GRIEF FUND VIDEO BLOG
Alex Honnold talks here about the Climbing Grief Fund's role in the climbing industry at large. He explains that he sees the Fund as a catalyst to push companies and sponsors to acknowledge their responsibility to their athletes and families by providing resources and support through the process of grief and loss. Alex believes that the Climbing Grief Fund can stand as a place for the industry to “normalize” and illustrate the different facets of the grieving process, hopefully urging the community to openly deal with the serious ramifications of climbing. Alex has had an assortment of friends die within his community but admits that he doesn’t understand what it is to have a close partner die, which he emphasizes while speaking about his perspective of grief and loss in the community. He mentions that being with family and friends is helpful through his process of grief and emphasizes the need to move forward and to be realistic with the risks that we take.
Angela lost her partner Scott almost three years ago in a climbing accident. In this interview, she delves into her experience of grief and loss while continuing to climb at a professional level. Angela mentions the difficulty of finding mental health support from someone who understand climbing, and who is able to affordably practice with a client who is on the road and traveling for most of the year. She emphasizes the importance of being gentle with yourself during the grieving process, and acknowledging that you are not always going to be able to hold grief with grace and that this is truly okay. She hopes that in the future there will be more resources for individuals who are seeking mental health professionals who specifically know how to deal with grief in the climbing community.
Alli Roskelley has just recently lost her husband, Jess Roskelley, in an avalanche accident close to two and a half months prior to this interview. Alli has stayed focused on the road ahead, explaining that she wants to continue being the woman that Jess fell in love with, and continue living the life he would want for her. Alli explains that she and Jess had previously talked about what would happen if either of them died, and that these conversations have really helped her in the healing process and giving her the strength to look forward into what life has to offer. Alli hopes that within the community we can establish a better understanding of grief and allow ourselves to be open about the process. Allie explains that social media, and being open about her own grieving process through an online presence, has impacted her positively throughout her process. She is incredibly grateful for the support that she has received within the community and is happy to be moving forward.
Brette Harington lost her partner, Marc, in March of 2018. This interview delves into the depths of the human experience through Brette’s relationship to grief. For the year after Marc’s death, Brette found refuge in the mountains and spent the majority of her time climbing and skiing out in nature, where she feels closer to Marc and the relationship that they shared. Brette delves into the experience of grief in tandem with the beauty and abundance that comes with being human and experiencing what still is left to live for. For Brette, climbing and focusing her attention to the mountain was her way in and through her own grieving process. She explains that she and Marc would have conversations about death prior to his accident and that these conversations helped her orient herself, in knowing what he wanted out of life and what he wanted for her after his death.
Chris Kalous recently lost his close friend Hayden Kennedy. In this interview he speaks about the impact that Hayden’s death has had on him and his community of Carbondale, Colorado. Chris explains the Climbing Grief Fund as a conduit for dealing with isolation and loneliness surrounding grief. Chris names how his close friends and family have being the best support in dealing with his own grief surrounding Hayden’s death. He explains the roller-coaster ride of emotions in grief, such as anger and humor, that accompanies a loss so close to one’s own inner circle. Chris explains that he no longer holds tightly to his feelings of anger, and instead focuses more on the love he feels towards Hayden and their friendship.
Jesse brings the wisdom of 20-plus years of climbing into the conversation as he speaks of many friends, specifically Hayden Kennedy, that have died within the climbing community. He emphasizes how this has made him pause and reconsider his relationship with climbing. For the length of his climbing career, Jesse explains that he has had to continually question what he was doing, why he was doing it and how to find balance between these two realities. Jesse observes many other people in the climbing community that are suffering and hopes that a larger conversation about the effects of loss and grief and the importance of focusing on mental health in the community will evolve.
Josie was Quinn Brett’s climbing partner when Quinn fell. Josie describes the accident as a shifting point for herself in her relationship to climbing. She explains that after the accident she needed to take a step back and reassess why she wanted to continue climbing and to continually be honest with where she is at opposed to feeling like she should be at any specific place with climbing.
In this interview, Marcus focuses on the importance of mentorship in the climbing community and the of developing these relationships with younger climbers. He describes this mentorship as an aid in helping his own healing process surrounding grief, through paying-it-forward and making younger climbers aware of how to be responsible and conscious about climbing decisions. His mentor was Jimmy Ray Forester, who died in El Potrero Chico in a climbing accident. Marcus was invited to go with Jimmy on this trip and chose to instead stay with his family for Thanksgiving. Marcus then flew down to identify the body and coordinate the logistics for flying him home for the funeral.
Kitty Calhoun has experienced loss throughout her life both in and out of the climbing community, starting with the suicide of her brother. She emphasizes the importance of community and learning how to listen and sit with silence in order to help support someone through trauma and grief. Kitty explains that her connection to faith has helped her come to terms with the deaths of friends and family members, acknowledging that there is a greater plan than she isn't able to understand. Kitty hopes that the climbing community resists placing judgment onto those that risk their lives in this sport and move towards an environment where asking for help is something that is praised. To deal with the loss in her life Kitty explains that she tries to keep in mind what those people have taught her and to remember them in this light. She explains that this perspective, as well as taking a lot of time to be in nature, helps her stay present in her life.
Sky had his best friend and climbing partner of 9 years, Saylah, die in a climbing accident within the recent years. His experience with this grief and observation of how he and his community dealt with this grief led him to begin work with the Climbing Grief Fund. Sky emphasizes the importance of acknowledging grief in order to fully enjoy and embrace joy and happiness in our lives, specifically in relationship with nature and climbing. He mentions a hard line between singularity and being tough, to falling into a callous detachment with your experience. Sky believes that the Climbing Grief Fund can offer a place of collective wisdom and an abundance of resources for the climbing community to acknowledge the grief and loss that is present.
Sam has had many close friends and others in his community die. He expresses his connection to eastern traditions that have helped him cope with a greater understanding of the cyclical nature of life and death. In this interview Sam focuses on the need to talk about grief and create a space in our community where it is acceptable and expected that individuals openly express their what they are going through. Sam also touches on the accepted risks that athletes in the industry have to come to terms with, and how his own range of acceptable risk has been pulled back a bit; that he is able to find a challenging edge while avoiding the need to push past that in order to feel accomplished. Fear and grief are important to him as an athlete and as someone who has to continually deal with the grief of continuously loosing friends in this field.
About two years prior to this interview Lizzy Scully was part of a climbing accident in which her climbing partner, Thad, fell and nearly died. Thankfully there were first responders near the climbing area and Thad was able to get immediate help. Lizzy has since kept a very close relationship to Thad but no longer considers herself a climber. She has gone on to immerse herself in other outdoor activities but describes that the accident turned her away from her longing to climb. Lizzy sought help from a trauma specialist fairly soon after the accident and describes this as a huge help in her recovery process. She emphasizes the importance of having access to mental health support and the importance of the Climbing Grief Fund’s role in providing these resources in the climbing community.
As the CEO of the American Alpine Club (2005- 2020), Phil Powers has a unique position and perspective on the grief and loss in the climbing community. Phil is constantly dealing with grief and loss, and expresses that at this point unfortunately, he has grown to feeling callous around the subject; a perspective that he feels is shared by search and rescue team members and anyone else who has to deal with reoccurring deaths. Phil is hopeful that the grief fund will be a step in the right direction in the case of confronting loss in the climbing community, and opening the conversation to hopefully deal with this grief in a healthier way.
Quinn is in the unique position of having worked as a park-ranger in Rocky Mountain National Park as a climbing ranger, rescuing countless people off the mountain, as well as having lived through a life-threatening climbing accident. She speaks about the grief that comes with losing the ‘before-accident’ self . She touches on the subject of blame, and regret. As well as the use of social media in opening up to communities in which grief is ever-prevalent as a way to have a larger and more holistic approach to dealing with her grief.
Matt is familiar with the grieving process, having had his father die when he was young and then two of his closest friends die in a climbing accident when he was in his mid-20s. Since then, upwards of 12 individuals in his close climbing community have passed away on and off the mountains. In this interview Matt touches on the confusion with complex grief, his experience with substance abuse and his hesitancy towards social media regarding the process of grieving. He mentions he has had third-party professional help through his process of grieving and mentions this was a big help in overcoming some of the harder times. Matt talks about the need for balance in accepting that death is a part of climbing.
Kestrel Hanson-Neathawk is a licensed professional counselor and climber in Boulder. In her interview, she describes her process of grief surrounding the death of her first love and climbing partner. Kestrel emphasizes that there is no right way to grieve, and urges us to not place ourselves in polarity with grief as, “we are already whole throughout the whole process.” Kestrel highlights that grief itself has a significant place in everyone’s life, and the impact of this process in important. Kestrel touches on the subject of risk in her interview and though she states she does not wish to live in fear, she finds herself more attune to risk and felt that when she was younger she didn’t have “the full capacity to understand the terrain we were navigating”. Kestrel hopes that as a community, being able to be vulnerable with grief will help others in the climbing community navigate the journey knowing they are not alone.
Tommy Caldwell is a professional climber who has experienced the loss of member of the climbing community and his own traumatic climbing experiences. Tommy describes that he doesn’t feel as if he has experienced loss or grief in a profound way, and questions his relationship with both. He states that he feels able to be vulnerable with people, but that he also recognizes that he doesn’t let his mind wander to “those dark places”. Caldwell describes how his relationship with risk has shifted, especially after the birth of his two children, and is open about the conversations that his family and he has regarding climbing trips and the risk that each trip involves. “I have two children now. Each time I feel like there are more people relaying on me, I feel like I get safer in the mountains.”
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In this interview, professional climber Lynn Hill describes her grief surrounding the death of loved ones and the different stages of a climber’s life. For her, being faced with death early on in her career made her really question what specifically she wanted to do in the world of climbing and consciously decide her limits. Thinking back to the friends she has lost, Lynn says that she tries to think of the beautiful things that person brought to her life and focus on how she can learn and move-forward in her own life with these lessons in mind. Lyn feels that the less connected you are with your body the more you draw away from life, and that climbing is how she chooses to celebrate life. “I think you have to embrace the whole spectrum of life. You are born, you live and then you die and I just hope to do it well.”
Roger has been a part of the Boulder climbing community for over 50 years. In this interview, he discusses the death of his long-term climbing partner, Chip and recognizes the different stages of grief that he has gone through with the passing of different individuals in the community. Roger emphasizes the importance of analyzing these stages, but also recognizing that he is still alive and to offer as much to the world that he can in that time. At the moment Roger is focused on writing a book on the topic of climbing, and has always felt a call to serve. A prominent loss that Roger recognizes is the loss of youth and he feels that grief has an influential part in this loss, but also the process of aging. Roger states, “always look forward and listen to your body. I think one of the harder losses in climbing is the loss of youth.”
Guilia discusses her experience of being six years old when her father, Craig Luebben, died in 2012 during a glacial ice collapse on Mt. Tomen in the North Cascades National Park. In this interview, Guilia offers to us a perspective of what it is like for a young kid to try and understand the emotional chaos that surrounds the death of a loved one. Guilia reflects on her relationship with grief in association with her father and remarks on the varied forms of grief she holds around the accident, especially as she compares her own grief with the grief she has seen her mother work through. Guilia holds a strong passion for climbing and has recently begun traveling to her father’s routes around the world in order to climb them. She expresses that this helps her feel closer to her father, and allows her to experience and see the different climbing locations that significantly marked his own life. Guilia reflects on her relationship to risk and the highlighted placement of friends and families fears within her own calculations of risk surrounding climbing.
Jaime Logan discusses her long career in climbing and the process of grieving the deaths of multiple friends and climbing partners. Jaime describes the difficulty of looking back and separating grief into different categories of loss. She describes that the process of climbing is a process of looking death in the face and developing a relationship with that reality. She says that in some ways she had made her piece with death while alpine climbing in the 70’s and implies a similar sentiment among her climbing partners and others in the community at that time. Right now the biggest and heaviest grief that Jaime feels is towards global warming and our environmental crises.
Chelsea Rude is a professional climber and coach, at one point coaching the US Climbing Team. In this interview, Chelsea speaks about her grief surrounding the loss of Hayden Kennedy and her close friend Savannah Buik. Chelsea describes the disbelief at both the loss of these individuals, and the long experience of processing her grief to both deaths. In her interview, Chelsea touches on specific questions on risk that the process of grief forced her to face. She describes a shift in her relationship to climbing, and how she came to love the sport again. “I’m realizing that I don’t need to approach climbing in the same way that I was when I was climbing with Savannah or when I met Savannah as a coach to her and that I don’t even need to approach it in the same way that she was approaching it,” Chelsea states.
Pioneering female climber, Jean Dempsey reflects on the 1981 accident that profoundly changed her life and career. She expresses that the process of grief is continuous, as grief intensified and lessened at different points in her life post-accident. Jean hopes that her acceptance of what happened to her, and her ability to continue climbing and working in environmental initiatives can inspires others who experience a similar grief. Jean maintains that it is always important to look out for a silver lining and never take any day for granted. Jean reflect on the fact that since the accident she has learned better patience and gratitude through the experience of her grief. “Death is sitting on our shoulders 100% of the time. I choose to look at death and grief occasionally. It is not the main meaning of my life.”