The Grandparent That’s Left

Published by

James Lott, Jr.

A Complex Relationship

I lost the mother of my oldest daughter this week.
We were never married.
Our relationship? Complex. That’s the word people use when the truth is too layered for a clean sentence.

We had history. We had love. We had hurt. We had silence. We had shared laughter that no one else understood—and long periods of time where we barely spoke. But together, we had something that mattered more than any label we ever gave each other: a daughter. And through her, we became grandparents.

A quiet kind of grief lives in the spaces we shared with someone we loved once—especially when our roles were undefined, but our connection was undeniable.

Now she’s gone. And I’m still here.
And it feels strange.
It feels heavy in a way I can’t quite explain.

When you’re not the spouse, not the partner, not the person who was by their side at the end, the grief can feel… complicated.

Grief doesn’t ask for permission,
but it sure does show up with questions.

Do I have the right to cry this hard?
Do I get to feel this loss so deeply?
Where do I place all this sadness when the world around me doesn’t know where to place me?

Shared Life, Shared Loss

She was the mother of my child.
We shared a life, even when we weren’t together.
We shared milestones, phone calls, disagreements, and the subtle knowing of what it meant to co-parent a child who would one day become a mother herself.

Now I watch my daughter grieve.
She’s navigating a pain I can’t fix.
And I’m standing here, trying to be strong, trying to be useful, while wrestling with my own loss in a quiet corner of my heart.

Being the grandparent that’s left is a strange kind of identity.
There’s an emptiness where her voice should be in those family moments.
There’s a pause in every conversation where her insight, her humor, her history would’ve filled the air.
There’s a piece of our grandchild’s story that can no longer be told in her own words.

I find myself wanting to protect that legacy.
To speak gently of who she was.
To tell my grandchild how their grandmother smiled, how she held her coffee cup, how she sang to herself when she thought no one was listening.

I didn’t expect this part of life.
To be the one still standing.
To be the remaining narrator of a story that took both of us to create.

But here I am.
And I’ll keep showing up—for our daughter, for our three grandchildren, for the memory of someone who shaped part of who I am, even if we didn’t end up together.

Love doesn’t always fit cleanly into roles.
Loss doesn’t always follow easy paths.

I’m grieving someone I once loved, someone I sometimes didn’t understand, someone who gave me one of the most important people in my life.

And I will carry her memory with care.
Because even in our complexity, she mattered.

And I will always be the grandparent that’s left—

...with a heart full of stories, and eyes still searching for peace.

Dr. James Lott, Jr., CTACC, CDC, CNA, CHOC, PMO, OA, DD, Certified Professional Organizer, is the Founder/CEO of The Super Organizer, LLC, and of the Online Network/Entertainment Company JLJ Media. He is a National Speaker/Teacher and Certified Life Coach. He founded and runs the JLJ Media network of over 80 shows (audio and video).

Certified by the Coach Training Alliance, James has been a Certified Life Coach for the past 15 years. He is certified in General Life, Media, Home and Office Organization, and Divorce Coaching. James also holds a Doctorate in Divinity. He also has the weekly Grandparent podcast, Really! I’m a Grandparent and was a Board Chairman of both the SF Church of Compassion and the Harvey Milk Institute.

10 years running, James has one of only several weekly Organizing shows called THE SOS SHOW with James Lott Jr. James is a Number One best-selling Amazon author and has over 60 books. He has several published songs about Organizing. He has been featured in Forbes, Homes & Gardens, Apartment Therapy, and made history on Jimmy Kimmel Live in 2021. James just celebrated 16 years as a Professional Organizer.

James is also a National Keynote Speaker speaking for organizations like: The National Association of Productivity & Organizers, National Association of Perinatal Social Workers, Culver City Garden Club, and Transworld Schools. And has a presentation on UCLA website.

James is a father of two grown daughters and four grandsons and one granddaughter.