Healing the Loss

21/04/2026

20/04/2026

18/04/2026

Instead of saying, "I know what it feels like", let's say "I cannot imagine your heartbreak".

Instead of saying, "You're strong, you'll get through this, let's say " You'll hurt, and I'll be here.

Instead of saying, "You look like you're doing well, Let's say, "How are you holding up today?"

Instead of saying, "Healing takes time", let's say "Healing has no timeline".

Instead of saying, "Everything happens for a reason, let's say "This must feel so terribly senseless right now".

And when there are no words to say at all, you don't need to try and find some. Love speaks in silences too.

~ 'Words' by Ullie-Kaye

~ Art by Jennifer Yoswa

18/04/2026

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DXPYLsDD3Jx/?igsh=MTcycDdzb3FiZ2Qweg==

18/04/2026

Today is the 6th anniversary of the terrible tragedy at Portapique, Nova Scotia.
In remembrance of all the lives taken and impacted by this tragedy.

17/04/2026

It’s confronting how quickly grief turns inward.

You can sit in a room full of people who have all lost someone, hear their stories, see their pain and still feel this quiet, stubborn certainty that what you’re carrying is heavier. Not because you lack empathy. Not because their loss doesn’t matter. But because yours is the one that rearranged your world.

In your world, this loss is the worst thing that has ever happened. It changed the way the day begins and the way it ends. It altered how you see the future, if you can even bring yourself to look that far ahead. It lives in the small, ordinary moments that no one else notices. The empty chair. The silence where a voice used to be. The instinct to reach for them before remembering you can’t.

There’s no need to minimise that just because others are hurting too.

Grief isn’t a competition, but it also isn’t communal in the way people expect. No one else is living inside your exact before and after. No one else is carrying the same memories, the same bond, the same rupture.

So yes, within your life, your loss is the worst.

You have lived your worst day.

And acknowledging that isn’t selfish. It’s honest.

17/04/2026

Walking into a room shouldn't take that much effort. But it does.

14/04/2026

“People will say, ‘Let me know what you need.’ That's not helpful. Expecting the person who's bereaved to be able to identify what I need from you is like giving a non-mathematician a very complex math problem and telling them, ‘Figure out the answer and then let me know what it is.’ Right?

What the bereaved need is that friend, that neighbor, that family member to say, ‘Hey, I'm gonna pick up the kids today,’ or ‘I’m going to bring food.’

So, being very concrete about the help that's being offered would truly help the bereaved as opposed to just saying, ‘My deepest condolences. Let me know if you need anything.’”

Cristina M Chipriano, LCSW-S, director of Equity & Community Outreach at Dougy Center, is featured in Speaking Grief.is featured in Speaking Grief, a public media initiative that works to create a more grief-aware society.

For more ideas about how to support someone who is grieving, visit: speakinggrief.org

Speaking Grief is produced by WPSU with philanthropic support from the New York Life Foundation.

14/04/2026

The calendar knows things your body already felt.

You start feeling off days before the actual date. Something shifts in your chest. Your patience thins. Sleep changes. And then you realize what's coming.

The anniversary. The birthday. The date that used to be just a day and now carries everything.

It's not just the day itself. It's the whole week around it. The buildup. The aftermath. The way time bends around the dates that matter most.

13/04/2026

“It has been said, 'time heals all wounds.' I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.”
Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy

Joan Brull - Dream, 1905.