The apartment, with its dried flowers and bible verses, was a stark contrast to the words the woman spoke. “If I hadn’t come to San Diego, I would be dead.”

Angelica began her life in Northern California, born into the care of an abusive father who exposed her to alcohol and drugs throughout her childhood. By the time she turned eighteen, she had fallen into circles of dangerous gangs, dealers, and criminals. She was addicted to hard drugs and alcohol, mindlessly surviving each day. Looking back, she says there was no thought behind each action she made. “When you are on drugs,” Angelica said, “You don’t really think…you don’t know what is going to happen to you, so you have to have thick skin.”

 “I had a funeral,” Ana spoke with grief in her voice, recalling the death of her son two years prior. “But there was no body, he was a full donor.” Tears pricked her eyes as she nodded, “A full donor.”

Ana never thought she would find herself alone, unhoused, and suffering from debilitating depression. But when her son died in 2023, Ana was unable to pull herself out of her apartment, much less make her way to work. She lost her job and nearly her life.

“If I had been alone in my apartment, I wouldn’t be here.” There was a pain in her recollection of the memory. “I did try to commit suicide.”

There is no timeline for the grief that losing a child can cause a loving mother. Studies from the National Institute on Aging found that parents who lost children can continue to face depressive symptoms and poor well-being 18 years after the loss of their child. Without intervention and support, parents will continue to feel the traumatic effects of child loss, impacting their daily lives. For Ana, there was no support system she could turn to, and her grief consumed her.