Grappling with Grief

Going Boldly Into the Darkness

by Autumn Toelle-Jackson   I was blessed growing up; I had very little experience with grief. When I faced my first real grief experience as an adult, I didn’t even recognize it. After having a healthy child, my husband and I experienced one miscarriage and then another. I knew I was sad, but I didn’t […]

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I Started Writing: Leanne Friesen

by Leanne Friesen   When I was thirty-five years old, I held my oldest sister’s hand as she took her last breath and her body grew cold. I had spent eight years knowing this moment would come. Roxanne had been diagnosed with Stage Four Melanoma nearly a decade before, and the prognosis had never been […]

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Love What Matters: Michal Baitz

by Michal Baitz   November 7th, 2021. My father passed away in Cornell Hospital while I was running on the sidewalks alongside the NYC marathon. People blew horns and cheered wildly as we got the call that he passed. They clapped and smiled and shouted as my father’s soul departed from his body. We were […]

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The Past, The Present, The Future

by Malissa Moss   I’ve been thinking a lot lately about life and in looking back at my past it seems as if it belongs to someone else. Someone else’s story. Even as I browse through my old blog posts, it’s as if I’m reading about someone else’s experience. I get lost in the memories […]

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Grieving and Acceptance After a TBI

by Laura Hagemann   Acceptance of the loss of my pre-accident, pre-brain-injury self has been gradual. In the last five years since my accident and injury (it will be six years in September) I have dealt with a lot of change and eventually accepted it. However, upon reflection, I realize that I have been in […]

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Chasing the Light: Nikki Kirk

by Nikki Kirk   Seven years of bliss — this is what we had, my husband and I. Soulmates tangled together in the threads of love. We spent our days relishing every moment together. While our nights were spent sitting at the kitchen table, burning our tongues on Twinning’s tea while planning our future. Chancing fate […]

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I Am a Grief Artist: Grace May

by Grace May   I know grief very well, the heartbreaking grief you experience when the people closest to you die. I lost my beautiful mother to cancer years ago, which I wrote about for The Motherlove Project. After that, my beloved grandmother, who had always looked out for me ever since I was a […]

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My Earth Angel Turned Guardian Angel

by Laura Victoria   At the age of 26, my worst nightmare came true. My mom passed away at the young age of 56 and I quickly became a member of a club that I wanted no part of — the grieving club. I quickly became consumed with feelings of sadness, confusion, shock, anger, and […]

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It’s Grief and My Dance With It: Edy Nathan

by Edy Nathan   I’m not unacquainted with grief. At a very young age, it seemed to me grief was everywhere. There was nothing morbid about it. It was as natural as breathing. Unrest and trauma were imprinted in my young mind as I saw homeless dogs and cats scavenging for food, witnessed loud, aggressive […]

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Learning to Grow from the Pain

by Mary Jane Cronin   At the age of twenty-three and having only been married for a few years, I found myself giving birth to my first son. I loved being a mom and welcomed every day as a new adventure to learn more about him. Just a year later I found myself pregnant again. […]

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