Today we’d like to introduce you to Elaine Gantz Wright.
Elaine Gantz, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I am an aging, yet scrappy, single mother of two wild and precious boys, one gone way too soon. As I intentionally honor the legacy and 26 exquisite years of knowing my late son, Elliot, I’m navigating the craggy and cumbersome path of devouring grief one day and one moment at a time. Inhabiting the liminal space between the before and the after, I am on a trek I never expected across a desolate terrain that might as well be the surface of a moon. Yes, my life has been challenging on many levels for many decades, but this journey on the other side of this dividing line has been a daunting, new road that has led me through hell — and also into infinite grace.
I am working on a memoir: Grief’s Fault: Finding Life on the Other Side, a poignant, profound, and personal story, a raw meditation on love, motherhood, and loss through the shadowy, murky lens of mental illness and family dysfunction. In this raw survival guide for anyone who has endured the unthinkable, I acknowledge that grief will never go away — and can only be carried as part of our human story of life, lost and found. Obsessed with the mystery of my Elliot’s freakish motorcycle death, I have often forgotten how to live, but through this achingly vulnerable exploration, I learn the most essential truths of all on the edge of grief’s fault.
I am a writer, editor, and creator living in Dallas, Texas. My late son Elliot was a brilliant musician, writer, reader, and technology savant. Ian, his surviving younger brother, is a multitalented artist, game creator, and citizen of the world living in Austin, Texas. Having lost all members of her immediate family except my adult son, Ian, I find meaning word by word in my writing — lifting the veil on grief to support others on their unique paths as I reimagine my own life after death.
Having studied theater arts and communications at Northwestern University, I earned an MBA/MA in arts administration from Southern Methodist University. Find my writing and resources at Grief Matter/Substack, ElaineGantzWright.com, and @ellgantz on Instagram. I am a published essayist in “The Spirituality of Grief: Ten Practices for Those Who Remain” by Fran Tilton Shelton, and “House of Comfort” and “House of Faith” by Retreat House Press, FaithandGrief.org, and I have appeared on Faith and Grief’s podcast.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a marketing communications writer and actor by day and a memoir writer with a Substack newsletter called Grief Matters by night.
Do you any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
Performing the role of the hermit Hiccup in “Dimwit and the Dark Castle” on stage at the Dallas Theater Center when was 12.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://elainegantzwright.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ellagantz
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elaine.g.wright
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elainegantzwright/
- Twitter: https://x.com/ellagantz
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ElaineGantzWright
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/user/ur34021864/
- Other: https://elainegantzwright.substack.com/
