Do you carry a longing for a place you’ve never fully known? Have you ever grieved something intangible?

To be part of a diaspora is to constantly live in two worlds. Your body in one place, moving through the motions of everyday life, while your heart is elsewhere, to a place that exists only in memories or stories you’ve been told. It also means living with a severed identity, always searching for that true sense of belonging.

As a Palestinian-Mexican in diaspora, I've always struggled with the in-betweenness of my identity - not knowing my native languages, the constant code-switching, feeling like an outsider in both of my communities. I’ve often felt confusion around cultural practices, unable to fully understand or participate in traditions that were meant to connect me to my roots. There were many moments when I felt guilty for not knowing enough. I questioned my belonging and wondered if I could ever fully claim both sides of my heritage.

For a long time I carried this grief with me. A heaviness I couldn’t name. It was the feeling of fragmentation, like pieces of me were scattered in places I couldn’t touch. A longing for something that I knew existed but was out of reach. As I began reclaiming my identity, I realized that healing is not linear. I connected to my diasporic roots through cooking cultural dishes, creating with my hands, and beginning to learn the language. These may seem like simple steps, but they began to stitch the parts of my identity back together. These practices rooted me in a sense of self I had longed for.

Diasporic grief is a complex and layered experience of displacement, one that extends across ancestral generations. It’s not just the loss of a homeland, but also the slow erosion of culture, language, and belonging. It is shaped by:

Displacement (forced or voluntary)
Cultural erasure and assimilation (loss of language, traditions, and identity)
The inability to return home (the exile of entire generations)
The loss of a life that could have been (a life, a version of oneself, a future that was never possible)

Why Diasporic Grief Is So Often Overlooked

Part of what makes diasporic grief so heavy is that it is rarely named or validated. Western mental health frameworks often fail to recognize this form of grief because it does not fit neatly into conventional models. Western psychology tends to individualize grief, framing it around personal bereavement, loss of a loved one, or a single traumatic event. But diasporic grief is collective, intergenerational, and political. It is not just the grief of one person but of entire communities, passed down through generations. It is nonlinear and ongoing; there is no closure, no finality. The loss continues to unfold, deepening as histories are erased and homelands are destroyed. Because of this, diasporic grief is often pathologized rather than recognized as cultural and ancestral mourning. Additionally, diasporic grief is continuously evolving in the the current geopolitical landscape.

Diasporic Grief in the Body

As a therapist, I often see how diasporic grief shows up not just emotionally, but also physically. Our bodies hold the trauma of our ancestors, and we can become the vessels for their unfinished grief. Ways it can show up somatically:

Nervous system dysregulation (hypervigilance, emotional numbness, dissociation)

Chronic pain & tension (jaw clenching, neck/shoulder stiffness, headaches/migraines)
Digestive & gut health issues (nausea, bloating, IBS)
Sleep disturbances (insomnia, nightmares, chronic fatigue)
Respiratory issues (shallow breathing, tightness in chest, breath-holding)
Cardiovascular symptoms (heart palpitations, cold hands/feet, high blood pressure)
Weakened immune response & skin conditions (autoimmune disorders, eczema, chronic inflammation)

Honoring and Healing Diasporic Grief

Therapy can be a space to witness and honor this grief with tenderness, to give it language, to sit with it, and to allow it to breathe. In my practice, I support clients to:

Move through grief somatically: recognizing how it shows up in the body and gently releasing it through breath, grounding, and movement.
Reclaim connection to culture and ancestry: through storytelling, creative expression, and cultural rituals.
Find community in grief: because healing happens in collective spaces.

As someone who carries this same grief, I’m here to remind you: you don’t have to carry it alone. You deserve a space where it can be named, witnessed, honored and worked through.

Reach out today to schedule a free consultation. https://calendly.com/therapywithnichole/15-min

Written by: Nichole Abdallah, AMFT

Nichole is a second-generation Palestinian-Latina Registered Associate Marriage and Family Therapist at Noor Therapy and Wellness who helps adult children of immigrants reclaim their cultural identities, navigate intergenerational trauma, and find a sense of belonging.