this resonates, you are not alone.
Navigating grief while also trying to build a life, step into adulthood, and figure out who you are is an incredibly isolating experience. It can feel like you cannot bring it up, like you do not want to burden anyone, like no one around you will really get it. I know that feeling. It is part of why I felt so compelled to start a grief group specifically for young adults who are navigating parent loss.
When I was 17 and my dad passed away, I didn’t have a space like this one. Reflecting back over a decade later, I know how much it would have changed my life to have support and be with other young adults learning to live with such significant loss.
We are not meant to grieve alone. Community is one of the most powerful things we can offer each other, especially in our hardest moments.
My hope is that this group can be that space. A place to come as you are, to feel what you feel, to be seen, to be understood, and to be in grief alongside people who get it.
Learn more about our upcoming grief group for young adults who’ve lost a parent below.
Join Our Young Adult parent loss Group in Highland Park
If you are looking for a place where you don't have to do this alone, our upcoming group is designed for real humans in their late teens and early 20s who are navigating these exact complexities.
A Space for Connection: We focus on a relational approach to healing—because you shouldn't have to navigate this transition in isolation.
Your Pace, Your Journey: We honor that there is no "fix" or "treatment plan" for loss; there is only moving forward at your own pace.
Local Support: We’ll met at our office in the heart of Highland Park, conveniently located for those in Northeast L.A., Eagle Rock, and Pasadena.
The Perfect Next Step: To ensure this group is the right fit for your specific needs, we start with a Match Call. This allows our Care Coordinator to act as your advocate, ensuring you are set up with the right community from the start.
Where can I find a grief support group for young adults in Los Angeles?
Kindman & Co. provides specialized support groups for young adults in the Highland Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, focusing on parent loss and relational healing from therapists like Elizabeth who’ve lost a parent themselves.
What does it mean if my grief feels "wrong"?
At Kindman & Co., we believe that nothing is wrong with you.
Grief is a non-linear process, and our therapists help you navigate "big feelings" without the pressure of clinical jargon or forced timelines. They’ll be with you in this every step of the way.
Featured therapist author:
Elizabeth Taylor is a queer, neurodivergent Associate Marriage and Family Therapist #132575 who brings a deep understanding of trauma and the many ways it can shape our bodies, relationships, and sense of self. She is committed to creating therapeutic spaces that feel safe, inclusive, and grounded in genuine care. Her goal is to offer a place where healing can unfold through connection, community, and the steady presence of someone who truly sees you. Elizabeth is especially passionate about working with queer and LGBTQIA+ clients and neurodivergent communities. Much of her work centers on exploring identity, desires, relationships, and the impact of the systems we move through. She supports clients in questioning limiting narratives, reclaiming their autonomy, and rediscovering the parts of themselves that have always deserved gentleness.
Her approach balances depth with playfulness, honoring the heaviness that can come with healing while still making room for joy, silliness, and moments of ease. Outside of therapy, Elizabeth is a sister, daughter, friend, devoted cat parent, and lifelong deep thinker. She enjoys discovering new corners of the city, spending time in parks, mermaiding, hiking, snowboarding, crafting, and getting a little too invested in board games. Her life and work are guided by a strong commitment to justice, equity, and community connection.
GET HELP NOW
If you are interested in therapy with Kindman & Co. and would like to learn more about the services we have to help you, follow these quick & easy steps:
Schedule a free 20-minute phone consultation with our Care Coordinator.
Get matched with the therapist who’s right for you.
Start feeling more supported and fulfilled in your life!
THERAPY AT KINDMAN & CO.
We are here for your diverse L.A. counseling needs. Our team of therapists provides lgbtqia+ affirmative therapy, grief & loss counseling, group therapy, and more. We have specialists in trauma, women's issues, depression & anxiety, substance use, mindfulness & embodiment, and support for creatives. For therapists and practice owners, we also provide consultation and supervision services! We look forward to welcoming you for therapy in Highland Park and online.
