Quick summary: Personal accounts of losing grandparents highlight how early bereavement and unresolved grief can shape emotional well being and family dynamics across generations. Processing these painful losses underscores the therapeutic importance of intergenerational connection and active presence in fostering psychological resilience. Integrating grief support into community healthcare practice and public policy can help young people navigate end of life trauma and cultivate healthier coping mechanisms.
It was 10:34 in the evening, and I was making myself dinner after skipping it to do some homework, when I heard that same old creaking door. My Lola stepped out and asked me what I was making. “Just some scrambled eggs with some corned beef,” I said. She stood beside me laughing because I had added the eggs before the oil even got hot, and she told me she would place her hand above the oil to see if her palm could feel the heat, and if it was hot, then I could start putting food in. We stood there on the cold kitchen floor, talking about cooking and life in general.
I love moments like this with my Lola, being able to laugh, talk, and just spend time near her, because moments like this are special. My Lola is 80 years old, and I know that at any second life can twist, turn, and do a 180 U-turn in the blink of an eye, and when I open my eyes again she might not be there anymore. Throughout my 15 years on this Earth, there have been so many people I haven’t gotten the chance to embrace one last time.
In some twisted and ironic scenario, the ones that hit the most were both of my Lolos. One I lost too early in my life. One I lost because I was too scared to even look at him in the only chances I had left to see him. I would give anything to see them one more time, to hug them one more time, and to be picked up by them like they used to when I was a kid.
Life is so short, and I had to learn this lesson the hard way by losing both of my Lolos. I still vividly remember losing my first Lolo when I was about 8 years old. We were visiting his house, and my dad noticed some symptoms of cardiac arrest, and we were forced to call an ambulance. I can still picture standing beside the old, dusty gate as the paramedics put my frail Lolo into the ambulance. I was too young to understand what was going on, but I knew something bad had happened to him, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. This was the first time I had seen someone I loved go into an ambulance, and even though my Mum tried to tell me he would be fine and that he was in good hands, I was still terrified and scared. After a couple of days, he passed, and even now I don’t know how to get over the fact that the last time I saw him was him being carried into that ambulance.
I lost my second Lolo at the age of 12. He had gone to America to see my cousins, and his condition got worse over time while he was there. He had already been feeling unwell before the trip but hid it so as not to worry the family, and he could no longer hide it once he was in America. My cousin’s family took him to hospital, and it turned out he had stage 4 lung cancer. They gave him five weeks to live. That hit me like a bullet to the heart, because I didn’t want the same situation to happen again, but I made the same mistake regardless. All of us went on a Zoom call to talk to him, and I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t bring myself to look at him in that condition. It was almost like he was already gone. I knew he was still there, but the same man who could carry me when I was 10 years old, when he was 76, now couldn’t hold a glass of water without help. So I just watched my family pray for him, say hello to him, and tell him how much they loved him, while I stood at the side, not even saying a simple “I love you, Lolo,” because I was too scared to face him. Before I knew it, he died on my birthday.
“The trouble is, you think you have time,” Jack Kornfield once said. I want the people I love to stay, but I know that everyone has a time appointed by God to finally come back to him. I hope I can listen to my Lola laugh and lecture me about putting my eggs in too early for as long as possible. I hope future me will act on the lesson I’ve learned, and give my Lola the final hug, the final kiss, and the final “I love you, Lola” she deserves.
Kyle Go is a 15-year-old writer based in the Philippines with a growing interest in personal and reflective writing. She is currently building her portfolio and developing her voice across a range of topics.
