Tag: loss

Five years after her mother’s death, while still grieving and suddenly middle-aged, Abby Mims turns to beauty products to cure what ails her.

“Cree First Nations believe ‘the northern lights are dancing spirits of loved ones who have passed on.’”

Wendy McClure recounts how an old audio tape of holiday music becomes a record of family history, unspoken rituals, and grief.

Carolita Johnson considers what it takes to recover from grief, build strength for the future, and become one’s own center of gravity again.

A year after the Camp Fire, Tessa Love contemplates home, California’s undoing, and what it means to belong.

Carolita Johnson considers the emotional and physical labor required of women as their loved ones die.

The death of his life-long skateboarding friend prompts Aaron Gilbreath to get back on his board — at 44, with his toddler daughter in tow.

Alison Fishburn shares seven longreads on how humans experience the death of their pets.

After the death of her dog, Katie Gutierrez grapples with the ripple effects of her decisions — and how to live with uncertainty as a mother.

Years after her cousin was killed, Lilly Dancyger is haunted by images of murdered women in the news.

Melissa Berman recalls what was said, and not said, between her and her beloved aunt as they approached her final year.

Kate Walter went to Woodstock in 1969 with her boyfriend. She went back in 1994 with her girlfriend. She’s not going back again.

Amy Scheiner reflects on her mother’s sudden death and what it means to be a woman in a world that is set up to bury them.

“There was no chance I was going to ask him to make another winter, but as long as he was hobbling to his golf course and chortling to me each morning, it seemed too early to end his life.”

When her grandfather died, Abigail Rasminsky learned about a part of his life she’d known nothing about.

Matthew Salesses considers the impact of his wife’s passing, and other factors, on his experience as a human passing through the fourth dimension.

Colin Dickey remembers a departed friend and a tree that won’t die.

Grace Loh Prasad realizes that mourning is complicated when home and homeland aren’t the same place.

Grieving the mysterious death of her father, Susanna Space seeks refuge in the study of meteors.

Michael Gonzales reflects on the deaths of a dear friend, and a bookworm he idolized: David Bowie.

“But who gets to impose those rules and who becomes subject to them can be decisions tainted with sexism and racism and transphobia and homophobia. “

A daughter recounts her family’s worst day, through her mother’s eyes.

After his death, Emily Urquhart ‘sees’ her brother with regularity. Nearly 20 years later, stories and science help to explain why.

A trip to Key West becomes an unexpected journey involving a sacred bird, a beloved dog, and the challenge of coming to terms with the nature of fate.

Nicole Chung contemplates loss, adoption, and working on a book her late father won’t get to see.

Ken Otterbourg contemplates love and loss and what we remember when we try to forget.

Grieving after giving up on academic life.

Seth Davis Branitz had an awful suspicion he’d feel relieved when, some day, his very troubled brother would pass. He had no idea about the other ends it would rapidly bring with it.

We have a tendency to lose items on a daily basis, and spend half a year over the course of our lifetimes searching for them.

What they don’t tell you about death—or what you don’t really understand until it happens close to you—is how permanent it is. In the months afterward I kept thinking to myself, all right, I get it. This is too painful. Let’s just take a little break from the loss. Let’s have a weekend off. A […]