Life, Love, and the In-Between by Golnosh Sharafsaleh

A Geriatrician's Journey Through Aging and the Meaning of Life

I have walked with people as they age, change, and live their lives, and I have been with them at the bedside when they are dying.

What they taught me changed how I understand love, loss, and what it means to live well.

As a geriatrician, Dr. Golnosh Sharafsaleh has spent years accompanying people across the full arc of life. She has witnessed how meaning evolves as certainty fades, how identity shifts with time, and how connection often deepens when life becomes more complex, not less.

When her own life was altered in ways she could not have prepared for, the lessons she had absorbed over years of caring for others became deeply personal. The distance between doctor and human being disappeared, and the wisdom she had once observed was now lived.

This book is not a chronicle of decline or a collection of medical stories. It is a reflection on how people continue to grow through aging, illness, love, and loss. It explores how relevance is redefined over time, how purpose changes shape, and how presence becomes more powerful than control.

Life, Love, and the In Between is written for anyone who senses that the most important lessons in life are learned not in moments of certainty, but in the in-between moments where we are forced to slow down, listen more closely, and pay attention to what truly matters.

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Excerpt from Life, Love, and the In-Between © Copyright 2026 Dr. Golnosh Sharafsaleh

Introduction

The Journey Begins

Life is a series of moments strung together, each one adding to the tapestry of our existence. Some bring joy, others sorrow, and many fall somewhere in between. Life, Love, and the In Between is a reflection on these moments, the lessons learned through both triumphs and tragedies, and the transformative power of love.

In 2016, I stood before an audience at a women’s conference and shared a deeply personal story: the story of my son, James, who was born with a congenital heart defect and destined to live a brief, yet profoundly meaningful life. On the day of his birth, we cried tears of joy as we welcomed him into a world of unknowns. A photographer, herself a mother who had once lost a child, volunteered her time to capture his first moments. Through her lens, she preserved James’s small but powerful cry, his gray eyes, his light brown hair, all of it filling our hearts with wonder and love.

James weighed just four pounds, a tiny, premature baby, yet full of life and spirit. Knowing our time with him would be short, we embraced every moment. We took him to the park, the bar, on hayrides, we made every day count. The audience at the conference didn’t know how James’s story would end until I shared, at the conclusion of my talk, that he had passed away at just eight weeks old. The room fell silent, then tears began to flow. Though it was painful to speak about James so soon after his passing, I felt compelled to share his story.

Through James’s journey, I began to understand the meaning of the in between—the space between birth and death. Every moment mattered. Every experience was sacred. And love was the thread that held it all together. That understanding only deepened as I continued my work as a geriatrician, walking alongside my patients during the final chapters of their lives.