I’d Give Almost Anything to Trip Over Her Shoes Again
I used to ask my daughter to clean up the shoes at our front door. Today I would give almost anything to trip over them. This is about the small arguments most parents want to be rid of, what I got wrong about a wet towel on a bedroom floor, and what my thirteen year old understood before I did. For any parent standing in a hallway after a door has closed, wondering what they did wrong.
I’m Starting to Forget Things About My Daughter. And I Hate It.
Eleven years after losing his 14-year-old daughter Maddie, Chris Coulter is confronting another painful part of grief: memories fading. From shoes at the front door to Adele in the shower, he shares the ordinary moments he refuses to let disappear and why Maddie’s life deserves to be remembered for far more than the way it ended.
I Wrote the Warning Signs for Parents. Then I Counted 11 in Myself.
Seven signs your teenager might be struggling, read back by the man who wrote them. The adult version of that list runs to fourteen items and the first seven are the same seven. Chris Coulter on cycling that quietly stopped, four hours of sleep for years, the explanation waiting for any man in his fifties who goes quiet, and why recognizing something and admitting it applies to you are two different things.
My Teenager Won't Talk to Me: 6 Ways to Help Them Open Up
Your teenager says they're fine. You know something's off. Six ways to make the first step smaller when your teen won't talk to you or anyone else, including why letting someone else be first is not a failure, and the one reassurance most parents offer that they will end up breaking. Plus what to do when you've tried everything and your kid still gives you nothing.
Nobody Asks How the Brothers Are
When my daughter died, her brothers were 13 and 9. Their hockey teams made black armbands with both boys' numbers on them. There was no school in that neighbourhood where they walked in as two kids nobody had heard about. This is about surviving siblings, what a grieving parent misses while they're inside their own grief, and the one thing to say to a family that has other children at home.
The Mental Health Checklist I Wish I Had When Maddie Was 14
They spend more time alone. They stop talking as much. They're on their phone more. Something feels different and you can't put your finger on it. Six things a parent can do when they've noticed a change in their teenager and don't know whether it means anything, including what to ask instead of how was your day, when to bring in someone who isn't you, and what changed in one house afterwards.
Know Your Child's Normal Well Enough to See When It Changes
Your teenager is quieter. Their sleep has changed. Conversations are shorter. Every item on that list also describes a perfectly normal fifteen-year-old, which is why parents explain it away. Chris Coulter on the difference between teenage moodiness and something worth attention, the six questions that separate a bad week from a pattern, and why knowing your child's baseline matters more than knowing the warning signs.
Everyone Goes Home After the Funeral. You Don’t.
The funeral director said he had never seen a line that long. Chris Coulter remembers comforting the people who came to comfort him. Then the next day arrived, the house went quiet, and grief moved in properly. On the hardest day after losing a child, why support thins out exactly when it starts to hurt, and why it is never too late to go back to a family in the quiet part.
Every Company Value Has an “Unless”
Most companies say they support employees through personal difficulty. Employees learn quickly where that support ends. Chris Coulter on the gap between the values board and what actually happens when someone's performance drops for six months, why low EAP utilisation is not a communications problem, and the three questions worth putting to your own leadership team this week.
We Have a Recognition Problem
Mental health support often begins after someone asks for help. But what happens before that? Chris Coulter explores the recognition gap facing parents, managers and employers, and how Teen Signal Check, Manager Signal Check and Culture Signal Check can help identify changes, blind spots and disconnects earlier, before assumptions replace conversations.
Your Teen Isn’t Refusing Therapy. They’re Refusing What Saying Yes Would Mean
You found someone, sorted the coverage, worked out how to raise it. And your teenager said no, with no reason attached. Most parents read that as stubbornness. It's usually something else. Six things a teenager is protecting when they refuse therapy, what to say instead of arguing, and what to do when the answer stays no.
The Decision Was About the Business. It Ended Up Being About the Gummies.
I stopped drinking in August 2023 after working out it was making the depression worse. Then cannabis arrived, quietly and reasonably, first for sleep and eventually as something I told myself helped me write. It took two years and a decision about the business to see it. This is about what happens when a functional adult misreads his own state, and why that worries me about fifteen-year-olds.
I Turn 61 Today. It Took Me 15 Years to Want Another Birthday
I stopped marking my birthday for about fifteen years. Inside a five year stretch I lost a business, then a marriage, then my daughter, and somewhere in there the desire to live. What followed was about a decade of darkness I almost didn't get out of. This is what I understand now that I couldn't have understood then, including why the understanding arrives so much later than anyone tells you.
He Hadn't Spoken to His Son in 10 Years. He Couldn't Remember Why.
A stranger in a Toronto pub told me he hadn't spoken to his son in almost ten years, then admitted he couldn't remember what started it. Most managers are carrying a smaller version of the same thing: a person on the team they've quietly stopped talking to properly. Nobody would take it to HR. Nobody is going to raise it either, because the person with the power in the room is you.
Boys Send the Signal as Attitude
Boys rarely say they're sad. They go short, retreat to their room, and answer everything with "I'm fine." Most parents read that as normal teenage behaviour, and most of the time they're right. Sometimes it's grief with no language attached. A father writes about why attitude is often the only signal a boy can send, and what to do when you're already noticing something.
I Picked a Day
In the spring of 2018, three years after we lost Maddie, I picked a day and told nobody. Not my therapist, not my closest friends, not the people who had already carried me through the worst thing that can happen to a family. Nothing was missing from my life. I had every person I needed. What I didn't have was any willingness to be a burden to them, and that was the dangerous part.
200 People Said the School Was Wrong. Four Parents Had Signed Up.
A school cancelled a talk I was giving to parents about my daughter. The post about it reached a couple of hundred thousand people and two hundred of them told me the school was wrong. Four families had registered. I spent years angry at a coordinator because it was easier than being curious about everyone who stayed home, and what kept them home was never indifference.
“Daddy, You Need to Take Me Back to the Hospital”
My daughter was beating me at a board game on a hospital day pass when something turned. She said take me back, in plain words, at fourteen. She could do that because someone had taught her the language. Most teens never get it, which is why fine and yeah is all you get. What that means if your teenager won't talk to you, and where to start before anything is wrong.
I Wrote About Depression When Maddie Was 12. I Never Asked If She Was Okay.
In October 2012 I published my first post about depression. I'd been seeing a psychiatrist for four years and took a careful inventory of my own life every few weeks. My daughter Maddie was twelve. She appears in that post once, as evidence I was doing fine. Knowing about depression and seeing it in the person across the table are two different abilities, and I confused them.
The Numbers Tell You What Happened. Your People Could Tell You Why
Turnover, absence and engagement scores record decisions your people already finished making. The account of why sits with the people the numbers are about, and most of them will never volunteer it. Chris Coulter on why employees stay quiet, why the manager script never asks, and a way to test whether your leadership team knows its own organization.