In 2025, a longtime client of Ilana Grines, a therapist in Los Angeles, found out that his mother had terminal cancer . Grines gave him an assignment: Write down everything you want to tell her while you still can. The man took the idea back to his friends, who were appalled: “That’s so morbid !” they said. He told them he was going to do it anyway. Earlier this year, when the two regrouped after his mom’s death, he was in tears. So was she. “He said to me, ‘I’m so thankful we did this, because