Death and grief are concepts that most people will grapple with at some point throughout their lives. Death became a reality for me on July 2005, when Ryan Terry's father died of cancer. As a grieving high school and later college student, studying the experiences of grieving college students is both personal and professional journey. His experiences taught him that while most people will experience the death of someone close to them, death is also a topic that most people tend to avoid. The stories in his research documented the transitional experiences of first-year college students who were grieving the loss of a parent. The participants in his study experienced numerous structural and social difficulties during their transition to school. Although his research focused entirely on the experiences of grieving first-year students, their experiences still offer lessons for higher education professionals.