Spousal death is a common and disruptive later life event, yet how resilience unfolds afterwards remains insufficiently understood, particularly from older adults’ perspectives. Resilience research utilizes the metaphor of ‘bouncing forward’ to describe navigating adversity, but how it relates to older adults’ experiences of spousal loss and the everyday conditions in which resilience takes shape remains unclear. To address these conceptual gaps, this study examines how older adults make sense of resilience after spousal loss, what supports or hinders it in daily life and how their experiences relate to ‘bouncing forward’. It uses participatory action research and was part of a larger Dutch project (2023–2025) conducted in three municipalities (one rural, two urban), exploring everyday resilience and loss.
Interview findings are presented using low-inference qualitative description, staying close to participants’ and co-researchers’ own language. They illustrate how resilience is experienced as a non-linear, multi-dimensional process across life domains such as health, social life and daily routines. This involves alternating periods of improvement, setback and stillness. These possibilities are opened up, restricted or suspended by personal orientations, close relationships, material environments and institutional responses. Clark’s holonic framework and Arendt’s theories of action and natality help interpret these changes as expansions, contractions and pauses across personal, relational and institutional contexts, clarifying how new beginnings can become possible or remain out of reach. The study offers a situational and relational account of resilience after spousal loss and identifies conditions that enable or restrict older adults’ efforts to navigate everyday life.
