A Pilgrimage Through Grief

I finished grad school last December, but truthfully, it happened during one of the heaviest seasons of my life — watching my mother slowly change through dementia, and burying my best friend far too soon. It was important for me to protect both of their privacy despite people noticing signs and peaking through curiosity; keeping those guards up became a priority even when it felt like a silent spectacle living under a probing microscope. Everything felt numb for a while.

Then, within the same week, my mother was quietly moved into a home with specialized supports, and my best friend quietly passed away like a thief in the night. The rest of the year became a blur. Even though I was constantly moving and surrounded by people checking in on me, sounds felt muffled, people often appeared like blurred images — like ink dipped into water — and my sense of time shifted like someone mindlessly pressing “next” on a remote. But it was important that I still took care of myself through my marathon training and running, my connections, my own personal supports, and eventually ending with the decision alongside another person close to my best friend to plan a trip for April of the following year.

This Portugal trip was meant to honor her — a trip she had planned on taking before her terminal diagnosis. Secretly, I dreaded it — to the point where even the thought of backing out of the trip despite already booking it crossed my mind. I thought it would feel like the final piece of her I had left to hold onto. But instead, I found her everywhere. In synchronicities — songs playing at random bars, music she adored being performed by a local busker, symbols, conversations, and moments that felt impossible to ignore. During part of the trip, we flew to Madeira and completed a compounded five-hour hike through the PR1 Vereda do Areeiro trail “Stairway to Heaven” and PR3 Pico do Arieiro trail together — sharing a quiet, deeply emotional moment while laying a piece of our beloved one to rest in a place she had always wanted to see and now gets to stay with. Coincidentally enough, we spent part of that hike walking through clouds before being met with a rainbow, somehow feeling closer to her than ever. It reminded me that love does not end where life does.

And somehow, at the very end of this trip, after four long months of uncertainty, I received the news that I had officially been certified nationwide by the Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Association — a dream I used to speak about with her often: being able to make meaningful connections and help people in more than just one place, while having the flexible opportunity to explore different parts of the world along the way.

For the first time in a long time, things feel lighter.

Hopeful.

Saudade.

Grief has never been unfamiliar to me after losing my father eight years ago, but this kind of compounded anticipatory grief hit differently — witnessing the slow descent of my mother's cognitive health through dementia, while helplessly watching another loved one’s physical health unravel and deteriorate so rapidly. It changed me. I hate what grief has taken from me, but am learning to accept what it continues to show me about love, resilience, purpose, and the fragile beauty of being alive. To honor the people you’ve lost, but especially to cherish the moments you still have with those who are still physically present around you. Life is hard, precious, and time is a thief of moments you may one day realize you never got to fully experience.

Keep choosing connection, vulnerability, and the life you know deep down you deserve before fear convinces you otherwise.

Trust the process.

-Bryan