Grief

All posts tagged Grief

I’m Still Here

Published February 9, 2026 by Malia

Well, hello there. It’s been a hot minute since I last updated this blog. And a lot has happened in that year and a half or so since my last post. To give you the short version: 2025 sucked.

Still here and want the longer version? Okay. Here goes…

Trigger warning…there’s a lot of death (people & pet)

To start with, I haven’t talked on here about my relationship with my mother the last few years, but it was non-existent. She wasn’t safe for me to be around and I finally had to step away from the relationship. It wasn’t a choice I made easily, but ultimately it was the best choice. I know that people have opinions about children going no-contact with their parent(s), and all I can say is unless you are involved personally in a relationship you have no idea what the whole story is. What you see publicly is not necessarily how things are behind closed doors. I genuinely hope you never find yourself in a situation where you have to make the decision to go no-contact. And if you have been in that situation and had to make that choice, I know it wasn’t easy.

I share all that because it helps to set up what happened in January of 2025. 2025 started with mom getting diagnosed with cancer. It was aggressive. Because of being no-contact with mom, I’d also had to go no-contact with dad. I re-established contact with him and we met for breakfast to catch up and discuss the situation with mom’s health. I’m so glad we got to have that breakfast.

At the end of January 2025, I had my tubes removed. Given the political climate in the U.S., it seemed safer than risk another early-term pregnancy loss. February 4th, a week after I had surgery, mom passed away. Thirteen days later, dad was supposed to return to work, and when he didn’t show up for his shift, my aunt was called to do a wellness check. Sometime between the evening of February 15 and morning of February 17, dad passed away in his sleep. He was very peaceful, according to those who saw him. While I was prepared for mom’s death (as much as one can be), I wasn’t prepared for dad to go. I knew it was possible because they were so close, but his health was pretty good and I thought we were going to have a little bit of time together. His death almost destroyed me, and almost a year later I’m still struggling.

In the midst of all this, my dog, Krypto, started acting off, but I didn’t initially think it was anything other than him reacting to my stress. He always seemed to be very in tune with how I was feeling. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Tom, my husband, noticed something seemed really off and took him to the vet. Turned out, Krypto had a very aggressive form of oral cancer. This was diagnosed not quite two weeks after dad died. The vet told us we’d be lucky to get a month. We weren’t lucky. The day after our tenth wedding anniversary, we said goodbye to Krypto.

Not even two weeks after we lost Krypto, my folks’ cat, Zazzy, was diagnosed with cancer and we lost her as well.

So yeah, 2025 sucked. I spent large chunks of it on heavy meds that basically sedated me because I couldn’t function. I did start improving toward the end of the year. In October, I wrote my next book. It’s a weird book about love and grief. I’m currently trying to sell my parents’ condo, and the market is pretty cold. It’s a bit stressful.

Anyway, I’m still here. Some days are better than others. Last week was the one year anniversary of mom’s death. Tom and I ate a bunch of seafood because she loved seafood. Next week is the anniversary of dad being found. I’m releasing my next book on that day because that date is always going to be devastating, and I need something happy to make it a little less heartbreaking and a little easier to get through.

Progress

Published May 24, 2021 by Malia

I’m starting this post with a Trigger Warning for suicidal ideation. I’ve been debating writing about this for the last few days, and decided to go ahead with it. As always when I write an out this stuff, I like to include the following reminder: Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (Lifeline) at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), or text the Crisis Text Line (text HELLO to 741741).

Well, it’s been a full week since the official diagnosis of the Big C.

I wish the C stood for “Cookie” in this case.

It’s been a week of processing. I’ll admit, I’ve been very surprised by how much grief I’ve been experiencing. I know I mentioned the grief last week, but I’m still surprised by it. The worst part of processing grief? It’s not linear.

Everyday seems to come with a different feeling. I’ll have a day of sadness, followed by a day of anger and bargaining, followed by sadness, followed by acceptance, followed by sadness. Been feeling sad quite a lot of the time. However, I noticed something on Saturday.

Through all of this, I have not experienced a desire to unalive myself. Usually, when I’m going through high stress, my brain begins this attack of constantly telling me that it would be better if I wasn’t here. That the pain and stress would go away. I spent most of May 2020 through January 2021 dealing with my brain constantly harassing me to just be done with life. It was exhausting, and part of what ultimately led to me deciding not to return to my job.

I’m not saying that I’m cured. I don’t think I am. But I do take it as a positive sign that I am making progress with my mental health.

I’m not okay, and that’s okay.

Published May 20, 2021 by Malia

I went to therapy this morning.

I hadn’t been in a few months, and I realized on Monday, after getting Tom’s official cancer diagnosis from the doctor, that I really needed a session. 

I’m just so overwhelmed by my feelings at present. Since I have a really bad habit of refusing to acknowledge what I’m feeling and just squashing them down deep inside, I’m trying to break that.

Here’s the thing about therapy. I appreciate it. It’s been amazingly helpful. It is not fun. I don’t walk out and immediately feel better. But there’s something about sitting in a judgement free zone, talking about what I’m thinking that really makes a difference.

I’m learning that it’s okay to feel all the feelings. It’s okay to be sad or angry or frustrated or any other emotion that sweeps over me. It’s okay to acknowledge those feelings and give name to them. The important thing is what I do with those feelings.

I think it’s important to point out that just because I’m facing some dark feelings, that doesn’t mean I’ve lost hope or my faith. I’m still reeling from feeling blindsided by all this, plus I’m grieving right now. I’m still dealing with some grief over my old job. I’m grieving my lost babies. I’m grieving putting dreams on hold. And I’m grieving Tom’s kidney. I’m sure that sounds absurd, but that’s just how things are right now.

So, what about Tom? He’s always been incredibly supportive of me getting mental health help. He knows that I’m equally supportive of him seeking help. But doing so is a very personal choice. So, I check in on him regularly, and the door is open if he decides he does want to talk to a professional.

Things are hard, but we will get through it.

Whosday

Published September 25, 2012 by Malia

Okay, so I think I’ve decided that Tuesdays are going to be my day to geek out over books and movie and tv.  Hence calling it “Whosday.”  (This is mostly a tip of the hat to my enduring love of Doctor Who.)

I’ve just started reading the Matched book series.  I finished the first book, and am a little ways into the second.  It’s an interesting series.  Much like The Hunger Games, the main character, Cassia, is a girl living in a dystopian society.  Basically, Cassia signs up to be “matched” (have an arranged marriage decided by the government based on statistics) and she accidentally gets matched to two guys she knows.  Being matched to someone you know is a rarity, and being matched to more than one person just doesn’t happen.  There’s a war going on, but you don’t really get into that until you’re closer to the end of the first book.  The story is quite interesting, but the writing is a little difficult to read.  It feels like it needed one more rewrite before getting published, but I can’t really complain because I’m not the one who wrote it and making money off of it.

I’ve really been enjoying watching Go On.  It’s this show on NBC about this guy who’s wife dies, and he has to join a grief support group.  It’s an interesting take on death and grief.  I think what I like about it is the fact that they’re dealing with an incredibly uncomfortable subject.  I grew up surrounded by death and regularly attending funerals(granted it was other people’s losses, not my own, the fun of being a pastor’s kid), so it was something I grew up knowing about and talking about.  I remember what a shock to my system it was when I discovered how many of my peers had never attended a funeral.  I even had friends around whom I couldn’t even mention anything to do with death or funerals.  The show is funny and sweet, and just a little strange.  Plus, it’s really nice to see Matthew Perry on t.v. again (he was always my favorite on Friends).