Death losses are sad and hard and they often bring us into acute awareness about the life we are living. Death losses bring to light how fragile and brief life is. Death losses also remind us that one day, we too will die.  

The death losses I’ve survived have made me take a good long look at my own mortality.  

I do not know when I will die but it is a certainty that I will die one day. We may try to ignore this certainty, but it never goes away. It only becomes more prominent as we age. As we live longer, we live with more losses under our belts. Perhaps we grow into an awareness that our time here is finite. 

Over years of living, we may experience death losses of those most dear to us. We lose parents, siblings, relatives, and dear friends. We also lose beloved pets – in my case dogs, cats, horses, and even animals that I worked near at two different zoos. It is something we cannot control – deaths just keep happening. 

Sometimes our losses seem to pile up. 

In 2017 I lost a sister, aunt and uncle, a high school friend, and the parents of one of my best friends. Those parents may not seem to be connected directly to me except that I’d been in their home. Received holiday messages from them and they from me. They knew my parents. And through my friend, I knew of their lives, failing health, and much more. 

That was all during the first year of my being a single person again after 28 years of marriage. That year I also lost a beloved dog. And I sold a house that was once home – but through divorce became not home. I sold other things too – and moved to a new house. 

The changes and challenges of the year were fast, furious, and unrelenting. My sister Lisa died at the beginning of 2017 – she was 2 years younger than me. While she’d struggled with health issues for several years, she had lived her life in rich and fruitful ways. She sought to overcome her health issues and to not let them become the overwhelming focus of her life even when they were overwhelming and sometimes disabling. 

Lisa fiercely pursued living her fullest life in all the ways she could despite the difficulties her health issues presented. For as long as she could, she did all the things she loved to do. She worked, traveled, created with enthusiasm and wisdom. Even as she struggled, she still had a deep desire to live into the life she had available to her in all the ways that she could. 

That was her gift to me – that question really – how will you live your one wild and precious life?

Was I, am I now, living my one wild and precious life? Nearly every single day I ask myself that question. How about you, what have your experiences of death loss taught you? Are you living differently than before the death loss? Perhaps taking better care of yourself? Planning more adventures? Pursuing something you’ve always wanted to do? 

Drop me a note and let me know how death and non-death losses have influenced the life you are living!