Tiny Griefs

This corner of my website has been quiet for a while and it’s because, well…a lot has happened since I was casually posting about TV shows and tofu recipes a few years ago.

In the summer of 2023 my husband and I bought a house and moved our little family halfway across the country to Cape Cod, MA where I was born and raised.

In many ways it felt like a dream come true because I had been romanticizing the idea of moving back home to the Cape forever, but unfortunately we didn’t move under the best circumstances.

Back in the fall of 2022, my beloved father, John Dzenawagis, was diagnosed with what they think is either Lewy Body Dementia or Parkinson’s with Lewy Bodies. If you know me, you know how much I love my dad (with my whole heart and then some), so you can imagine how devastating this has been.

Being 800+ miles away while my parents were navigating this impossible new reality eventually became too difficult to bear, so we made the decision to move back east so I could be there to support my family.

Between buying a house (which was the most stressful experience of my entire life!), moving, settling into our new home & community, helping to care for my dad, and raising a toddler—all while grieving—let’s just say, my hands have been full and my attention has been elsewhere.

However, I started a Substack called Tiny Griefs where I’ve been sharing about the experience of losing my dad to dementia. It’s hard to write, I imagine it can be hard to read, but I feel compelled to share what it’s like to lose a loved one in this way. Grief is something we all go through at some point in our lives but it’s not something we always talk openly about—and among the many lessons that all this has taught me, one is that I don’t think we are meant to grieve alone.

I debated just sharing everything I’ve been going through with my dad on here where the majority of my writing lives, but I felt like those stories deserved their own container where they wouldn’t be interrupted by other unrelated “content,” so that’s what I gave them.

If this speaks to you in any way and you’d like to read more, you can find Tiny Griefs here.

The gorgeous illustration of my father and I that Sarah Nisbett from Drawn On The Way created for me.