Stages of Grief When You've Lost Your Browser Tabs

Grief is a complex emotional process that takes many forms in life, but the loss of your browser tabs is a uniquely modern experience. In the digital workspace, one may amass an array of carefully curated knowledge over time, expecting to peruse it at a later date. We assume these tabs are safe to keep open indefinitely, but too often, they accumulate and succumb to unexpected shutdowns, crashes, or other circumstances. Here are the five stages of grief you can expect to experience in the minutes and even hours that follow:

1. Denial - Your mind cannot immediately comprehend the loss of hours of research. This rejection of reality leads to a frantic but futile search for your tabs. You may reassure yourself that they must be hiding behind the system update window or muster up the false hope that Chrome has remembered your last session. At this stage, it is also likely that you will haphazardly close every other program with little regard for saving your work.

2. Anger - There will be a point where your search reaches its logical end, and you will begin to exhibit passive-aggressive behaviors. Your frustration is compounded by the fact that you cannot remember what, exactly, you are angry about losing. You may turn to the closest person in the room and ask leading questions like, “Were you using my computer?” and “Then why is there just this single Pinterest page open?” An innocent pet known for walking across the keyboard may even be subject to an undeserved side-eye.

3. Bargaining - Maybe you had a friend’s SoundCloud open that you were supposed to check out. Maybe if they were on Spotify, you would have been more likely to listen to it. Sound familiar? This is just one example signifying a downward spiral of hypotheticals; your mind’s attempt to regain control over the situation: “If I had just used Bookmarks for their intended purpose...” - “If only I could admit that opening a page for Instagram didn’t really count as ‘deleting the app’...” This is your mind turning on itself - indulging in speculations and marking them as turning points that may have catalyzed your insurmountable build up of information.

4. Depression - You come to know your amalgamation of helpful information as a digital surrogate for a mentor, considerate friend, or even a guardian. In this stage, you truly mourn the loss of their presence and can feel directionless or empty. You may find yourself questioning, “What’s the point of it all without that blogger’s minimalist workout routine that I definitely probably would have started today if I still had it up?” Gone, too, with that omniscient caretaker are countless recipes, critically important home repair forum threads, and that one-pager that would have finally made you understand your personal finances.

5. Acceptance - You willingly accept that, perhaps, in an alternate dimension, a version of you exists that has consumed a wildly different set of information. You come to terms with the fact that you will now become a completely different person than your last browsing session would have influenced. With a blank slate, this new version of yourself can seek out new possibilities with the confidence to leave the alternate dimension behind. Your destructive self-talk will finally fade, and you will eventually find yourself stating things like, “I am enough!”, “I will find the perfect copycat Crunchwrap Supreme recipe!”, and “I can do my own unsupervised electrical work!”