Grief comes in waves. Map yours.
Anyone grieving knows the wave: months of level water, then a song, a date, an ordinary Tuesday — and it’s over your head again. Mark your moments below and see your own waves. Private, free, and yours to keep.
A wave map of grief since the loss, with no wave moments marked yet.
The waves don’t get smaller. They get farther apart — and you get better at swimming.
The grief timeline nobody gives you
Grief is often described as stages, as if it moved in one direction and finished. Almost no one grieves that way. What people actually live is waves — grief arriving, receding, and arriving again, often without warning and often long after everyone else has moved on.
That’s why the waves catch us at anniversaries, birthdays, and holidays — the calendar keeps appointments the heart never agreed to. And it’s why a wave two years in doesn’t mean you’ve gone backwards. A grief timeline isn’t a line from broken to fixed; it’s open water you learn to live on. The waves don’t shrink on a schedule. They space out. Between them, life grows back in.
If the waves are why you’re here, this read may help: Waves of grief — why it hits you when you least expect it · How to handle the death anniversary of a loved one
I painted my waves for 365 days
In 2019, my own brother died. I threw myself into painting every day for a year — 365 paintings that became the documentary The Art of Grieving. Every one of those paintings is a wave I stopped bracing against and put somewhere instead.
Some families ask me to paint theirs — an original commissioned painting built from the memories behind their waves. Commissions start at $4,900, and the conversation starts with no obligation at all.