About

If you have found your way here because you have lost someone you love or know someone who has, I am so sorry. Grief sucks. Every time it sucks. I am no stranger to grief–I lost great grandparents, grandparents, uncles, mentors, and pets long before I was ready to do life without them. I thought I knew grief. Then I lost my dad. 

In 2020, I was living in NYC and had just graduated with my masters degree in engineering. I was starting my first full time job when my dad’s 10-year-long battle with Parkinson’s dramatically worsened. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, I came home to help take care of him. 

As his condition progressed, I became one of his primary caretakers. Within a short time period, he lost his ability to walk, talk, and write. As a historian and a writer all his life, this last one was particularly difficult for him. He dedicated his life to sharing the previously untold stories of Hispanic political figures in the United States. He was writing a book about cigar workers in Tampa when his health declined and he could no longer write. He enlisted me to help him–growing up, he would pay me to edit his writing, so he’d trained me for this–and together we would continue to work on this book as if he wasn’t dying, as if we could finish it. My dad’s commitment to his passions despite his situation inspired me to start thinking about my own. 

His ability to see beauty everywhere stays with me still, as I walk my dog and notice every flower, bee and butterfly. Every day, my dad and I would spend time in our garden, planting seasonal vegetables and his favorite flowers, particularly dahlias and sunflowers. My dad was so proud that our sunflowers grew to be 12 feet tall. By that time he was in a wheelchair and I would take him on walks around our neighborhood. He would direct me where to go and which flowers to photograph for his Facebook by turning his head and nodding. Following his gaze, I would go and take close-up photos of the flowers, then bring them back for his appraisal.

After fighting for his doctors to actually see him in person, we learned what we thought was his Parkinson’s getting worse was actually ALS. He was given three months to live. He died three months later. He was 62, I was 24. Supporting and caring for him in his death changed my life.

After he passed, I did my best to return to my previous life. I moved back to NYC to continue my career as a structural engineer, but work felt pointless and unfulfilling; I had a new perspective on life that my peers couldn't understand. Lost and seeking comfort, I returned to my childhood love of art to work through my grief. 

In my grief I felt called to create and express myself artistically, but found creating art without guidelines to be daunting. So I turned to coloring books. They helped me to connect with my inner child, keep my hands busy, and take my mind off of my new reality. 

As time passed, I wanted to remember and reflect on my dad, our happy memories together and his impact on my life but felt overwhelmed by the abstractness of the task. I wanted some type of dedicated space to process his passing that was more personal than a grief journal.

This gave me an idea. Finding no alternative online, I created a journal-meets-coloring book that could guide me through my grief and facilitate the process of reflection with prompts and coloring pages of photos of my dad and other loved ones that have passed. I call the book Life in Color - A Personalized Coloring Book for Processing Loss and Celebrating Life.