My Whole Family Died – How I Grieved and What I Learned About Loss

“Religion is for people who fear hell, Spirituality is for people who have been there.” – Bowie

I never believed in hell, but I certainly have been there. 

I lost both my parents and my only sibling by the age of 30, and this coming August will mark the third year of my mom’s passing. In the last four years, I have grown and experienced more loss than some people do in a lifetime. This does not mean I consider myself to have all the answers—quite the opposite.

I’m writing as someone who explored many different avenues to understand the meaning and lessons from all my suffering. I had to dig fucking deep, but I refused to let the despair harden my heart.

I thought I first understood grief after my father died when I was a child. I vividly remember sitting in a restaurant with my grandfather, eight years old, when he began to cry. He explained he got emotional watching a father and daughter hold hands and it hit him that I won’t ever have that. I remember feeling like I should comfort him, so I smiled to show that I was okay with it all. But I wasn’t. What I thought was grief was really me pitying myself when I compared myself to others. When I look back, I was at peace with my reality, and it was really other people's perception of my situation that made me sad. 

I was so young when my dad died that I only missed the idea of him. In the wake of that loss, my mom did everything in her power to make sure my brother and I had a happy childhood. 

During my high school years, my mom opened one of the most beautifully curated, womenswear boutiques I still have ever seen. I worked alongside her as a buyer and merchandiser (a very unexperienced one at best). Those early years at her store unleashed my innate love of design and fashion. I remember first understanding how powerful clothing can really be. How what we wear directly influences our mood, giving truth to ‘when we look good, we feel good.’ Immersed in this world, I became the version of myself I liked most.

Because our house was not a very happy place to be, her store became our haven. My brother Jack gravely suffered from drug addiction, which began in high school and continued until he passed away. My mom and I endured the daily torment for over a decade, unsure if he was safe or alive. Despite a beautiful and sober last year of his life, Jack suddenly passed away when I was 28 years old. 

That’s the second time I thought I understood grief.

When I got ‘the call’ from Jack’s girlfriend, I raced from my apartment in the West Village to my mom’s place uptown. I never allowed myself to grieve as a sister. I convinced myself my sadness didn’t matter. My sole purpose was healing my mom from the anguish of losing a child. Because I loved her so deeply, I couldn’t find happiness until she did.

After Jack died, I got pregnant to give my mom another child to love, to bring her healing and return joy back to her life. I learned the hard way that we can’t heal anyone’s grief for them. It is an experience so unique to each individual and their relationship with the person they lost. 

I strongly believe that my mom got sick from the grief of losing her son. There is some science-based evidence that suggests lung cancer is associated with grief. When I got that version of ‘the call,’ the doctor told me they found ‘lesions’—a word for tumors that they use to soften the blow—all over her body from stage 4 lung cancer. My journey of all-encompassing grief started there. I was eight days postpartum.

There was a shock that reverberated through me for months after receiving news of her cancer diagnosis. Losing my mom was my single biggest fear in life–she was both parents in one, my best friend, and my idol. It was my worst nightmare come true. I couldn’t fathom existing without her. As much as I fantasized a different reality, this was real.

I distracted myself from my knotted insides by dedicating every waking moment to researching, learning and physically taking my mom to every doctor appointment and treatment she had, to ensure she was getting the best care possible. I was relentless.

When I first saw my mom in the hospital, she was so herself that my grief started to subside. Through the first 5 months of treatment she was her funny, brutally honest, loving, delicious, cool-as-fuck self. We walked to the Sloan Kettering buildings as if we were going to lunch, holding hands, arm in arm, chatting and usually smiling. She was still wearing her Levi’s and t-shirts, until the bloat from the medications prevented her jeans from buttoning. Thinking back, those were actually happy memories. We stayed present and enjoyed the steps together.

When my mom started losing strength, my husband Jordan and I started to force her to sleep over at night. Jordan slept on the couch and I shared our bed with my mom. I remember one night waking to her stifled breathing. I looked at her and completely lost it. Her face was very swollen, colorless and her mouth was open. She couldn’t catch her breath. I tried turning her on her side a few times but that didn’t help her breathing. She was still asleep but grunting from pain while I was moving her. She was in a medicated sleep because she was in too much pain to be able to sleep naturally. I felt the life get sucked out of me. Looking back, I’m surprised I was able to move. I mustered all my strength to crawl over to the couch to wake Jordan up. The grief hit like a sucker punch to the gut. Shortly after, my mom was placed in hospice.

Unexpectedly, I then had the fortune of meeting a beautiful soul who soon became our death doula. It’s a profession I didn't know existed but now it makes so much sense. There are doulas who help us come into this world, so of course there are ones who help us leave it.

She taught me about other cultures, where death is not feared, where it’s looked at as a beautiful transition out of this world and into the next phase. Right before my mom let go, we had a poignant conversation. I held her in my arms and promised that I would be okay without her. We discussed that it was her turn to finally have peace. Though she couldn’t respond I know she heard me, as she passed shortly after I kissed her goodbye.

At first, I was afraid to feel better. For eleven months, pain became my constant companion, walking beside me under the umbrella of dark clouds. I forgot what life was like without the pain, sitting in the agony of it all felt comforting – almost as if the pain was the last piece I had of her, and by letting it go, I would be letting her go.

After loss, you walk out into the world a completely different person, shocked and battered, but everyone is still looking at you the same. Especially in the initial stages of grief – it was so strange to be surrounded by ‘normal’ people, who look at you the same even though you feel nothing of the sort. I remember pacing outside of Sloan Kettering, afraid to walk the few blocks where normal people walked. I felt safe among the wounded. 

It reminds me of a Steve Leder quote I often go back to… “You could not tell by looking at me that I was in mourning. You still cannot tell by looking at me. Sometimes I wish you could know when I am missing my dad– like some neon sign blinking above my head…” It hits the nail on the head.

There was a point shortly after my mom died where I felt like I had just succeeded in climbing Mt. Everest. When people say I did all I could, I knew I really fucking did all I possibly could. And I did it all while raising a newborn baby as a first-time mother, with no sibling or father to help along the ride. It makes me teary thinking about how much determination and hope I maintained throughout her treatment. 

It gave me a sense of fearlessness, which I still carry in many ways. If I could survive this, I could survive anything. I was ready to start my new journey of healing, as a viking who survived battle.

In our society, it is common to distract or numb to cope with pain. However, I knew that to really heal from my trauma, I needed to face the pain head on. I couldn’t afford any shortcuts. Discovering plant medicine provided me with the transformative approach I needed. Through guided ceremonies with substances like psylocibin, I enhanced my capacity to uncover the insights that transformed my life.

Many people find this idea scary due to our deep-rooted fear of the unknown. If it wasn’t scary then everyone would do it. By the first time I tried it, I had very little left to fear.

Other cultures have been using plant medicine as a means for healing for centuries and scientists are now starting to run trials testing its potential therapeutic benefits for conditions such as depression, anxiety and PTSD. I continued to partake in intense, sometimes heart wrenching, ceremonies to reach the depths of my soul. Allowing myself to release the pain I had bottled up–paving way for new insights to pour in.

These experiences are often described as the equivalent of 20 years of therapy in a day. Personally, I resonate more with my friend’s analogy: it’s like giving your brain fresh, untouched snow – a clean slate ready for carving out new pathways and seeing things in a new light.

The ceremonies led me to open my heart to a new teacher who saved my life. Through our weekly discussions, she helped me to discover that when we really want answers: don’t think, feel. Whenever I get in my own way, I remind myself of this repeatedly. What is my heart telling me? Forget about what my mind is telling me. As a culture we often reference mindfulness, but she introduced me to the concept of heartfulness. She played a pivotal role in helping me find meaning to my suffering.

I learned that my mom had to pass on for me to have the freedom to move forward. My intense attachment to her was preventing me from living for myself. I now connect with my mom in a healthy new way. Fashion used to be an escape from the pain, but it’s now a way to nourish my soul while honoring her memory. It allows me to carry on our shared passion and stay in a place where I feel like the most authentic version of myself.

More recently, the birth of my second child reignited my creativity and led me to realize my dream of designing my own collection and launching a styling business. I believe fashion gives people the power to feel stronger and happier. When I cut and drape fabrics, my goal is to create pieces that bring joy, comfort, and confidence. It energizes me to show all the ways that clothing is so inherently versatile. My mom would get such a kick out of watching me turn a jacket upside down to fall differently down my shoulders or tie a shirt to transform it into something completely new.

I am proud of this relationship I continue to have with my mom after she passed on. I like to give her space to explore this next phase and newfound peace. Something she was not given much of while she was alive. When I do something that is ‘so her’ (at least once a day) I laugh or roll my eyes and so does she. A huge part of me feels like I didn’t lose her at all. This journey has been intensely challenging, yet profoundly human – continuously testing my resilience and capacity to grow. It has taught me that hardship is a universal experience, touching each of us in different ways throughout our lives. What defines our journey is not the challenges themselves but how we respond.

I truly am grateful for the obstacles, for all the losses. They made me who I am today. I am still working on myself and always will be. I am a student for life and of life. I continue to seek authenticity and the people who are brave enough to be vulnerable. 

After reading my story, it may sound odd to hear that I’m okay, but I really am. Just like I promised my mom I would be the day we let each other go.

For us that means allowing her to float up amongst the clouds, reconnecting with my dad and my brother in profound ways I don’t fully understand. I picture my mom hovering above, observing the world, taking in the learnings of her life from this new perspective. Often watching over our family and home, listening in on my boys’ giggles and shrieks, immersed in the joy of seeing my three-year-old become the most loving big brother to “his baby.” I close my eyes and know she is in awe of the mother I have now become.

Stay heartful over mindful. Do the work, it’s worth the pain. Dive in instead of distract. Grief is weird. Be open to whatever feelings arise without an ounce of self judgement.

I’m here to support you through it all. Always and in all the ways.

Kelly Klein

*If this article resonates with you or would be beneficial to someone you know, please feel free to share on socials and tag me so I can follow along @kellyklein__

If you are grieving, here is a brief list of books that were my guiding light. Books I still reference and think about daily, many of which have helped me find meaning to my suffering.

• Dying to be Me by Anita Moorjani

• Many Lives, Many Masters by Brian L Weiss, MD

• Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl

• The Beauty of What Remains by Steve Leder