Nicole Chung Reflects on Grief After Writing a Memoir About Loss
While writing “A Living Remedy,” a book about losing her parents, Nicole Chung learned to be gentle with herself and to invite others into her parents’ legacies and her own pain.
This article is part of Mochi’s fall 2024 issue on Resilience, redefined as “finding agency in adversity and fighting for radical change.” We highlight the strength of individuals and communities and their courage in dismantling systems of injustice. Our hope is that you will feel the strength pulsing through these stories and that you also are inspired to pair resilience with actions that lead to real, necessary, and revolutionary change.
“I have no doubt that my parents would have relished having more time as my primary family, the people I thought of as ‘home.’”
In her memoir, “A Living Remedy,” Nicole Chung asks, “How do you learn to cherish yourself, your life, when grief has made it unrecognizable?”
This question gives us a window into the relationship between resilience and grief. Resilience is often associated with words like strength, persistence, tenacity. Most of us believe that resilience is the ability to keep bending, never breaking. It is often predicated on the idea that someone has gone through a challenge and is encouraged by a supposed light at the end of the tunnel, thus building a stronger person. The American Psychological Association describes resilience as “the process and outcome of successfully adapting to difficult or challenging life experiences.”
We see this definition in Nicole Chung’s “A Living Remedy: A Memoir,” released in April 2023, a book about her experience navigating life while grieving the loss of her adoptive parents. Chung’s resilience is not about bending without breaking, but about finding ways to navigate life’s challenges. In a conversation with Chung over Zoom, we explored the complexities of writing about such vulnerable experiences and journeying through our grief.
A Vulnerable Writing Process
When we read memoirs like Chung’s, we only see the final product. We often do not see the process behind writing something so personal and vulnerable and the emotional journey that comes after publication.
Creativity and grief don’t always coincide, and often require different processes. Some days are more productive than others, while others require more rest, flexibility, and self-compassion. Chung’s experience writing her previous book, “All You Can Ever Know,” was completely different from writing her memoir.
“In the past, I think I would have tried to keep my butt in the chair and muscle through and produce and create no matter what,” Chung shared. “I really couldn’t do that with ‘A Living Remedy.’ It very much required me to give myself more grace. I had to be content sometimes with one sentence or two sentences a day.”
Keeping Memories Alive
More than a year after her memoir’s release, Chung continues to recognize where her grief shows up and how she can pass memories of her parents to her children.
“I still talk with my family and friends about both my parents,” Chung said. “Just a little while ago, my daughter and I were baking cookies and it reminded me of times I spent baking growing up. My mom didn’t actually cook, but there are certain times of the year, like holiday baking, when I just remember making batch after batch of cookies.”
Chung shows us that even after losing people we love, we can honor and remember them by sharing little parts of the memories we hold. These moments, no matter how small, can help keep loved ones’ legacies alive.
Grieving in Community
One of the ways people can continue to build resilience is finding the people that let you show all parts of you—not only to laugh and share the kinder parts of life, but also to let you open up about the triumphs and tribulations that life brings. Chung’s experience highlights the importance of community in times of grief. A support network can be crucial during the hardest times. We can help by showing each other compassion and kindness. We don’t have to navigate grief in silos.
To keep building resilience, we sometimes need to turn to and rely on the community we build. Chung expresses the importance of having people in your corner. “I am incredibly blessed with friends, like the same people I used to text late at night while my mother was dying are still among the people I reach out to when I am going through something else. I’d like to hope that I am there for them, as well, in the different things they struggle with. Friends and chosen family remain important. I feel so lucky to have those people in my life.”
We may never move past grief or the pain of loss. Rather, like with resilience, we learn to coexist, adapt, and live with it. We learn to move through these new realities by preserving the memories of loved ones and bringing them into the relationships we have.
Cover: Illustration by Lisa Wakiyama, photo of author Nicole Chung by Carletta Girma
