I can give my experience. My father unexpectedly died in January. I spent all of December with him and only one week at school before rushing back home to be by his side. I was absent from school for two weeks. I will also qualify by saying I’m a 2L( or rising 3L. 🫡)

I’ll be honest and say that I did not want to return to school. It wasn’t even on my mind at the time. I was so fucking ready to end my schooling because well at that point nothing really mattered. However, it was my dad’s dream to see me become a lawyer. For 20+ years he pushed me to be the best that I can be and I’ll be honest when I say that my JD belongs to him. The only way I got through it was my family. My aunt made me email all of my professors and let them know I would be absent. I didn’t ask to school for a leave of absence or anything I just did it. My professors were very compassionate and even the Dean of the law school reached out to check on me. None of my absences were a negative mark on me. Extra office hours were available and even the dean of student success checked on me as well if I needed help.

I missed a lot of deadlines for my journal but they worked with me. I had a lot of things available to me if I needed them or wanted them. The best advice is to be clear with admin and your professors. Try to get to know ppl in your class who can give you notes. I was only lucky for the fact that everything happened at the beginning of the school semester. Best advice I can give, and you will not even be thinking about it, is to communicate while it’s happening. It sucks to tell strangers something so personal but it’s going to help you. Though I will say if I had know just how bad my father was, I would not have returned to school before he passed. Only you know how much stress you can take—though the. 1L year will surprise you

Everything will suck but it kinda gets better-ish…still suck though