The day my husband Dan died, I was visited in his hospital room by one of the palliative care doctors that had been assigned to us after it became apparent that no more could be done to prolong his life.

During our conversation, she told me something which resonated so much that I wrote it down on the back of a business card:

It will be OK in the end. If it’s not OK it’s not the end.

As you know if you’ve read this column over the years, it was not OK for a very long time. Even now, there are moments when it’s not OK. It will never be the end of losing Dan, no matter how much of my equilibrium I have regained and how happy I am.

But overall, it’s been mostly OK for quite a while now. One of the reasons is my grief counselor, Carol.

Eleven years and three months after I encountered her, I am saying goodbye. No, not because of anything terrible, thank goodness! (Although I do have a friend who told me her therapist died suddenly. This was years ago, and I’m still shocked by it, I can’t even imagine how traumatizing that would be.)

Carol is alive and well and as of June, very much retired.

I’m sure she’s thrilled, and I’m thrilled for her! But I’ve been sad too, since I emailed her to find out her exact last day and got the “I am retired” auto-reply response. It threw me for an unexpected loop, even knowing long in advance that she was retiring.

I feel like I didn’t get to send one final email thanking her for everything and making sure she knew again (I have told her many times previously) how her support has meant so much. That felt important to me, but my email didn’t arrive in time. Life got in the way, again, sigh.

I was surprised at the depth and finality of loss I felt, but I know enough after all this practice of grieving, to simply go with it. I may have cried a little. I may have had that shell-shocked feeling the next day. I may have felt hollow for the next week or two. Carol’s retirement marks an end to one of the significant eras of my life.

She has been a witness to my story of Dan’s and my life together, and the extent of our love for and devotion to each other. She has seen me through the worst thing that has ever happened to me. She truly understood exactly why, even though life is good and it’s been years, I still sometimes find myself randomly ugly-crying from missing Dan. She left me feeling hopeful, lifted and comforted every single time we talked, her gentle, calm voice always imparting exactly the perfect wisdom I needed to hear right then and there.

Carol is one of those special ones you encounter in life when you least expect it and most need it. Knowing someone like that is there for you is absolutely everything, even if you don’t talk to them more than once or twice a year as time goes by.

I grabbed onto her words like I was drowning and reaching for a life preserver, supportive and validating things that I scribbled as we chatted such as:

It takes a long time to fully grieve.

My core is the same, I’m just using different parts.

Dan and I had something rare and unique.

Grief brings a connection to Dan that I no longer have with him physically. Later on, it will be more uplifting.

Part of my work is to love my life and find joy (that is actually grief work). Not an “either/or” but both at the same time. Learning to reconcile incredible joy with incredible sorrow.

In grief, other people fail us.

Dan gave me great gifts; it’s a gift to him to accept them.

The worst times are the secret anniversaries of the heart (when only the person you’ve lost can understand why your pain cuts particularly deep in that moment/on that day/when you hear that song or see that photo, and so on).

Moving forward not moving on is the goal.

Bereavement = to be robbed.

Carol was right about all of it and so much more.

If we had one last conversation it would go something like this (reconstructed from actual things she said):

She’d say, “I’m so lucky to have been able to see you take grief on and stare it down to its rightful size.”

She’d say, “Keep writing. People really need to know someone made it through.”

She’d say, “You’ve worked hard in body, mind and spirit. You have a beautiful spirit and a strong core.”

She’d say, “You’ve survived. You’ve thrived. You’ve made it through the worst.”

And I would say to her, “Carol, like you told me once — this is another growth opportunity I could’ve done without!” Then we’d laugh.

I wish everyone suffering the loss of a loved one had a grief counselor like her. I am certain there are many more Carols out there — if you need support and haven’t found the right person, keep looking. And if you already have your Carol, be sure to send that email before she retires!

What a gift to the world that Carol chose to go into grief counseling and to those of us that by luck and circumstance were privileged to be supported by her.

And that quote? “It will be OK in the end.” It must be true.

It’s the end. And I’m very much OK.

Coach Pritam Potts is a writer and strength coach. After many years of training athletes and clients of all ages as co-owner of Edmonds-based Advanced Athlete LLC, she now lives in Dallas, Texas. She writes about health & wellbeing, grief & loss, love & life at infinitecapability.substack.com and www.advancedathlete.com.