Grief Fragments is a raw, ongoing diary about being by my mother’s side as she faces terminal cancer. It is an attempt to process—and survive—grief in real-time, to stay connected to life in the midst of death, to write the unspeakable, to bear the unbearable, and to record the final months, weeks, and days I have left with my mother. I am writing for my life.
May 12, 2025
I sit and watch her, thinking of the cancer growing inside her body, silent and unseen.
At times, I can't breathe. I break into tears. I touch an emptiness.
My life has been intricately intertwined with her for almost 36 years now. I have rarely been separated from her.
I struggled to sleep last night. The nights are the worst. I can't keep anything at bay. What should I do? No one beside me. I fall through darkness. I scroll too much. I should read or watch films. Not even music makes the nights bearable. Maybe I should write. I'd rather take a sleeping pill, dissolve into the ether of a dreamworld. I want to be unconscious.
I remember holding her one time years ago and knowing, in that moment, that I never wanted to let her go.
The way back is lost, the one obsession.
The worst is over.
The worst is yet to come.
—Carolyn Forché, from "The Testimony of Light"
Did I do enough? Have I failed? The weight of the guilt.
Other lives go on. Other lives have nothing to do with me now.
I am a drowning woman.
All that matters is each day that comes and making the time we have left count for something. Not everyone gets the extra time. The next six to nine months are what matter now. I need to collect memories, get recordings, and so on.
What is there to live for without my mother?
