While ecology represented a major paradigm shift in understanding nature, very few were able to apply its insights to understanding the afflictions of the mind. The ecologist, Phyllis Windle, in her essay “The Ecology of Grief”, pioneered a bridge between professional ecology and psychological grief (Windle 1995), and her opening of this transdisciplinary space was followed later by the thanatologist Kriss Kevorkian, who explained that desolation in terms she named ‘environmental grief’ and/or ‘ecological grief’ (Kevorkian 2004, 2019). These terms, and the grief theory that underpins them, have recently re-appeared in the literature as a response to the climate crisis. ~ Dr. Glenn Albrecht, Environmental Philosopher and author of a recent book called Earth Emotions, coined the term solastalgia.
If you’re struggling with environmental grief and/or ecological grief, please contact me. You do not have to carry this grief alone. Kindly allow me to help you.
When I began my doctoral research in thanatology in 2001, I was challenged by a professor to contribute something new to the field. A daunting task to be sure since the ideas I had were a bit too progressive at the time. I was interested in Shamanic Journeying to help people at the end-of-life, and I was also interested in the use of psychedelics at the end-of-life, but my doctoral committee thought those ideas were too far fetched. I thought about the environment that I was living in at the time, an area I always loved, but witnessed daily the logging taking place. It was painful for me to see a logging truck on the highway filled with trees that were killed for human benefit… my benefit. While we consider how many unhoused people there are, each tree we kill was a home to many of our wild Kin. I found myself grieving the loss of the trees, whales, etc., and it was then that I coined the term environmental grief. I focused my research of that new term on the Southern Resident Orcas who were declining. At the time, my doctoral committee believed that, too, was a bit out there, but today so many people are struggling with environmental grief, as well as ecological grief, another term I coined and one that people mistakenly use interchangeably with environmental grief.
Photo taken from shore by Betsey Thoennes.
Environmental grief is defined as the grief reaction stemming from the environmental loss of ecosystems caused by natural or human-made events. If we look at the definition of environmental, we find that it relates more to the impact of humans on the natural world. We’re looking at this grief reaction from a larger perspective such as the loss of a forest or species due to humans. I’m reacting with environmental grief to the decline, and perhaps extinction, of the Southern Resident Orcas in the Salish Sea.
Ecological grief is the grief reaction stemming from the disconnection, and relational loss, of our natural world. In this case, I feel ecological to be more like our relationship to physical surroundings and living organisms like the trees in the neighborhood. Ecological grief would be the reaction I’d have to those trees being cut down. Not only are the trees being killed, but birds and other animals that call those trees home are either being killed or having to find another place to live.
Environmental Grief
Several years ago, I was invited to write a chapter on environmental grief for the book, Non-Death Loss and Grief Context and Clinical Implications.
Photo taken from shore by Betsey Thoennes.
Ecological Law
Dr. Rosalind Warner, a colleague in Canada, invited me to co-author a chapter about our work educating decision makers to recognize the inherent rights of the Southern Resident Orcas for this book, Ecological Law in Practice Case Studies for a Transformative Approach.
Legal Rights for the Salish Sea
I often remind people that when they are struggling to cope with grief, that taking action really helps. Do something. That’s not to suggest we ignore, suppress or deny our grief. It means that we do not allow the grief to consume us. What helps me cope with environmental and ecological grief is being a part of the rights of Nature movement because I feel like we are actually making a difference. I founded Legal Rights for the Salish Sea in 2016 along with friends in my community.