In a few days, I will be travelling abroad for a very short period. The separation is temporary, its duration is known, and we are certain that we will be reunited. Yet, in recent days, I have found myself repeatedly saying the same things to my daughter: I love you. I will miss you so much.
I have already begun to miss her before even leaving. It feels as though I am experiencing the ordinary moments we share with greater attentiveness. Even while she is still beside me, the sadness of knowing that she will soon no longer be by my side begins to settle within me.
Why do we embrace someone more tightly when we know we are about to leave? How does an absence that has not yet occurred change the meaning of a presence in the here and now?
Saying goodbye is not merely a moment of separation. Perhaps it is a process that begins before the separation itself, woven through words, touches, glances, and the time spent together.
So, can saying goodbye also be considered an occupation?
Occupational therapy views the activities people engage in throughout their daily lives not merely as tasks and behaviours, but also in terms of their personal and social meanings. An activity can become a meaningful occupation when it intersects with a person's identity, relationships, values, and life story. Saying goodbye can also be considered from this perspective.
Embracing someone, seeing them off, sharing one last meal, expressing love, leaving a letter, or experiencing the time spent together before a separation with a heightened sense of attentiveness… These are actions that take place in everyday life but can carry meanings that extend beyond the ordinary. In this sense, saying goodbye involves establishing how a relationship will be sustained through a period of temporary distance.
Moreover, not all goodbyes are the same. Leaving a home, moving away from a city, quitting a job, experiencing a change in one's parental role, temporarily being apart from a loved one, or facing an irreversible loss are distinct experiences. Yet each may require us to reconsider our familiar ways of living, our relationships, and sometimes even our sense of self.
The literature on occupation and life transitions emphasises the importance of the personal meanings of daily activities and occupations during such periods. Change is not merely a shift in circumstances; it also involves changes in how people sustain their lives, what they hold on to, and how they reposition themselves.
Farewell rituals help us make sense of this transition. An embrace, a sentence, a particular way of seeing someone off… They do not eliminate separation. However, they give separation meaning and form, and sometimes allow us to carry a sense of closeness with us.
Empathy also has an important place here. When we try to understand another person's sadness at parting, we can draw on our own experiences. We might think of someone we miss even while they are still beside us, a city we have left behind, or a way of life we can no longer maintain. However, empathy does not mean assuming that everyone experiences the same emotion in the same way. It means approaching another person's experience through our own while making room for the uniqueness of theirs.
From an occupational therapy perspective, this approach may lead us to ask new questions: How does separation affect a person's daily life? How do habits, roles, and routines change? Which occupations help people maintain their connections amid changing circumstances, and which help them prepare for a new way of life? How can actions that are meaningful to an individual be supported during a period of transition?
Therefore, we should not think of saying goodbye solely as an ending. A farewell is a life activity in which a connection sometimes becomes visible, change sometimes begins to be accepted, and feelings that have not yet been named sometimes find expression.
I do not want to eliminate the sadness I feel when saying goodbye to my daughter. I cannot pretend that I have never experienced it before. Perhaps I do not need to. This sadness reminds me of how meaningful the bond I have built with her is to me.
This time, I will ask myself a question: Instead of trying to reduce the sadness of separation, how can I recognise the meaning within it? Because saying goodbye to someone is not merely about preparing to be apart from them. It is also about rediscovering the bond we share, the place they hold within us, and the meaning of the time we have spent together.
Saying goodbye, too, is an occupation of this kind: engaging with a meaningful bond on the threshold of separation. Not every farewell is a form of grief, but it can be a threshold that helps us recognise our connections and the meaningful occupations in our lives. How does knowing that we will experience the temporary absence of something change the relationship we establish with it today? An occupational therapist should ask this question not only of their clients but also of themselves.
