Living Alongside Loss: A reflection on grief, rituals, and gratitude by Diego R. Hijano

July 10, 2026 Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine

© *Womb* by Johanna Glaser. Acrylic paints, linocut prints, tissue paper and pens.
“I made this collage as a gift for a pregnant friend using a mixture of acrylic paints, linocut prints, tissue paper and pens. It is inspired by and directly draws upon elements from a portrait of a young dead woman by Egon Schiele. At the time, I was in the middle of a palliative care fellowship and personally recovering from a severe IBD flare. It is a meditation on birth, illness, joy, pain and death; an expression of awe as to how humans can simultaneously be wounded, age, heal, celebrate and create throughout the seasons of our lives.”

Johanna Glaser’s collage “Womb” (Fall-Winter 2025-26 Intima) challenges the idea that life unfolds in emotional stages. Instead, it holds simultaneity:

Birth beside illness.
Joy beside grief.
Healing beside wounding.
Presence beside absence.

That duality emerges in writer and educator Valk Fisher’s Field Notes essay “Diary of a Plunge Year” (Spring-Summer 2025 Intima) and my short story “The Other Son” (Spring-Summer 2026 Intima). Both explore how rituals, whether running beside the ocean or gathering around a table, allow people to live alongside loss without being entirely consumed by it.

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