Migratory grief: multiple losses and impact on identity
Summary
Migration is a phenomenon present throughout history. People have moved around the world temporarily or permanently, and under very diverse historical circumstances. There have been expansive migrations, colonial migrations, and migrations involving the occupation of other territories. The migrations we are currently experiencing, at least the most prevalent ones in our territory, occur in situations of precarious conditions in the country of origin, a lack of future prospects, as well as armed conflicts and violence that pose a threat to life itself. Thousands of people, in their decision to migrate, are trying to find a place where they can envision a better future.
Generally, the person who migrates is the one who has the conditions and strength to face the risks of an uncertain, often dangerous journey, and to cope with the arrival in a country that is often neither welcoming nor friendly.
Migration, although often conceptualized as a strategy of opportunity and improvement, also entails a series of emotional, social, and symbolic losses that can have a significant impact on psychological well-being.
In this sense, the concept of migration grief was developed as a theoretical tool to refer to the losses that people experience in this process. We are talking about separation from family, language, culture, territory, or the loss of social status. These are losses that generate a profoundly complex emotional impact.
There are different descriptions of what migration grief entails, as well as reflections from individuals who speak from experience. All of these complement each other and help us understand the different dimensions and the depth of the impact experienced by migrants.
Emotional, social, and symbolic losses
Said el Kadaoui, a psychologist and writer born in Morocco and raised in Spain, describes migration grief as:
- Partial - Not everything is lost, but essential elements are lost: language, cultural references, social networks, affective environment... Grief is not absolute as in a death, but it is intense and continuous (Arribas, 2021).
- Recurrent – The pain returns again and again: in encounters with prejudice, in moments of nostalgia, in difficulties integrating, or in identity issues. It is not a linear process that ends, but a cycle that reactivates.
- Multiple - Migration involves multiple simultaneous losses: culture, family, status, language, landscapes, rituals... Therefore, grief is plural and affects many dimensions of the person.
El Kadaoui emphasizes that migration «always causes a rupture» that can last a lifetime. This process forces the migrant into a constant dialogue about identity with the new environment and often transforms them into «a different person than they were.»
The challenge of mental health in migrants
According to psychiatrist Joseba Achotegui, migrants face seven major losses that generate a complex and multidimensional grief. This model, formulated in 1995 and extensively developed in his work The Seven Griefs of Migration and Interculturality (Achotegui, 2022), is now a reference in transcultural psychology.
These seven losses or griefs are (Achotegui, 2022):
- Grief for family and loved ones
- Mourning the loss of one's mother tongue
- The mourning for culture
- The duel for the land
- The mourning for social status
- Grief over belonging to a group
- The mourning for physical safety
Achotegui points out that this grief can become chronic if the conditions of reception are not favorable. It is such an intense psychological process that it can lead to the well-known Ulysses Syndrome, when stress exceeds the capacity to adapt.
Other authors, such as Wajdi Mouawad , whose central thought in his works revolves around identity, loss, and memory, express it starkly when he comments that exile is not only the loss of the land, it is the loss from which to narrate oneself, it is the loss of the physical territory and the symbolic territory.
Amina Bargach, a child psychiatrist and migration expert with a career focused on integration processes, mental health, and the psychosocial impacts of migration, especially on children, adolescents, and young adults, suggests that migration grief is not only a matter of personal losses, but also of how society receives and acknowledges (or fails to acknowledge) migrants (Espacio, 2029). Social invisibility —not being heard, not being seen, not being recognized as a subject with full rights—generates profound emotional suffering that adds to the traditional migration grief.
Identity and cultural fracture in migration
Psychoanalysts León and Rebeca Grinberg , pioneers in the psychoanalytic study of migration and exile, describe how migration involves a profound alteration of the sense of identity , because the individual loses cultural, linguistic, and social reference points that formed part of their «self» (Grinberg & Grinberg, 1984). A fracture occurs between the past and the present, with a feeling of transience and vulnerability, often accompanied by confusion and anxiety. Exile or migration can activate defense mechanisms (idealization, dissociation, denial) to protect identity from loss. Authors speak of migration as an experience that «shakes the cultural foundations of the personality», generating conflicts between the previous identity and the new identity under construction.
We also find the theory of ambiguous loss developed by Pauline Boss, a family therapist and researcher, which is especially useful for understanding migration grief. This type of loss is characterized by a lack of closure and clarity, since the person or object lost is physically absent but psychologically present, or vice versa. In the case of migration, family, country of origin, or cultural identity continue to exist, but are no longer equally accessible. This ambiguity can hinder the grieving process and generate feelings of ambivalence, guilt, and emotional numbness. Migration grief, therefore, shares the logic of grief without definitive resolution , requiring learning to live with the loss rather than overcoming it.
All authors agree that migration involves an emotional upheaval that triggers multiple losses and forces a reconstruction of one's deep sense of self. If this process is successfully navigated, the individual can develop a richer and more flexible identity. However, if the necessary personal conditions (such as fractured sense of belonging due to violence, trauma, or marginalization that creates dissociations hindering the integration of past and present) or structural conditions are not present, the process can generate significant psychological suffering.
It must be acknowledged that migration grief is not conventional grief, but rather a series of unresolved losses that resurface over time. Working through grief involves acknowledging the pain, understanding it, and transforming it into a process of personal reconstruction.
As Joan Coderch, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, stated, professionals who work with migrants must become emotionally involved and empathize with them. It is therefore necessary to promote transdisciplinary care, capable of actively listening to the intimacy of each person's story, the echoes of history, culture, and politics, with sensitivity and a focus on the social determinants of health.
