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Louise Williams was 13 when her younger brother died from a longstanding illness. A few months after he died, she recalls being invited to a grief counselling session for young people. There were about 12 in the group and ‑ apart from her and one other boy who’d lost his sister ‑ everyone was grieving for a parent.

She recalls sitting in a circle and being asked: “What’s worse, losing a parent or losing a sibling?”

Although part of a memory-making exercise to prompt conversation it seemed cruel to compare this bereavement. 

Yet it highlights the hierarchy of grief, and the face siblings are often at the bottom. 

Not only are they often overlooked, and the impact of their loss misunderstood, even disregarded, but siblings can often downplay their own grief to protect other family members, not least their parents. This can have a detrimental impact, and contribute to sibling grief often feeling lonely.

“It’s over 20 years since my brother died, but there isn’t a day when I don’t think about him,” says Williams.

“Even now, it can just hit you that he’s gone, or you’ll get a flashback to the days before he died. There are so many happy memories too, of course, but you can find yourself thinking of all the moments you’ve missed growing up together.

“We talk about him as a family, but it’s rare to talk about his passing with new people, and on the rare occasion it does come up, the usual response is, ‘It must’ve been hard on your parents’.

“It can feel like a kick in the stomach. Nothing can be worse than losing a child, and my older sibling and I have wanted to protect our parents from enduring any extra pain, but at the same time you want to say, ‘For us too’ ‑ but you can’t, at least that’s how it feels.”

In society, we don’t really acknowledge or recognise the importance of the sibling relationship, or the loss that occurs. It’s why sibling grief is described as “disenfranchised grief” because it can feel subordinate to other people’s grief.

“Effectively, disenfranchised grief means any grief or loss that doesn’t get recognised in the way grief normally would, say, if you lose your partner, or a child. It has this significance to you, but the outer world doesn’t recognise it so much,” explains BACP registered integrative therapist Jennifer Park.

“If siblings are older, it’s almost, ‘oh well, it’s the natural flow of life’, and when they’re younger, the emphasis might go to the parents or the sibling’s family and the grieving sibling takes on the role of helping out, making sure other people are okay, so their own grief gets lost in that.

“It can feel like they can’t talk about their own grief, or shouldn’t, or don’t have a right to, but grief is how we cry for the people we lose, and if grief is unacknowledged, or not processed, it can lead to a sense of isolation, disconnection, and loneliness.”

Park said it is essential to talk to a therapist, trusted friend or support group to help process emotions, memories and experiences. 

“That can be really helpful because it allows you to be with others who have experienced something similar to you and make your feelings more relevant and real.”

When their younger sister, Triona, died suddenly in February 2017, Maeveen Brown, Edel McGirr and Cathy Teague, who live in Tyrone and Armagh, found there was little support for bereaved adult siblings, and so they founded the Sibling Grief Club.

“We had lots of support from our family, friends and community but specific professional support was seriously lacking. In fact, there has been little to no research into sibling loss worldwide,” says Brown.

“We wanted to change the landscape of sibling loss and so we launched Sibling Grief Club to provide an online resource and community that adult siblings could utilise, so they never have to feel alone in their grief again.

“There is a societal misconception that the death of an adult sibling is not as profound or painful as other types of loss, for example, the loss of a spouse or a child. However, I have learned that the depth of my grief is identical to the depth of love I have for Triona.

“If you love hard you will grieve hard.

“It is paramount that adult sibling grievers feel their grief is valid, we need to find a ‘home’ for our grief, somewhere we feel safe, heard and understood.”

Park noted that it is important for siblings to acknowledge that the grief is separate from the grief the family feels.

“You may have to support parents, or their partner, but alongside that there has to be something that’s just for the sibling because the loss is a loss of your shared history that no one else will have experienced, or understand.

“The person you might talk to about that is ironically the late sibling, so this confusion emerges, and you can be left with a sense of life having a before and after. It’s why siblings can feel completely disconnected from their younger self, and that can happen at any age.

“Plus, the shape of the family unit will have been altered, and you need to process that.”

Just as talking to someone is paramount, writing things down can help too.

Parks added: “It might be the history of your life with your sibling, or what you remember about the relationship. Or it might be a ritual, on a birthday or key anniversary perhaps, where you have some sort of symbolic celebration that’s yours, and something that focuses on the uniqueness of your relationship.

“With grief, I don’t believe there is a hierarchy. It’s individual and about what the relationship means to you, and all grief should be acknowledged.

“By sharing, writing down and processing your feelings, you can help reconnect yourself to your experience and pass through the grief because really it’s about learning to live with the loss rather than getting over it.”

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