That moment when you’re staring at your computer screen, trying desperately to focus on the task in front of you, but all you can see is their face, their smile, their absence, it’s a moment I’ve experienced more times than I can count since May 2018.
The collision between grief and the necessity of work is brutal and unforgiving. And yet, somehow, we’re expected to navigate it.
I remember sitting at my desk just a few short weeks after my husband took his life, attempting to respond to emails and client enquiries that suddenly seemed so trivial, so disconnected from the shattered reality I was living in. The cursor blinked back at me, mocking my inability to form even simple sentences.
But bills needed paying. The boys needed stability. Life, despite its new hollowness, demanded continuation.
So how do we do it? How do we focus on meetings and deadlines when our hearts have been shattered into a million pieces and our world’s turned upside down? There’s no perfect answer, but there are paths forward I’ve discovered through my own journey with grief.
First, let me acknowledge something important: It’s okay that you can’t focus right now.
Your brain is doing exactly what it’s designed to do while processing the experience of a profound loss. The fog, the forgetfulness, the inability to concentrate aren’t signs of weakness or failure; they’re normal, natural responses to grief.
The brain physically changes when we’re grieving. Executive function, our ability to plan, focus, and complete tasks takes a significant hit. What used to be simple becomes monumentally difficult. That task that would have taken you two hours might now take eight, if you can complete it at all.
Understanding this was my first step toward compassion for myself. I wasn’t failing at work, I was responding normally to an abnormal situation.
But understanding doesn’t pay the bills, so I had to find ways to function, even while drowning in grief.
I discovered that micro-focus was more manageable than sustained attention. I couldn’t handle an eight-hour workday, but I could handle twenty minutes of focused work then a break and then another twenty minutes.
Whle searching the internet for help focusing, I came across the Pomodoro Technique where you work for short intervals separated by brief breaks. It became my lifeline. I set a timer for 15 minutes (even the standard 25 felt impossible at first) and gave myself permission to do only that much. Sometimes those 15 minutes were productive; other times they were filled with tears. Either was acceptable.
I started each day by writing down the absolute minimum I needed to accomplish—not what I would have done before, but what was truly essential now. Often, it was just one or two tasks. Completing even those small tasks were huge victories and they became foundational to rebuilding my sense of capability.
I learned to be radically honest about my capacity. Before my husband died, I prided myself on being the person who could handle anything, who never said no to a project or request. That person disappeared the moment I found him that morning.
In her place emerged someone who had to say, plainly and without apology, “I cannot do that right now.” It was terrifying at first. Would I lose clients? Would people think less of me? Would I lose the business I’d worked so hard to build?
But the alternative of pretending I was operating at full capacity when I was barely functioning was unrealistic and unsustainable and would have led to complete burnout in a very short space of time.
I found that most people, when given honest information without emotional dumping, responded with more compassion than I expected. Admittedly, that can’t be said of everyone; some relationships, professional and personal, didn’t survive this period. But enough did. The right ones did.
“I’m going through a difficult personal situation and need to scale back for the next few months” became a script I rehearsed and delivered when necessary. I didn’t owe everyone the details, just the parameters of what I could and couldn’t manage.
I discovered that certain types of work became more difficult than others. Creative tasks, which was the backbone of my business were nearly impossible in the early months. My brain simply couldn’t generate new ideas when it was consumed with processing loss.
So I focused on the work that I could do. Ones that I could complete almost on autopilot. Administrative tasks, and projects that just required a basic tidy up, format and aligning to brand identities, surprisingly became almost comforting. The structure, the clear start and finish, the lack of required deep creativity all became tasks where I could function on autopilot. Tasks I’d previously found tedious became gentle ways to feel productive without demanding emotional resources I didn’t have.
I rearranged my workload accordingly, trading creative tasks with colleagues where possible, focusing on administrative work during my lowest periods, saving my strongest moments for client interactions or more demanding projects.
Time management took on new meaning. I recognised that grief comes in waves, and learned to work with them rather than against them. Mornings, I discovered, were (and still are all these years on) my cognitive best, the window after waking before the full weight of reality settled back in. I protected those hours fiercely for my most demanding work.
Afternoons often brought emotional fatigue, so I scheduled simpler tasks, meetings that energised rather than drained me, or sometimes simply acknowledged that I needed to stop and rest.
I came to understand that fighting against the grief only made it more powerful. When I resisted it, tensed against it, it grew overwhelming. When I acknowledged it, gave it space, it remained painful but became something I could move alongside rather than be consumed by.
Over time, and we’re talking years, not weeks or months, focus returned. Not all at once, not completely, but in increments. Six months after his death, I could work for an hour without breaking down. A year later, a full morning. Two years later, most days were productive, though grief still arrived without warning, still took me out of commission completely sometimes.
Now, nearly seven years later, I can function at work in ways that once seemed impossible. The grief hasn’t disappeared, it never will, but it has transformed from something that consumed me entirely to something that lives alongside me, rising and falling, but no longer dictating my ability to engage with work and life. There’s a quote I cam across a couple of years after his death from Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy – “It has been said that, ‘time healS all wounds.’ I do not agree. the wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting it’s sanity, coverst them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.” It is the most accurate description I have read and still resonates deeply even after all this time.
For anyone in those early, impossible days where work and grief seem utterly incompatible, know this: What you’re experiencing is normal. Your brain is doing the important work of processing loss, and that naturally affects your ability to do other work.
Be gentle with yourself. Lower expectations temporarily. Ask for help and accommodations where possible. Break tasks into the smallest possible components. Celebrate tiny victories. Rest when you need to rest.
Know that you are stronger than you think, that it is possible, and that you can and will come through the other side of this horribly dark time. Not unchanged, never that, but you will come back with the ability to function, to work, to create, to contribute again, even while carrying your grief.
Focus will return, not all at once, but in moments that gradually extend into hours, then days. Your capacity will rebuild. It will be different, perhaps as grief changes us permanently, but it will rebuild. You will rebuild.
Until then, be patient with the process. It’s not just okay to struggle with focus during grief, it’s entirely human.
