The calendar keeps its own record of a loss. A birthday, a wedding anniversary, the date of the death, the first night of a holiday the two of you always spent together: these days can bring grief back with a force that feels out of proportion to how you were doing the week before.
With the winter holidays close, this article explains why dates have this effect and offers some ways to plan for them. For the wider question of timing, see how long grief lasts.
What is an anniversary reaction?
The American Psychological Association's Dictionary of Psychology defines an anniversary reaction as "a strong emotional response on the anniversary of a significant event." It adds that this most commonly involves depressive symptoms around the same time of year that a death or another painful event happened.
The National Cancer Institute describes something similar when it explains why grief comes in waves. Many bereaved people have highly intense, time-limited periods of distress, for example 20 to 30 minutes. These can be set off by reminders such as major cultural or social holidays, the anniversary of the death, or giving away the person's belongings. NCI adds that at other times the pangs arrive unexpectedly. So a date is one kind of reminder among many, and an especially predictable one.
Why do dates carry so much weight?
A date is a cue. The National Center for PTSD at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, writing about the anniversaries of traumatic events and not about grief specifically, explains that an anniversary date can bring back memories of the event. It also says that most people feel better within a week or two after the anniversary. That guidance was written about trauma, so it may not map exactly onto your loss, but many grieving people will recognize the pattern.
Holidays add another layer, because they come with other people's expectations and a set of rituals that the person used to be part of. The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, drawing on the stories of people bereaved by suicide, notes that winter can be a difficult time for bereaved families and that days like Mother's Day can be especially hard. Those are accounts of lived experience, not research findings, and they will sound familiar to many people after any kind of loss.
Is a hard day years later a setback?
No. The American Psychiatric Association says that for most people grief-related symptoms decrease over time, and that feelings and symptoms of grief "may sometimes increase at different points in time." It adds that these increases do not usually require mental health treatment. The National Institute on Aging puts it simply: as time passes you may still miss the person, the intense pain lessens for most people, and there will be good and bad days.
One model of grieving describes this kind of back and forth. In the dual process model, published by Margaret Stroebe and Henk Schut in 1999, a grieving person moves between facing the loss and attending to the rest of life, and taking a break from grief is treated as part of coping well. A wave on the fifth or the fifteenth anniversary fits that picture. It says something about what the person meant to you. It does not cancel the ground you have covered.
How can you plan for the winter holidays?
The ideas below are options that people commonly find useful. They are not rules, and they are not drawn from studies. Take what fits your family, your faith and your energy this year.
- Decide ahead what to keep, change or skip. You might hold on to one tradition, hand another to someone else, and let a third go for now. A choice made for this year is not a choice forever.
- Tell people what you want. Let your host know whether you would like the person mentioned, and that you might leave early.
- Give the person a place, if you want to. A toast, a favorite dish, a candle, a story at the table. Some families find this comforting. Others would rather not, and that is fine too.
- Keep the plan loose. Arrive in your own car. Have a quiet room or a walk available. Allow yourself to change your mind on the day.
- Think about the day after. A plan for the morning that follows, even a small one, can soften the drop once the gathering ends.
If you catch yourself enjoying part of the day, that is allowed. The National Institute on Aging reminds grieving people that there are no rules about how you should feel. If you are the friend or relative of someone who is grieving this season, the article on how to support someone who is grieving has specific suggestions.
What about birthdays, death anniversaries and private dates?
Holidays are shared, so at least other people know they are coming. The harder dates are often the private ones: the birthday, the day of the diagnosis, a due date, the anniversary of the last conversation. Nobody at work knows why you are quiet.
Some people take the day off and visit a place that mattered. Some mark it with one other person who also remembers. Some prefer an ordinary day with as little ceremony as possible. You can also ask a friend to put the date in their calendar, so that someone checks in without your having to explain. None of these is the correct way to do it. What you chose last year does not bind you this year.
When is it worth getting more support?
Most bereaved people do not need therapy, and many get through these dates with the help of family and friends. The National Institute on Aging offers a plain test for when to reach further: if sadness is making it difficult to carry on in your day-to-day life, help is available from a support group, a mental health professional or the people close to you.
A group can be a good fit around the holidays, because everyone in the room is facing the same season. The practice keeps a list of grief support groups in the Boston area. If you would prefer to talk with someone one to one, Dr. Rabin offers grief and loss therapy in Brookline and by telehealth across Massachusetts. She offers a free phone consultation of about 15 minutes, which you can request through the contact page.
If a date brings thoughts of not wanting to be alive, call or text 988 at any hour, or call 911 in an emergency.
Keep reading
Sources
- American Psychological Association, APA Dictionary of Psychology: anniversary reaction
- National Cancer Institute, Grief, Bereavement, and Coping With Loss (PDQ), Health Professional Version (2024)
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Center for PTSD, Trauma Reminders: Anniversaries
- American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, I've lost someone
- American Psychiatric Association, Prolonged Grief Disorder (2025)
- National Institute on Aging, Coping With Grief and Loss (2024)
- Stroebe and Schut, The dual process model of coping with bereavement: rationale and description, Death Studies (1999)
Last reviewed October 2026. This guide is general information, not medical advice or a diagnosis. If you are in crisis, call or text 988, or call 911 in an emergency.
