The Canoe - Le Canoë

05/25/2026

𝑰𝑻'𝑺 𝑪𝑶𝑴𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑭𝑶𝑹 𝑨𝑳𝑳 𝑶𝑭 𝑼𝑺. 𝒀𝑬𝑻 𝑴𝑶𝑺𝑻 𝑮𝑹𝑶𝑼𝑷 𝑩𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑭𝑰𝑻𝑺 𝑷𝑨𝑪𝑲𝑨𝑮𝑬𝑺 𝑫𝑶𝑵'𝑻 𝑰𝑵𝑪𝑳𝑼𝑫𝑬 𝑻𝑯𝑰𝑺, 𝒀𝑬𝑻.

I spent the last couple weeks building something I believe could change how Canadian workplaces support their people through loss. Maybe American ones, too.

It's a full research brief. And we are giving it away for free. Just send us a DM and we will share it with any and all who ask for it.

Here's what it covers:
▸ 895 Canadians die every single day — leaving millions of bereaved employees navigating grief inside a benefits structure designed for the logistics of death, not the living through it
▸ Most plans offer 2–5 days of leave and 3–10 therapy sessions before the annual maximum runs out
▸ Public psychological services in Quebec average 6–24 months wait — nationally, 1 in 10 waits over four months
▸ 90% of bereaved people will never receive a clinical diagnosis — they don't need treatment, they need companionship

The brief makes the case — backed by Statistics Canada, the DSM-5-TR, CIHI, and multiple peer-reviewed sources — for including certified grief and death doula services as an eligible expense under Wellness and Lifestyle Spending Accounts.

No insurer approval required. No budget overhaul. An employer-defined decision that tells your people: we see you in your hardest moments, and we made room for you there.

Grief and Death doulas offer non-clinical, non-pathologizing support through terminal illness, death, and the long grief that follows — including the losses that don't have funerals. Divorce. Estrangement. The life that didn't unfold the way someone believed it would.

This offering belongs in your benefits package.

If you work in HR, people operations, or lead a team — this brief is for you.

Share it with your benefits provider. Put it on the desk of your VP of Total Rewards. Or simply tell your team: we're adding this. Because we care about what happens to you when life suddenly shifts course.

Drop a comment, send me a message, or share this post with someone who has the power to make this change.

Grief is coming for all of us. Let's make sure our benefits plans are ready for it.

05/23/2026

𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐃𝐔𝐂𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐁𝐄𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐈𝐅𝐔𝐋 𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐖𝐄𝐁𝐒𝐈𝐓𝐄!
We are so happy to be sharing with you our new website! With a softer, gentler palette and a more easily navigable menu, along with the ability to sign up for our soon-to-be-released newsletter, resources section and more, The Canoe is ready to support all those who are curious about what else might be possible as we journey with Grief, Dying and Death.

If you have questions or comments, please do reach out! We would love to hear from you!!

🖤 Veuillez noter que la version française du site sera bientôt disponible. Merci de votre patience. 🖤

The Canoe offers individuals and families the support they need during times of grief.

05/20/2026

𝐂𝐚𝐧 𝐖𝐞 𝐁𝐞 𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐓𝐨 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐈𝐬?

One of the things that I am often asked is how to navigate the months as death approaches, and the weeks that follow.

While the weight of it can feel overwhelming, there is actually so much beauty that we might find in this time, if we are open to seeing it, to being with it, to allowing it to be possible.

Being with someone you love as they are dying does not need to be limited to sadness.

It can be full of everything that always was, and perhaps, if we are open, fuller still.

The latest blog post I wrote for The Canoe - Le Canoë speaks to this, inviting us to open up to what else might be possible as we accompany a loved one towards the edge of life.

There are few things in life that reveal us more completely than accompanying someone we love toward death.And yet, in so much of modern culture, we are given almost no language for it.We are taught how to achieve, how to produce, how to optimize, how to consume. But very few of us are taught how to...

05/15/2026

𝐂𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐲 𝐈𝐧 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐓𝐨 𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞

The love you shared is not gone.

It is looking for you to share be with it in a new way, a way that has a name we know well, though we misunderstand its heart.

Grief.

When a loved one dies, there is an invitation, an open space where their bodies once was, to make ceremony in the place left, a place where we can learn the language of Grief, of love with one who has died.

Together, let us reclaim that which we never chose to forget.

We understand instinctively that love needs ritual.We celebrate anniversaries.Plan date nights.Gather for birthday dinners.Host holiday traditions.Small gestures that say: “This matters.” “You matter.” “Our love belongs somewhere.”Ritual gives love a place to live. And we sustain them fo...

05/12/2026

𝓐 𝓒𝓮𝓵𝓮𝓫𝓻𝓪𝓽𝓲𝓸𝓷 𝓐𝓼 𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓺𝓾𝓮 𝓐𝓼 𝓣𝓱𝓮 𝓛𝓲𝓯𝓮

A question we’ve been sitting with lately:

Why do so many celebrations of life feel… the same?

When every life is so completely unique.

What if a ceremony could feel like:
• their music
• their stories
• their humour
• their contradictions
• their essence

We work with individuals and families to co-create deeply personal ceremonies—whether before or after death.

Not something you attend.

Something you feel part of.

If this is something you’re navigating, or even thinking about quietly…

Our door is open.

05/11/2026

𝓐 𝓑𝓮𝓪𝓾𝓽𝓲𝓯𝓾𝓵 𝓡𝓮-𝓜𝓮𝓶𝓫𝓮𝓻𝓲𝓷𝓰

There’s something I see often, but we don’t talk about…

Someone loses a loved one.

There’s a funeral. Maybe a gathering.

And then… nothing.

But inside?

The relationship is still very much alive.

What if we created space for that?

Not just in the first weeks or months…
…but years later?

I’ve started working with people to create simple, personal rituals to honour those they love:
– creating ceremonies for meaningful days
– keeping their loved ones “at the table” in their lives
– making space for deep connection with the ones they love.

Not as a way of “holding on”…
…but as a way of continuing the bond.

Would you ever consider something like that?

Because, what you should know is that, at some point in your lineage, this is how your ancestors were with their dead. And it brought them far more than what we have in how we are today.

It brought them peace, and a way of loving… it brought them connection, and a deep sense of belonging.

If we chose to, we could make this how we are, too.

05/09/2026

𝐑𝐞-𝐦𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐖𝐞 𝐇𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐍𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐊𝐧𝐨𝐰𝐧

How we celebrate a life has largely been flattened. With a focus on efficiency and "a return to normal", on getting through it so we can get over it.

And yet...

"Somewhere right now, on the other side of the world, paper lanterns are being floated out onto a river. Families are carrying the body of their grandfather through the streets behind a brass band playing, slowly, a song about sorrow. A woman is dancing with her grandmother's bones. A table is being set — a full place laid out — for someone who has been dead for a year."

These are the ways that most of our own ancestors were with the dead. They memorials, ceremonies and celebrations of life were not a return to sadness alone, they were a an invitation for the dead to sit at the table, be held in our arms, join our voices in song, reminding us that because they still belong, we do, as well.

And this way of being awaits us, if we choose it. To mark their deaths, individually and in community, weaves us together, not just in the current moment, but through time.

There is so much that is available for us in how we are with our dead. Let us wonder together what might nourish us, and be worthy of them.

On the global tradition of gathering at the threshold — and what we've forgotten.Somewhere right now, on the other side of the world, paper lanterns are being floated out onto a river. Families are carrying the body of their grandfather through the streets behind a brass band playing, slowly, a so...

05/07/2026

𝐒𝐨 𝐌𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐈𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞

I wish everyone could see what I see. I know many people do, or are starting to.

Yet, for so many more, the way we have been socialized to be after someone we love has died leaves us little space for anything other than the sadness, the loneliness. The sense of absence, of an empty space...

I can tell you, first had, that there is so much more available to us. And it was always there.

What we are called into after someone has died is not the mourning that shrouds us in eternal night. It is the morning that invites us into a new day, gifting us with an opportunity to learn to LOVE that person again, in a new way, one that goes beyond all we have known so far.

I want that for all of us. I want us to re-member in a full way. One that includes sadness, of course. But one that also includes joy, happiness, laughter.

This is my longest piece on this yet. It asks more of your time than I have asked until now...

And maybe, just maybe, it invites you into just as much, if not more...

A Meditation on Love, Loss, and the Art of Staying CloseGrief is the last act of love we have to giveto those we loved.Where there is deep grief, there is great love.— Author UnknownBefore We BeginThis is not a “how to” guide for your grief. It is not a roadmap through stages, nor a prescripti...

05/07/2026

What if the relationships we cherish never ended…

…they just changed shape?

What if grief isn’t something to “get over”…

…but something that invites us to imagine the relationship—differently?

I’ve been quietly thinking about how I work with individuals and families.

Wondering how others might see the beauty I see in these powerful moments, and to invite them to join us in that exploration.

More focus on:
• Nourishing the relationship that continues
• Creating meaningful rituals of remembrance
• Designing ceremonies that feel like *them*

Because love doesn’t end.

It just longs for a new way of being expressed. That way, when we open ourselves to it, is called Grief.

If you’ve ever felt like your person is still with you—but you don’t quite know how to meet them there…

You’re not alone.

And there are ways.

Let's discover them together.

02/06/2026