I began writing Age Out Loud not just because I believed in the message, but because I was committed to helping others experience it — the strength, vitality, and holistic resilience that come from choosing to live fully, no matter your age or stage of life.
I had lived that truth. I had built a life and a body of work around it. People told me all the time, “You’re such an inspiration.” And I was grateful for that.
But as I wrote, something inside me began to stir.
It was a quiet knowing, a heaviness pressing at the edges of my heart. Something was missing. In the words. In the message. In me.
I’ve spent much of my life being strong — not to prove something, but because I had to be. When my brother Matt was murdered, I became the one who stayed steady. When my son Will died by suicide, I carried the weight for everyone else.
Through addiction, mental illness, and loss that wove through generations of my family, I learned to keep standing — because everything around me was falling apart.
That kind of readiness becomes armor. It looks like strength from the outside, but inside, it’s a slow unraveling.
I was tired — not of life, but of holding it all together.
For so long, I thought strength meant being unshakable — that courage meant holding everyone else up, even when I was falling apart inside.
I wore resilience like armor. And people admired that. They saw the drive, the discipline, the energy, and said, “You’re amazing.”
But they didn’t see the nights I cried quietly, not wanting to worry anyone. They didn’t see the exhaustion that comes from being the one who always shows up.
And I didn’t show them, because somewhere along the way I decided that love meant holding it together, no matter the cost.
What I didn’t know then was that true strength isn’t found in holding on — it’s found in the moment you finally let go.
One afternoon, I saw a flyer for a Grief Summit being held at a nearby church.
Something in me whispered, Go.
When I walked into that sanctuary, I didn’t know what to expect.
What I found was a sea of people — hundreds gathered together, not pretending or performing, but showing up as they were.
There were tears and trembling voices, laughter and silence. But mostly, there was truth.
For the first time in years, I didn’t have to hold it all together.
I sat there among strangers who somehow felt like family.
And in that room full of humanity, I felt the weight I’d been carrying begin to lift.
In that packed room, I stood up.
I told my story.
I was witnessed.
And the relief I felt was immense.
Because in that moment, I realized: I wasn’t alone.
And neither are you.
The main facilitator that day was David Kessler, one of the world’s foremost grief experts and co-author with Elisabeth Kübler-Ross of On Grief and Grieving.
I had studied his work before, but hearing him speak that day was different. His presence was calm, his message simple, his compassion unwavering.
He said,
“We can’t heal what we won’t feel. But we don’t have to heal alone.”
Those words landed like a truth I had been circling for years.
After the summit, I sat in my car for a long time, quiet and undone.
And then I felt it — grief, not as a wave or a storm, but as something gentle.
It tapped me on the shoulder and whispered,
“You can rest now. You don’t have to do this alone.”
That’s when I knew — this was the book I was meant to write, the work I was meant to do, and the people I was meant to serve.
In the weeks after that day, I noticed something new in myself.
I stopped rushing to fill the silence. I let my tears come when they needed to.
And instead of trying to explain away my pain, I started listening to it.
Grief, I realized, had been trying to reach me for years — not to drag me backward, but to bring me back to myself.
It wasn’t asking me to be less; it was asking me to be real.
And in that honesty, I started to feel lighter, more whole, more human.
That’s what grace feels like — not the absence of pain, but the quiet return of peace.
I didn’t plan to write Grief and Grace.
In truth, I resisted it.
Because writing it meant facing everything I had held at bay — the pain, the confusion, the exhaustion of decades spent staying strong.
But when I finally let grief have its say, I realized it wasn’t here to destroy me.
It was here to guide me home.
Through the tears and the silence, I found something that had been missing from my strength all along — tenderness.
Writing this book has been both heartbreak and healing.
Because grief, when fully met, reveals what’s most sacred:
the love that remains, the meaning that endures, the grace that refuses to leave.
After that summit, I chose to deepen my path.
I began studying directly with David Kessler through his Grief Educator Certification Program and integrating grief and restorative coaching into my life’s work.
Because I know now: grief isn’t something to fix.
It’s something to witness.
And those of us who have walked through it can help others feel less alone — to hold their stories with reverence, to remind them that healing isn’t about “getting over it,” but about living with what’s been lost, one breath, one act of grace at a time.
I didn’t set out to write this book.
But I believe it was waiting for me.
Because when I finally stopped holding it all together, grief found me again —
and grace was right there beside it, whispering,
“You’re not alone. You’re home.”
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