Tag Archives: grief

September 27, 2026 · 12:52 pm

Navigating the spectrum of caregiver emotions

AARP had a column recently that tackled the issue of maintaining a healthy perspective as a caregiver. Can one dare to hope and maintain some optimism while still keeping solid footing in reality?

Like with all aspects of caregiving, it’s not easy. Family therapist and clinical psychologist Barry Jacobs offers some helpful tips. Jacobs notes that while optimism has been found to have positive health benefits, finding a middle ground between hope and realistic expectations may help protect emotional well-being.

If you’ve read my book The Reluctant Caregiver, you know I’m on the pessimistic end of the spectrum. Always prepared for the worst but grateful for good news helped me maintain my resilience throughout my caregiving journey.

Jacobs suggests caregivers adopt “cautious optimism.” Jacobs says this “requires the ability to simultaneously hold on to both hope and the prospect of further decline.” Sounds like a challenge but caregivers are up to the task. Here are tips from Jacobs on finding a good balance:

Aim for support and comfort, not a cure: Sometimes caregivers convince themselves that if they just provide enough loving care, they can overcome a poor prognosis. Sometimes people do beat a grim diagnosis or live years longer than expected. But conditions like dementia are terminal, even if there are ups and downs along the way. That’s why Jacobs encourages caregivers to set a more realistic and meaningful goal, which is to provide compassionate care for your loved one.

I’ve written a lot about caregiver guilt. The best we can do as caregivers for someone who is terminal is provide comfort care and a reassuring presence.

Plan for good and bad outcomes: Education is key as a caregiver. When my father developed dementia symptoms and my mother was diagnosed with colon cancer, I immersed myself in the relevant caregiver communities in addition to diving into the scientific research. Knowledge is powerful and will help you plan for the good, the bad, and the unexpected. Caregiving always throws some curve balls but being aware that those outcomes exist can help manage expectations as a caregiver.

Accept the unexpected: This is the most valuable piece of advice that helped me as a caregiver. No matter how much you prepare, you can’t predict all of the twists and turns that is the roller coaster ride of caregiving. Jacobs makes a good point that waves of grief may hit even before a care recipient’s death, as we watch a loved one decline despite our best efforts.

For more caregiving tips, visit AARP.

Image by AbsolutVision from Pixabay.

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August 9, 2026 · 3:06 pm

4 things to say before a loved one dies

Two people holding hands near a hospital bed with an elderly patient
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What should one say to a loved one who is dying?

It’s something that many people struggle with. I know I did, and the matter is complicated with a loved one who has dementia. It’s also a very personal conversation. But according to Dr. Ira Byock, a palliative care physician and author of The Four Things That Matter Most, these four simple phrases can say a lot:

“Please forgive me. I forgive you. Thank you. I love you.”

I wrote about my struggles with final words for my mother and father in The Reluctant Caregiver. Shortly before his death, while my father was in an induced coma, I expressed my love to him daily and I hope he felt the love that was surrounding him. With my mother, it was a mix of missed opportunities and missing the mark, but love was still shared. Death is often messy and unpredictable and not the carefully choreographed deathbed scenes depicted in films.

Other tips included in the Time article: try to balance out what you need to say to be at peace after your loved one’s death without overwhelming the dying person in their waning moments. The best time to relay your feelings is now.

What not to say to someone who is dying? The experts agreed that “I know how you feel” is the top phrase to avoid. Not only is it factually untrue, it makes the discussion more about you and your feelings than the dying person. Another phrase to avoid is anything concerned with quitting. Frustrated loved ones may not understand a person’s decision to stop treatment, but that is not for them to decide, and to judge a dying person as a quitter creates an unfair burden.

If you are agonizing over the right words to say, you may be surprised to learn that experts in death and dying shared that sometimes, silence is golden. Just being present in the room, holding someone’s hand, and listening if they are able to speak is profoundly meaningful.

What works for end-of-life conversations can also work for those moving through stages of dementia. If there are things you want to tell your loved one with dementia, don’t hesitate to share while they are still able to comprehend. I wish I had shared more with my father during that precious time.

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June 14, 2026 · 10:00 am

Caregiver guilt can be a motivating force

I came across a documentary series by Peter Murphy Lewis who was recently profiled on Being Patient. He candidly admits to “making a documentary out of guilt.” He was in another country working when his beloved grandfather, who had dementia, died.

From his grief and guilt came the idea for a documentary series, “People Worth Caring About.”


“We treat the buildings where our elders live as places of “sadness,” which inadvertently devalues the people who work there. It turns a noble calling into an invisible job,” Lewis said. His goal with the project is to shine a light on those workers who care for our elder loved ones.

My own family caregiving experience followed a similar road. I was in another state, working, when my father died from Alzheimer’s complications. I too remember getting that dreaded call while on the job. I also experienced a deep amount of guilt that I was mostly a long-distance caregiver. And similar to Lewis, that guilt inspired the birth of a creative project about caregiving. In my case, it’s the blog that you are reading right now, The Memories Project.

If you find yourself weighed down by guilt after the loss of a loved one, consider ways you can honor your loved one’s memory with your own unique skillset. It doesn’t have to be a public project. I know of people who have created a memorial garden in their backyard. It could also be a conscious lifestyle choice: to spend more quality time with family, to travel more, to take up a new hobby or reconnect with an old friend.

Everyone moves through the grief process in their own way. For some, embarking on such a project can bring some meaning and closure to one of the most difficult events a person can experience.

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May 21, 2026 · 6:51 pm

Remembering my mother, 11 years after her death

Death has a way of warping time. While 11 years doesn’t feel that long to me, it does seem like my mother died in a different era. For me, her death was the end of normal times, and the decade that has followed has ushered in a world I barely recognize.

As those who have experienced loss of a loved one knows, grief is not linear. It moves in unpredictable waves. Another way of describing it is “growing around grief.”

My mother doesn’t visit me that often in dreams but one way I feel her presence is each year, around the time of the anniversary of her death, the butterfly bush I planted in her honor begins to bloom.

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May 10, 2026 · 9:00 am

Happy Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day stirs a mixed range of emotions for me, as it does for many whose mothers are no longer alive. As I wrote about in The Reluctant Caregiver, my mother and I often did not see eye to eye. Yet there is a bond that can never be broken. I took my first breath in her presence, and she took her last breath in my presence.

I was getting my hair cut yesterday, and out of nowhere, I thought about one of the last photos ever taken of my mother, which was at the hair salon. How she even managed to get out of the house in the pain she was in, I don’t fully comprehend, but she loved to have her hair done.

She was gone two months later.

For those who are grieving this Mother’s Day, I hope you are able to find some comfort and peace through memories and reflections.

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December 24, 2025 · 4:16 pm

Happy Holidays

Wishing you and your family a holiday filled with love.

For those of us grieving the loss of a loved one this holiday season, may you find some sense of peace and solace in honoring your loved one’s memory in a way that is meaningful to you. For me, that is looking at photos from my childhood. I created a virtual snow globe featuring a photo of my parents at Christmas.

Remember the caregivers in your life, and if possible, offer to pick up a task so that they don’t feel overwhelmed this holiday season and can carve out a bit of self-care time. Respite care comes in many forms.

Need a last-minute gift? E-books make a great gift. Smashwords is running the 2025 End of Year Sale through Jan. 1. You can get the e-book version of my award-winning personal essay collection, The Reluctant Caregiver, for half-off.

Image generated by Google Gemini.

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December 20, 2025 · 1:41 pm

Marking 14 years since my father’s death

Today marks 14 years since my father’s death. The events of that day in 2011 and receiving the call that every family member dreads is so sharply engraved in my memory that it’s difficult to believe so much times has passed. Yet my own life and the world has transformed so much that it’s equally as difficult to believe all of these changes have occurred in the last 14 years. Grief processing tends to warp the time element.

For those of you experiencing grief during the holidays, thisWhat’s Your Grief? resource posted by Happy Healthy Caregiver in a recent newsletter may be helpful. It offers 64 tips on how to manage grief and honor the memories of departed loved ones during the holiday season.

Finally, I want to express gratitude for those who read this blog. The Memories Project was born in the immediate aftermath of my father’s death. I’m grateful to the caregiver blogging community for their support and sharing their own caregiving journeys. The blog led to personal essays and then my award-winning book, The Reluctant Caregiver. For those grieving this holiday season, consider a creative outlet to process those complex emotions. Most of all, give yourself the space to simply be with your emotions.

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November 16, 2025 · 12:35 pm

Gratitude comes in many forms and sizes

I was attending an event this weekend where we were talking about grief and gratitude. It’s an appropriate topic for November as we quickly approach Thanksgiving where we are reminded to be grateful for our blessings.

But when one is going through difficult times or actively grieving, tapping into gratitude can feel impossible. A person at the event I attended suggested that the bigger and deeper the grief, aiming to engage in smaller moments of gratitude can feel more achievable and still have a significant impact. The last thing one should do is force themselves to be grateful, because authenticity is essential. The last thing someone who is grieving should do is feel guilty because they cannot muster feelings of gratitude.

What can be helpful is taking time to be present in the moment. Recognizing the complexity of the more negative emotions and understanding that grief’s depth mirrors the bond you had with what is gone. Those relationships that were complicated may trigger even a deeper mix of emotions. Honoring those feelings over time can slowly make space for other feelings to emerge, such as gratitude.

It can also help to focus on something outside of your current situation. I find nature to be one of the simplest and most satisfying ways to ground oneself in a moment of gratitude. Being of awe of the stars in the night sky, a gorgeous sunrise, the colors of the leaves in autumn — these simple moments of gratitude have helped chip away at the oppressive grief I have felt at times during the holiday season.

Hope these tips help if you are navigating grief this holiday season.

Illustration generated by Google Gemini.

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July 6, 2025 · 9:00 am

Thinking of Mom on her birthday

Today Mom would have been 88 years old. My mother and I shared a birthday month which always made July special to me. Now it’s a little bittersweet, but I still carry the memories of how my mother tried to make my birthday special each year and how I did the same by making her handmade cards and crafts. What my gifts lacked in artistic talent they made up for in love.

Even though my mother and I were born in the same month and the same astrological sign, we were opposites in personality. I write about those challenges in The Reluctant Caregiver. But one thing we shared was a love of creativity and the arts. Over her lifetime my mother learned how to play the guitar and took dance lessons. She made fabric art wall hangings. I’m grateful to have inherited a love of creativity as well, as it can make the world a better place during challenging times.

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June 15, 2025 · 7:49 am

Happy Father’s Day

Thinking of Dad today and what it would be like to take a long walk in the park with him and discuss all of the troubles happening in the world right now.

Hope you get to spend quality time on this Father’s Day with your fathers or those who serve as father figures in your life.

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