Turning 40 and Navigating Life's Grief: Midlife Reflections
Birthdays in the Shadow of Loss
On September 4th, I turned 41. I used to love celebrating. Ever since I moved to Vancouver ten years ago, I’d hosted an outdoor picnic at Kits Beach, inviting friends from all walks of life. With no space restrictions, the group sometimes grew to 30 or even 40 people. And even though September weather can be unreliable, the sun never failed to come out on my special day. It was always such a blast.
When the pandemic hit in 2020, I had to skip my big birthday celebration for obvious reasons. And then in 2021, my partner, Alex, took his own life, and birthdays shifted from occasions of joy and celebration to times of confusion and anxiety.
That year, my friends threw me a surprise party for my 37th birthday. It was perfectly executed—from convincing me we were going kayaking that day, to asking me to stop by the house first and come in through the backyard where everyone was waiting, to the beautifully decorated setup. I was flooded with gratitude and wanted to cry, but felt nothing—just numb since Alex’s death two months earlier. I found myself performing joy, hoping the rest of me would catch up.
I was so confused: how could I be turning just one year older? It felt more like a decade, given how heavy the year had been with profound experiences. Love, pain, trauma, and loss had changed me in ways I would continue to unravel in the months and years to come. Alex had changed me. Our relationship and his death completely shook my belief system and everything I thought I knew about life and myself. His death marked the beginning of a journey of self-discovery and metamorphosis, because nothing could go back to the way it was—not even me.
When I turned forty, I thought I was finally ready to celebrate again in a big group. But as the date came closer, and I began to picture myself reuniting with many friends I hadn’t seen in a long time—even before tragedy struck—I froze at the idea of answering a very simple yet loaded question: “How have you been?”
It’s not that I haven’t been okay. But there have been many moments since Alex’s death that were absolute hell, and I’m still trying to figure out where I’ve landed in the aftermath. It’s like crashing your bike, and when someone rushes up to ask, “Are you okay?” you reflexively answer “yes”—because if you can talk, you assume you must be fine, even though you haven’t had a second to check your body and pinpoint what’s sore or maybe broken. Even after four years since Alex’s passing, I’m still checking my body, heart, and mind for injuries and bruises.
The truth is that I still don’t know how to answer “How have you been?” Or even how I’m supposed to feel on my birthday.
The Big Four-Oh: Questions and Reckoning
What is it about turning forty that makes us question everything—and sometimes feel a mid-life crisis looming?
In my twenties, I used to feel like I had all the time in the world to figure things out: time to make mistakes, course correct, start again, and try new things without fearing the consequences. You see people taking a gap year, changing majors in university, or ending a long-term relationship, and it never feels like the end of the world, because there’s time for things to turn out okay. In my thirties, my life felt a bit more on track as I had figured some things out. And for the things I hadn’t, I felt that eventually they would fall into place—that everything would work out somehow.
Then I hit forty, and like most people, I started taking inventory of my life and realized I wasn’t where I wanted to be in certain areas. But now, making a change feels riskier because time is tighter and the stakes are higher: there’s less room to bounce back from a business venture, changing careers—while not impossible—is extremely difficult, and every year that you don’t meet your person makes you wonder if you’ll end up meeting the love of your life in a retirement home. Suddenly, the possibility that all those things I had always assumed would eventually fall into place might not actually happen became very real.
The big 4-0 triggered a sense of urgency—and a little bit of panic—because the runway suddenly felt much shorter. I realized I was moving further away from my graduation age and closer each day to an age of retirement. I know I’m not old—even if I get called “ma’am” now and then—but I’m not that young either. It’s hard to know how to feel when some days you read that forties are the new thirties, and other days, the world treats you like the senior cat at the shelter: too old to be given a chance at a new life, even though half of your life may still lie ahead.
We hear that age is just a number, that you can achieve anything at any age. But what I really hear from the people around me as they age is how tired they feel, that even if they could make time for something they’ve been wanting to do, they don’t always have the energy—they can’t just push themselves like in their twenties—and even a bad night’s sleep can throw off their whole week. That’s why they now have to be much more intentional with their time and energy. Even though we enjoy and appreciate feeling wiser, more grounded, and less concerned with what other people think, we still miss the feeling of boundless energy and endless possibilities. Because while age may be just a number, we can't change the fact that our time in this world is limited.
I was already going through a deep process of transformation as I learned to hold space for my pain and integrate Alex’s loss into my life, so it was hard to imagine that the big 4-0 could make even more waves. And yet, this milestone age set off a big inquiry as I started to question whether the life I'd lived so far was truly my choice or something I'd been conditioned to choose. Now I could ask myself: How do I want to live the next half of my life? Who do I want to become? What do I want to let go of? What do I want to bring into this world? It felt like being fresh out of high school again, challenged to decide who I wanted to be as an adult.
Stepping Into the Forties: What We Feel
Not only did my forties give way to a “crisis” in the sense of self-reflection and deep questions, but they also triggered a crisis of authenticity—with myself and the world around me. Personally, I sought to be in better alignment with my own values and needs and to let go of any conditioning, but as I looked around me, I suddenly began seeing everything in a different light. People who once felt spontaneous, upon closer examination, turned out to be impulsive. And those who seemed adventurous were, in fact, restless. Instead of listening and nodding when someone shared their wants and wishes—only to reveal actions in complete dissonance—I wanted to say, “You are full of shit.” I started feeling disconnected from many people and activities I used to enjoy, realizing that more often than not, they would leave me drained. I couldn’t stand performative behaviors—confidence, kindness, even healing—whether intentional or not. The world around me started to feel like a house of mirrors, and all I craved was authenticity: in relationships, in work, in how I showed up in the world—nothing else interested me.
On the note of authenticity, I asked my group of girlfriends to openly share what stepping into their forties brought up for them—the good and the ugly—and they didn’t disappoint.
“At this age, you start realizing that there are things you won’t get to do. In your twenties, even thirties, you still have the feeling that you’ll find the right moment to do those things—you feel everything is possible, because there’s time. I had lost that feeling with age. I know now it’s too late to become a professional hockey player or study Psychology as a second career. I’m glad I did certain trips when I was younger, though, because I wouldn’t have the courage to do them now. I’m more concerned about planning for retirement these days, as I recognize these are my golden years to make money. On top of that, I began to notice my limitations—the changes in my body, waking up with a new ache that might never go away.”
—Creative freelancer in a long-term relationship
“When I was a teenager, I viewed forty as old. But now that I’m here, I feel quite young, at least on the inside. I miss the independence of my twenties, but when I’m away from my kids, I miss them dearly—the ambivalence of being a mother. For me, this is an age of complete surrender.”
—Working mom of a little girl and a baby boy in a long-term relationship
“The shift has been evident; I can feel it on a cellular level. Knowing I have the courage, confidence, and competence to do what I set my mind to. There is no wasting time, no wasted days. I’m living intentionally and inviting miracles into my life each day. Pouring myself into others, especially my dear friends and family, gives me energy. And turning forty has consistently reminded me to be grateful each day.”
—Free-spirited working professional, navigating the single life
“It’s not just one crisis, it’s many crises. I have two kids, and becoming a mom meant putting on pause many aspects of my life, like my career and hobbies. The crisis is realizing that time only moves forward—that there’s no way to go back. Even when my little girl gets older and I have more time to myself, I can’t go back to the person I used to be and just pick up where I left off. Time has passed. The crisis is learning to let go—letting go of your youth, the hobbies I had before becoming a mom, and so many other things. That’s the challenge: how do we survive as we move into this phase of life where we have to let go of more and more? How do we accept the losses? The crisis is taking inventory of my life. How much have I accomplished since university? I know I raised two little girls, but I don’t think I’ve accomplished much professionally, and that’s painful to admit.”
—Married, full-time mom of two little girls
“This age is about deciding what you like and what you don’t, acknowledging that death is coming closer, so it’s better to do now those things you always wanted, coping with the expectations from ourselves and others on the life we had imagined—a life that might not be right for us after all, having more appreciation for the body that helps you do the things you want, learning how to live with disappointment, working on acceptance, being more mindful of your flaws, and recognizing the powers within you—in my case, a strong will.”
—Traveling and working around the world after quitting her 9-5
“My motto for my forties is letting go: letting go of the expectations I had for myself, letting go of things that don’t make me happy, letting go of relationships that aren’t good for me, letting go of people and things that don’t match my energy, letting go of society’s expectations of what I should be doing, and being more the version of myself that makes me happy. For me, it hasn’t been so much of a mid-life crisis as it has been growing into my own self.”
—Deciding her next career move and navigating the single life
In the End, It's Grief
There’s something my late partner Alex said that has stayed with me. After returning from war, he joined a support group for veterans and, once they explained what Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was and how it manifested, he realized that his trauma had deeper roots than his time in war, because he had felt that way his whole life. When Alex died, I had a similar realization. His death exposed me to the most extreme form of grief, and gradually I realized that I had been grieving my whole life too—in fact, we all do, in one form or another.
Before his death, I didn’t recognize that the disconcerting swirl of emotions—sadness, anger, regret, guilt, nostalgia, and many others I couldn’t yet name—was grief. Now I understand that every time we come to a crossroad and choose a path, there’s grief for every path not taken: for every person or place we leave behind, every expectation unmet, every opportunity that never came, every version of ourselves we shed. We are constantly grieving the past and the unrealized future—the lives we didn’t live, the choices we didn’t make, and the possibilities we never had the chance to explore.
I don’t believe there’s a right or wrong path in life. There are many ways to reach the same destination—happiness, fulfillment, connection. But there are trade-offs in every decision, and the hardest part is learning to let go of what we lose so we can fully enjoy what’s right in front of us.
The runway keeps getting shorter and shorter. The pressure is real. But maybe the best response isn’t to do more, to cram more experiences into our busy days, but instead to slow down and savor every moment of whatever path we are on.
This post is dedicated to the beautiful, wise, honest, and courageous women in my life navigating their forties. Your stories inspire me every day. And for my dear readers, I’d love to know: what has stepping into this decade brought up for you—the joys, the challenges, or the unexpected lessons?