Journaling Prompts for Losing a Parent
Losing a parent—even when the relationship was complicated, even when it was expected, even when part of you feels relief—is one of the most significant losses a person goes through. It changes the generational order. It removes the original witnesses to your life. It can bring up grief for the parent they were and grief for the parent they never quite were, which are two different losses that don't always get named separately. There is no right way to grieve this, no timeline, no feeling that is wrong to be having. Writing gives it space.
Journaling Prompts
What do you miss most specifically—their voice, a particular habit, the specific way they talked to you, knowing they were in the world? Try to name the missing as precisely as you can.
What was left unfinished between you—unsaid, unresolved, unexplored? Is there something you wish you'd asked, told them, or worked through together while there was time?
What did your parent give you that you carry—a value, a way of seeing things, a phrase, a skill, something they modeled? What do you want to carry forward intentionally?
What was hardest about this relationship while they were alive? How does their death change or complicate how you sit with those difficulties?
Who are you now that they're gone? Not in terms of family hierarchy, but in terms of who you are without that relationship as part of your ongoing life. How are you different? What does it reveal?