Market reference note: This article draws on sources from both Korea and the United States. Each piece of information is labeled 🇰🇷 Korea or 🇺🇸 U.S. in the body to indicate which country it applies to.
Your parent is still with you. They eat their meals, and sometimes they bring up old memories. And yet, strangely, your heart already feels heavy, as though something has been lost. If you find yourself crying for no apparent reason at night, or feel your chest sink every time you think about the future — that does not mean you are unusual or weak. Professionals give this emotion a name: 'Anticipatory Grief.' It is the grief of experiencing an approaching loss before the actual farewell arrives.
Let us first look at what anticipatory grief is. 🇺🇸 U.S. According to research, anticipatory grief is defined as the process by which patients or caregivers experience a sense of loss even before an actual death occurs due to a life-threatening illness. This emotion is not only grief over death itself, but a complex response to changes in the relationship, the loss of freedom, and the disappearance of the life that once was. According to a 2022 study published in BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care, 1 in 4 family caregivers experiences anticipatory grief.
🇺🇸 U.S. Anticipatory grief appears especially prominently among caregivers of patients with dementia and Alzheimer's disease and related disorders (ADRD), and the tendency grows stronger as the illness becomes more severe. A recent scoping review (2025, analyzing PubMed and 6 other databases) also found that anticipatory grief was consistently associated with depressive symptoms in caregivers, and that grief intensity was higher among spousal caregivers and those who spent more hours on caregiving. This grief is also linked to 'caregiver burden' — results show that the greater the caregiver burden, the significantly higher the anticipatory grief score.
🇰🇷 Korea According to the 2024 National Mental Health Knowledge and Attitudes Survey published by the Ministry of Health and Welfare's National Center for Mental Health, the proportion of respondents who reported experiencing severe stress jumped by more than 10 percentage points, from 36.0% in 2022 to 46.3% in 2024, and the proportion who experienced depressive feelings lasting several days also rose from 30.0% to 40.2%. It is easy to surmise that families caring for elderly loved ones are not unrelated to these figures. Many caregivers who have long shouldered family caregiving alone grow exhausted without accurately recognizing their own emotional state.
What forms does anticipatory grief take? Sometimes it disguises itself as guilt. You find yourself reproaching yourself with thoughts like, 'They haven't even passed yet — why am I feeling this way?' Sometimes it manifests as anger. And sometimes it appears as numbness, with days stretching on where nothing seems to be felt at all. All of these emotions are a normal part of the grieving process. Knowing the name makes it feel a little less lonely.
So how can we live alongside this emotion? Research consistently shows that social support and acceptance-based coping strategies are effective in easing anticipatory grief. Speaking to someone you trust, rather than carrying it alone, and participating in caregiver groups with people who have had similar experiences, can help. 🇺🇸 U.S. NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) operates a dedicated helpline for family caregivers (1-800-950-NAMI, option 4), where you can be connected free of charge with a counselor who has real caregiving experience. Available Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. (Eastern Time). 🇰🇷 Korea The mental health crisis counseling line 1577-0199 operates 24 hours a day, and family caregiver counseling services are also available at regional 정신건강복지센터 (community mental health welfare centers).
Rather than trying to make the grief disappear quickly, please remember that this emotion is evidence of how deeply you love your parent. Anticipatory grief is not weakness — it is a mark left by the heart of a caregiver who has dedicated themselves over a long period of time. Giving your grief a name and slowly looking at it a little at a time can be the first step toward caring for yourself.
Sources: BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care (2022), PubMed scoping review (Anticipatory grief among caregivers of people living with dementia, 2025), Journal of the American Medical Directors Association (2024), Ministry of Health and Welfare National Center for Mental Health 2024 National Mental Health Knowledge and Attitudes Survey, NAMI Family Caregiver HelpLine (nami.org, 2025).
Note: This article was compiled by AI from the sources cited above. We strive for accuracy, but for decisions about your specific situation, please confirm the latest guidance from a professional or the relevant agency.