From diagnosis to death, my dad’s journey was a callously swift nine months. A strange lump in his...
Category: Grief
The ‘grief window’ and other myths…
I’m 37-years-old now and I can see that was as impossible as raising my mum from the ground (or,...
The question of a funeral
Our social worker and child life specialists speak to the patients and parents, informing them of...
With Flowers
I’ve tried to tell this story before. Let me try again. This time with flowers. My mother died on...
Encountering my grandma’s ghost allowed me to grieve her absence
When I tell my mum about my dream, she’s relieved, saying that she’s done everything to invite my...
How to Rescue a Grieving Friend
Before my father’s decline, he was a preeminent scholar of Black religious history. As brilliant...
How Talking to the Dead Dislodged Some of My Sorrow
I began leaving voice-mail messages for my mother about a month after she died. It was February...
Sex after death
After my husband, Fernando, had been dead for about two years, I decided to fill out a profile on...
My partner died. Then my brother. Here’s what not to say to someone who is grieving
We are hardwired to say these things when someone dies because otherwise, it would be too much....
What if There’s No Such Thing as Closure?
[Pauline] Boss, an emeritus professor of family social science — the study of families and close...
United in Grief: Two Widow’s Perspectives
The first months after our partners passed away, we saw all the survival mechanisms we didn’t know...
Caring and Grieving in the Shadow of COVID
When my mother had brain surgery to remove a tumor in May 2020, I thought that was the most...
A moment that changed me: my mother died – and I became my brother’s legal guardian
It was in Stansted airport’s Pink Elephant car park that I realised all the adults were going...
“I need you to just be there. I need you to hold my story.”
In September 2020, I watched from afar as Andrew and his wife, Rachel, announced that their infant...
I lost my son six months ago
Fourteen years ago, I remember taking my son home from the NICU. The way the world currently...
The Grief Artist
Someone in my group for hospice workers shares the article on flowers as a grief ritual, and...
The Future is The Supremes
As a person who does not find it easy to express their emotions unless it’s 3am and I’m rolling on...
What Losing My Disabled Mom Taught Me About Ableism
If I’ve learned anything in the five years since my mom died, it’s that grief is exceedingly...
Moving Forward After Caregiving Ends
In November of 2020, my beloved husband died. His death brought 23 years of caregiving to an end....
Poet Tracy K. Smith On Grief In The Holidays And ‘Different Vocabularies For Feeling’
When I was a kid, I watched the winter holidays shift for my family after my mother died. And this...
Saying I Do, And Saying Farewell
In 2010, after two years together as a couple, during which we almost broke up once, we learned...
At 82, My Grandmother Has Lost Her Husband — And The World As She Knows It
The disarray and social upheaval caused by the virus took a life event that’s already fraught for...
If I could
Well I’ll have to say I’m guilty .. I put my hubby first when he had a stroke and heart attack,...
Does life ever get easier?
Sometimes it's just one thing after another, for months and then years. How do you make it...