Cancer is a brutal opponent. It doesn’t strike just once; it drags you into a relentless 10-round f ...
Book of Mourning Prologue
Prologue: Mourning is the Price of Love Grief is never generic. We don’t mourn in some univer ...
Camino Changed My Mind
Why I’m walking. Why I’m writing. Why this book matters. I thought I knew what the Camino would ...
Joy vs Happiness — The Memory and the Motion
The Memory and the Motion It was raining the first time I truly understood the difference betwee ...
Forgiveness and Mourning
Personal Story — The Fruit Aisle A few days after Angé died, I went to the grocery store. I saw ...
The Weight We Carry When Love Outlives Life
Opening Reflection When someone you love dies, you don’t just lose them — you inherit the weight ...
Forgiveness and Happiness (As Verbs)
“Forgiveness is what frees the hands. Happiness is what we build with them.” ⸻ Opening Reflec ...
Dealing with the Small Things That Were Special
Opening Reflection The evenings are the hardest. I used to look back from the path — after one o ...
Mourning Behaviour – What Does This Look Like?
Introduction: Forget the Rules There are no six steps to mourning. No neat pathway to “new be ...
Steps to Support Those That Are Mourning
Because of Angé: The Candlelight on the Stoep One night, maybe six weeks after Angé died, I came ...
The Pain of Grief
Opening Reflection — The Dinner Table Without Her The other night, I found myself at a long dinn ...
What About the Behaviours I Don’t Miss?
Angé, I have to say this out loud, and I hope you’re smiling. I miss you. Deeply, daily, unbeara ...
The Way You Mourn Reflects Who You Are
“Grief doesn’t change you. It reveals you.” ⸻ Opening Reflection: The day after Angé passe ...
Becoming You
Opening Reflection: Grief doesn’t destroy you — but it does change the architecture of who you a ...
Creating Purposeful Memories
“In grief, we do not only remember — we choose how to remember. And we can choose to do it together ...
Remodeling Your Life — Not to Move On, But to Live With Purpose
“You don’t rebuild because you’ve forgotten the past You rebuild because you remember, and because ...
Don’t Lose Yourself by Mourning Their Way
Opening Reflection The house filled with casseroles, flowers, and whispers. Some people wanted s ...
It’s Okay to Be Jealous
Opening Reflection — The WhatsApp Posts In the days after Angé died, the WhatsApp messages began ...
The Questions I’ll Never Get to Ask
Some things went with her. I have to live with that. ⸻ Opening Reflection: The Photograph Wit ...
Play the Movie Forward
Personal Reflection: Three Regrets Hi Angé, I have two confessions. Actually, three. The f ...
The Fruit Forest — A Memorial in Her Name, and in Mine
“We planted trees, not tears.” ⸻ Opening Reflection: A Different Kind of Goodbye There was ...
Mourning, Contentment, and Happiness
🌻 Mourning Mourning is the price we pay for deep love. It’s raw. It’s honest. And it cha ...
The Hard Grief Emotions
“Grief is a storm of emotions. It doesn’t ask permission to arrive, and it rarely leaves quietly.” ...
The Good Emotions in Grief
Moments of light — unexpected, undeserved, and absolutely allowed. ⸻ Opening Reflection: The ...
The Hardest Road You’ll Ever Walk — Stopping Is Not an Option
Because if you stop walking this road, you don’t just pause — you disappear. Perseverance is not a ...
When the Pain Is Too Much — Mourning and Suicidal Thoughts
There have been nights, quiet and dark, when I’ve sat alone with the weight of Angé’s absence and t ...
Mourning and Addiction — The Late-Night Glass
It began innocently — a single glass of wine late at night. At first, it was a comfort. A sof ...
Planning for Excitement and Happiness.
Camino Reflection: A Planless Path I was walking on the Camino without any real plan for what I ...
Mourning by Gender and Age – From Inside the Grief
Introduction “People look at you differently when you’re older and grieving. They think you’re s ...
Supporting the Mourner — Understanding the Impact of Age and Gender
Grief is universal — and yet deeply personal. Everyone who mourns does so from the unique vantage p ...
Mourning and Physical Symptoms: When Grief Lives in the Body
I remember lying on the bed one morning, maybe a week or so after Angé died, and I couldn’t get up. ...
Learning to Live by Yourself: Crafting a New Life
When your partner dies — or even when you lose a child, or someone else you’ve shared life with — t ...
Living Alone, But Not Being Lonely – The Emotional Work
There’s a silence that only the grieving understand. It’s not just the absence of noise. It’s th ...
Being Single and Still Having Your Old Friends — And Making New Ones: How Does That Work?
Opening Reflection: The Double Bed in the Auberge Last night, I offered to share a bed with a wo ...
Decision Making — When Grief Gets Behind the Wheel
Six weeks. It’s been six weeks since Angé died. Long enough to feel the empty space beside me in ev ...
Loss of My Sexual Partner: The Absence of Intimacy and Touch
A Private Kind of Grief There are some losses in mourning that people rarely talk about — not ou ...
Dealing with Other People’s Insensitiveness
“They didn’t mean to hurt me. But they did.” ⸻ Introduction: The Unexpected Hurt Grief has ...
You Will Have the Worst Day — Prepare for It
There will be a day after your loss that will feel like the worst one yet.You might think you’ve al ...
Rewriting Your Elevator Speech — Introducing Yourself After Loss
“What a beautiful sunset.” There’s something powerful about the closing of a day. The way the ...
Other People’s Lives
Introduction: The Pattern We Built Together When you live with someone—really live with them—you ...