A little about me
I'm Courtney — a 35-year-old mom to a two-year-old girl, and wife to my husband Andrew, who has helped me pick up the pieces in every way since my dad's passing. I built Grief Kit as a passion project, because I wish something like it had existed for my family.
My dad, Bob Steinkrauss, passed away in April 2022 — the day after my 31st birthday. Five months before my wedding. Before my daughter was born. Before so many things he deserved to see. He went too quickly. I wasn't ready. I wasn't expecting to lose him.
My dad had always been a planner. You could find him sitting on the beach in Cape Cod on a perfect summer day, clicking away on his calculator — budgeting, planning, reviewing finances. He always had a plan B. He always figured it out.
When I was young, he cashed in his 401k to leave a stable corporate job and run an early-stage startup. He risked so much, worked incredibly hard, and eventually brought the company public. That work changed our lives. He took calculated bets, and he always had a backup plan.
So when he died, there was a passwords folder for my mom. A will and trust. Accounts for his grandkids. He had thought so deeply about how to take care of us even when he was gone. And despite all of that, the aftermath of his death was overwhelming.
Where do I start? How do I figure this out? How do I move forward? He would have hated that despite his meticulous efforts, it was still chaos to sort through. I wish my mom had something like Grief Kit to help her navigate the emotional, financial, and life implications of losing the person she loved most.
Our story is not unique. So many people lose the people they love and their lives are never the same. Of course they will never be the same. But dealing with the overwhelm that comes after death shouldn't be as hard as it is. Because we have enough grief to carry. And fighting with a credit card company is the last thing anyone should have to do after burying a loved one.
The day I knew we were losing him
I remember clearly: March 2022. My company was doing a "back to office" push. My dad was in the ICU and I spent days traveling into our Boston office, then making my way out to the suburbs to visit him. For a while, we thought he would recover.
One day I was in a meeting, without my phone. I got back to my desk and saw the missed calls from my mom. I walked to the phone pods and called her. He had been sedated and put on a ventilator. He couldn't breathe on his own. I knew in that moment we were losing him.
I quietly packed my bag, walked out of the office, and walked toward the train station. Along the way, I had a panic attack. From what I can remember, I was hysterically crying, talking to myself, walking as fast as I could to the T. People stopped to check on me. I just kept saying: I have to get home. I have to get home.
Somehow I made it onto the T, back to my car, and my husband met me there to drive us to the hospital. I will never forget that day. It is forever burned into my memory — along with the PTSD that overcomes me whenever I hear a ringtone that sounds like a ventilator. If you know, you know. Hours sitting by that machine, listening to it breathe for my dad. It stops me in my tracks to this day.
Five months later: our wedding day
Five months after my dad died, Andrew and I carried on with our wedding day — the one we had planned when my dad was still here. I walked down the aisle with my mom.
Minutes before, thunder and lightning struck the venue and fried most of the TVs in the hotel, shut the power down, broke the elevator, and lightning struck a tree outside — stripping it of all its bark. To this day when we visit, that bare tree is still standing out front. The hotel roared in thunder, five minutes before I walked down the aisle.
Many people told me that was dad. I'm not a religious person. But how could that not be him? He was there in spirit, bringing me to the person who has carried me forward every single day since.
We served "Bob's Chardonnay" at our reception — his photo on every bottle, his favorite wine in every glass. The card on the table read: "In loving memory of the best dad — we invite you to share your favorite memory of him." The sunflowers on the tables were golden yellow. He was everywhere.
Grief, again — and again
On Christmas morning of 2023, I was eight months pregnant and had unexpectedly been laid off from my job a few weeks earlier. That morning, my dog couldn't stand up. Andrew and I spent Christmas together at the vet. Her spleen had a massive tumor we didn't know about. She was bleeding out internally.
We made the decision to let her go peacefully. We said our goodbyes and went home to a house without her. Overnight, our daily routine changed completely. No more walks. No more sitting in the sun on the deck. No more drooly nostrils on my belly as my daughter kicked.
The grief of losing my dog hit harder than I anticipated. She wasn't my dad — I knew that. But it brought back all the raw emotions: the routine changes, the administrative work, the vet bills, the question of what to do with ashes. Grief is grief.
A month later, my daughter entered the world — perfect, healthy, and beautiful. The biggest blessing of my life. The world shifted again, this time toward something full of light.