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Sibling Loss and Stigmatized Grief: Nina Rodriguez on the Death of Her Brother and Navigating Shame

 

"Shame is what killed my brother…and I refuse to let shame take anything away from us anymore.”

In this episode of Grief'd Up, host Rebecca Feinglos welcomes Nina Rodriguez, grief guide, educator, podcaster, and founder of Grief and Light. Nina shares her experience of the death of her little brother and only sibling, Yosef, at 32 to fentanyl poisoning. His death transformed her into a passionate advocate for grief support and stigmatized loss.

Nina was celebrating Yosef’s 32nd birthday on an ordinary Wednesday when everything changed. For a year and a half, Nina told people her brother died of a heart attack, unable to bear the weight of judgment and shame surrounding addiction and overdose. But standing at the University of Miami, preparing to speak publicly about her loss, something shifted. She realized that shame had already taken too much, and she refused to let it take anything more.

This conversation explores the unique grief of sibling loss and why siblings are often called the forgotten mourners. Nina and Rebecca discuss how losing a sibling means losing not just your person, but your future as you imagined it: no nieces or nephews, no shared experience of burying parents, the family branch ending with you. They also dive into the layers within sibling loss itself: losing a sibling as a child versus an adult, losing an only sibling, the strange relationship siblings have, and why bereaved siblings feel they must constantly qualify their loss as valid.

Nina speaks to the importance of energetic hygiene when working in the grief space, the beauty of meeting people in their most vulnerable and raw selves, and why she still uses the present tense when talking about her brother. 

Join Rebecca and Nina as they challenge the shame surrounding stigmatized loss, explore how siblings navigate being the forgotten mourners, and celebrate the ways we can maintain continuing bonds with those we love, even when they're no longer physically here.

Resources:

For more on sibling grief, listen to Rebecca's conversation with Annie Sklaver-Orenstein: https://www.grieveleave.com/podcasts/grief-d-up/episodes/2148864342

 

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