I'm a grief guide helping you navigate your loss and a death midwife empowering end-of-life care choices

my story

For so long after my dad died, I didn't recognize myself. Where I'd once known a joyful woman with a big appetite for life, I saw the saddest eyes when I looked in the mirror. Felt my grief down to my very bones. I was fearful of the way it seemed to leak out everywhere — often unexpectedly — branding me bruised and fragile, teetering always on the brink of some collapse I didn’t want witnessed. I wondered if I would forever be this broken-hearted girl.

My grief was compounded by the death of a father figure the year before my dad died and a breakup the year after.

I bore the ache of so much loss and change but didn't know how to carry any of it. I was, after all, the woman who'd been hearing how strong she was for years. I was the one who could be counted on to keep smiling and laughing, to lead a brimming life, always on the go. I came from a culture and a family where no one talked about grief. I didn't want to burden or exhaust others with what I was feeling, if I could even articulate what that was — which most days I couldn't. And I was such a people-pleaser, I wasn’t used to giving my wants and feelings space. And so I mostly kept my sadness, anger and longing — not realizing grief was so much more than this — to myself.

Until I couldn’t anymore. I was tired of not knowing who and how to be in this altered reality… and somewhere I also sensed there was an invitation in the aching. To maybe do life differently. To learn to offer myself compassion. To speak my truth and practice setting boundaries. To face and express my sorrows so they wouldn’t manifest in bewildering body pains or as saboteurs, keeping me from letting life in.

I found a soft place to land. Somewhere I would be listened to without feeling shamed or judged. Where I could bring my whole self, and all the things I thought I couldn’t say, all the emotions I thought I couldn’t express, and let them out. Here, I was met with wisdom and insight and helpful tools, yes, but also compassion and care. The latter made all the difference. To have a kind and affirming place to fall apart, to explore this wilderness I found myself in enabled me, slowly but surely, to begin to inhabit my life again.

To see that grief contained room for joy, softness, passion, for opening to possibility. I could honor what was broken and lost and still be present to the good when it came. I could move forward with living and still carry my dad with me, finding new ways to connect to him. I could be myself, my true self, and let that be enough.

Grief is still my forever companion but I've learned life can be lived alongside her groanings and aches, her inevitable bursts and waves.

And I want that for you, too. I hope this will be your soft place to land.

-Naila Francis