By There’s something about working with natural fibers that heals me in ways nothing else can. I’ve turned to knitting during multiple grief heavy events in my life, but at the beginning of the year after losing my partner, it was almost the only thing I could do.
After posting a TikTok showing the first garment I ever made with my own hands, one with the memory of my loved one in every stitch, I came to find that hundreds of people had experienced the healing properties of making something with their hands when moving through grief.
Apparently, it is such a common method of coping and healing that many death doulas and cemeteries host Weaving and Grieving events, including Colleen of Death Doula Does.
Weaving and Grieving: How Fiber Arts Can Help us Grieve and Heal
Creating Through Grief
In 2007, Colleen’s mother died after a two-year battle with stage four cancer. Just a month later, they discovered they were pregnant. “As I navigated the profound changes in my life, a friend of my now ex-partner suggested I learn how to knit. From late 2007 to the birth of my child, I didn’t finish a single blanket, but I did gain a deep understanding of how to sit with my emotions.”
Grief knitting… was a way to connect me with those in my community who were grieving the same loss
I was also surprised to find that finishing a project never felt like a goal when grief was so present. In fact, it is often hard for me to finish projects. Knowing that my grief will never end, how could I finish something that represented so much of my grief? After finishing my first sweater, I couldn’t get myself to weave in the loose ends that dangled off the sleeves and the hem. I was okay with that, and I still haven’t weaved them in. A friend even suggested that when I’m ready I can trim the ends and use those pieces for my next project – always carrying the grief forward with me.
Crafting Community Care
Image via Colleen of Death Doula Does
Colleen was inspired to build a container for communities they belong to – people of the global majority, queer and disabled, to process living under a government that is not protecting us during a continuing pandemic. “I wanted a space where I would feel comfortable to grieve parts of life not directly related to death or the loss of a loved one. In those moments of daydreaming, I turned to what brought me the most solace while I grieved the death of my parents and the big life transitions I navigated without them – fiber arts.”
When I began grief knitting, I found that it was a way to connect me with those in my community who were grieving the same loss. Spending time together felt necessary, but talking was hard. So we watched movies, knit, and let loved ones drop meals off at our door. Knitting became a literal thread holding us together.
Image via Colleen of Death Doula Does
Oumou Syllaʻs work in the Radical Mental Health First Aide workshop introduced Colleen to Deepa Iyerʻs Social Change Ecosystem Map. They learned through this work that the idea of weavers is not only making fabric but also changing how folks connect with social change within their community.
“Weaving & Grieving has become a passion project about building a fabric of community care, where we can publicly grieve the losses of daily life and normalize sitting with our personal and communal grief.”
Creating Legacy Through Art
Creating with fiber isn’t just for those who are grieving, however. Sometimes the work of our loved ones lives on after their death. Inheriting a blanket or sweater your grandmother made can connect you to a piece of their life.
In 2023, avid knitters Jennifer Simonic and Masey Kaplan realized they shared the experience of friends asking them to finish projects that their loved ones had started before their death. They came together to start the Loose Ends project, a nonprofit which pairs finishers with incomplete projects. To date, an estimated 2500 projects have been completed or are in progress.
A project submitter named Jim stated that “In a matter of less than two months, a sweater that my beloved wife was unable to finish before passing from breast cancer has transposed from an incomplete souvenir to a beautiful article of clothing that our daughter will receive for her birthday in two days.”
Continuing to Move Through Grief
Image via Colleen of Death Doula Does
My friend Morgan tells me knitting and other fiber arts are a delicate, slow, and repetitive process. Isn’t this just like the experience of grief?
We will never have our deceased loved ones back in this lifetime, but sometimes when I pull the wool through my fingers it feels like my partner’s fingers are reaching to hold my hand. When I need to feel the compression of their hug, I can put on the sweater I made while thinking about them.
It all reminds me of a poem titled Separation by W.S. Merwin:
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
You can sign up here to volunteer with Loose Ends project.
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