You’ve ended a relationship, but their profile is still just a click away. A loved one is gone, but their posts remain frozen in time. A friend group drifts apart, but the old photos keep resurfacing in your memories feed. You unfollow, mute, delete—and still, somehow, they’re there.

Welcome to the era of digital grief.

In a world where so much of our lives are lived online, endings no longer arrive with clean breaks. They leave digital ghosts—traces, reminders, algorithms that don’t know we’ve moved on. For young people especially, this adds a new, complex layer to grief. Because in the age of social media, nothing really disappears. And neither does the emotional weight it carries.

At One Life Many Endings, we explore how grief has changed—not in essence, but in shape. It’s not just about missing someone or something. It’s about being constantly reminded of what’s no longer there, without choosing to remember.

And that matters.

Social media was built to connect us, not to help us let go. Its language is one of permanence—saved messages, shared memories, time-stamped moments. But grief is fluid. Messy. Private. And the digital world rarely offers space for that kind of nuance.

One participant shared: “After my breakup, I kept seeing his comments under mutual friends’ posts. I thought I was doing okay, but then that one sentence would throw me back emotionally. I didn’t expect to be haunted by someone still alive.”

Another said: “My friend passed away, and her Instagram is still up. At first, it was comforting. But now, I don’t know how to engage with it. Should I post? Should I unfollow? It’s like her profile is still talking to us, but she’s gone.”

These are not abstract dilemmas—they’re emotional realities. And they’re often left unspoken, as if grief in digital spaces isn’t “real” enough to name.

But it is. And it needs support.

The first step is acknowledgement. That it’s okay to feel unsettled by online remnants. That it’s normal to feel grief resurface when an old memory pops up. That digital presence doesn’t erase emotional absence—in fact, it can amplify it.

The second step is choice. In physical life, we create rituals to mark endings. Online, we need to do the same—setting boundaries, reclaiming control, choosing when and how we engage.

That might mean archiving chats. Muting accounts. Unfollowing people you no longer feel connected to. It’s not petty—it’s a form of digital self-care. And it doesn’t mean forgetting. It means protecting your process.

Some young people create their own rituals for online closure. Writing a private message they never send. Creating a hidden album of photos they’re not ready to delete. Making a symbolic post, then stepping away for a while. These acts—small but intentional—can offer the space that platforms themselves don’t provide.

There’s also power in reframing. Social media encourages us to curate, to perform, to stay visible. But grief needs space to withdraw, to be messy, to not make sense. And that’s okay. You don’t owe anyone public grief. You don’t need to post a tribute or craft the perfect caption. Silence can be sacred, too.

On the other hand, for some, online spaces become a vital outlet. They write about their loss. They connect with others who understand. They create digital memorials or safe spaces for grief. This, too, is valid.

The key is autonomy. What works for one person may feel unbearable for another. We have to allow young people to navigate their digital grief in ways that feel authentic to them—not dictated by trends or algorithms.

And finally, we must talk about community. Because online grief can be deeply isolating. You’re surrounded by content—happy updates, filtered lives—while privately grieving something that no one else can see. That’s why peer support matters. Having someone say, “I get it. I’ve been there. It’s real,” can make all the difference.

Digital grief is real grief. The ghosts may be virtual, but the pain is not.

In the One Life Many Endings project, we believe in helping youth name these new forms of emotional struggle—not to dramatize them, but to humanize them. To bring compassion, clarity, and creativity to a part of life that’s often invisible, yet deeply felt.

Because even in the digital age, healing begins the same way it always has: with honesty, with presence, and with the freedom to say, this hurts—and that matters.