My Six-Year Grief Road Map

Year six without my daughter begins with a too-warm winter and my commitment to make the most of spring.

Jacqueline Dooley
Human Parts
Published in
7 min readMar 22

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Painting of a girl standing at the end of a long hallway with her eyes downcast, clutching her arms. There is a row of six gravestones on the ceiling above her head. Lighting is blue and red giving the image a threating and morose vibe.
Illustration by Emily Dooley

Year 1

The first year is hard to recall with clarity except for the moment she died. She is in her own bed. I sit beside her and wish, with my whole heart, that I can die in her place. Is that such a strange thing to…

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Jacqueline Dooley
Human Parts

Essayist, content writer, bereaved parent. Bylines: Human Parts, GEN, Marker, OneZero, Washington Post, Al Jazeera, Pulse, HuffPost, Longreads, Modern Loss