Disenfranchised grief

Disenfranchised grief is a term coined by Dr. Kenneth J. Doka in 1989. The concept describes the fact that some forms of grief are not acknowledged on a personal or societal level. People might not like how you may or may not be expressing your grief or view your loss as insignificant, and thus they may feel uncomfortable, or judgmental. This is not a conscious way of thinking for most individuals, as it is deeply engrained in our psyche. This can be extremely isolating, and push you to question the depth of your grief and the loss you've experienced. This concept is viewed as a "type of grief", but it more so can be viewed as a "side effect" of grief. This also is not only applicable to grief in the case of death, but also the many other forms of grief. There are few support systems, rituals, traditions, or institutions such as bereavement leave available to those experiencing grief and loss.

Even widely recognized forms of grief can become disenfranchised when well-meaning friends and family attempt to set a time limit on a bereaved person's right to grieve. For example, the need to regulate mourning and restore a state of normal work activity severely impacted the grieving process of victims of the Oklahoma City bombing, according to American scholar Edward Linenthal. Grieving for deceased children was redefined as post-traumatic stress disorder if parents were not "over it" within two weeks.