Love, Loss, and the Meaning In Between

There’s something I keep coming back to from Viktor Frankl… that even in the hardest moments, we still get to choose how we meet them.

When my mum was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, I went back to the UK. I left my home in New Zealand, not knowing how long I’d be gone. I just knew I needed to be there.

And that “why” carried me.

It was honestly the hardest chapter of my life emotionally, and also one of the most important, in a strange way, and one of the most beautiful.

The hospice soon became a world within a world. Busy doctors, tired nurses, medications, beepers… and strangers who very quickly didn’t feel like strangers at all. Everyone in there walking heavily in the same final chapter with someone they deeply love.

I sometimes slept on a tiny but cosy mattress, on the hospital floor beside her. Held her shrinking hand.

And every new day had a really clear purpose… just to be there. To love her. To do crosswords as we always had. To be with her, to hear her disbelief, her fear, her strength.

And then there were the 3 a.m. wake-ups.

Quietly walking barefoot and dazed into the family area as the devoted carers changed her sheets… There it would be, the communal jigsaw. Pieces half done, half waiting. Someone always there, or just gone. It became this strange, gentle anchor.

There was something so comforting about it. A silent space that somehow gave us a brief space to breathe out.

So simple. So human.

And this feeling I didn’t expect… belonging.

In a whole new corner of the world I never imagined being part of.

Hearts breaking… and somehow connecting at the same time.

Even the smallest, slightly forced smile from someone across the room felt warm. Like we all just knew. No words needed. Just a quiet, shared understanding. A deep respect for each other’s space within it.

But what I didn’t expect… was the people.

The ones who showed up. The old school loves. The blood and bones of the small family we have. Friends who held us in those moments. It felt powerful… almost magical at times.

I was living with my niece… a woman who feels like my heart and soul. I felt loved, welcomed, and like we all just knew how to show up for each other.

My boys, my actual heart, were there by my side. They even carried the emotional and physical weight of her coffin.

When I look back now, I give that time new meaning.

It was dreadful. It was brutal. It was beautiful. It was a gift. It was an honour.

And. My husband back home, holding everything together, paying the bills, keeping life steady so I could be there… another quiet kind of love I will never forget.

It was witnessing my humans at their best…

While I was, at times, at my absolute worst.

Exhausted. Raw. Overwhelmed.

Frankl talks about how we can’t always control what happens, but we can choose how we respond. And that meaning can still exist, even in the middle of suffering.

I really get that now.

Something in me has shifted.

I am wildly grateful. For all of it.

The pain. The laughs. The rekindled connections.

The reminder that none of us has forever.

So I’m choosing differently now.

To love myself more.

To be kinder to myself.

To walk away from things that don’t need to matter… and from people who don’t really care or ask how I am. I mean, really ask, then ask again.

My family is smaller now. Both my parents are gone.

But … my world feels fuller. My family is richer.

Because my family is also bigger now in connection.

The real, say-the-things kind of connection. Mum would love that.

The real “I love you” — where we show up, and sit in it all.

The gold, the garbage, and everything in between.

I don’t think I’ve ever had a purpose as clear as I did at that time.

And now… I carry that forward.

I put it into my family. Into the way I love.

Into building community, into deeper, more awake conversations.

And I try to let go of the rest.

The shallows. The need to make everyone okay.

I don’t need that anymore.

Maybe that’s what meaning actually looks like.

Not avoiding the hard stuff… but choosing how we meet it, and who we become because of it.

If you’re in a hard chapter right now… I see you. You can do hard things, you can sit with the pain. You can still blossom.

There can still be meaning here. Even here.

I hope this helps you in some way.

Love and Stardust

Caron xox

#grief #heartbreak #losingsomeone #loss #death #love