Losing someone you love feels like the whole world stops, and Joel Dahmen knows that feeling all too well. His mom, Jolyn, passed away from cancer in 2005, and even though it’s been two decades, that pain must still linger. The bond they had was strong, and her loss left a huge hole in his life.

Dahmen’s never shy about talking about his mom, Jolyn. Whether he’s calling himself a “mama’s boy” or remembering her cinnamon rolls, she’s always on his mind. In “I Want to Talk About My Mom,” published in The Player’s Tribune, he opened up about her and how much she meant to him. “She was a superhero. She was my superhero. Zach (his brother) and I were completely spoiled by her. She made our beds every day, she cooked incredible dinners — there wasn’t a thing we had to do around the house. We were both big mama’s boys,” said the golfer back then. 

Growing up in Clarkston, Washington, with his brother Zach and their parents, life had a sense of comfort and stability. Describing his mom, Dahmen said, “She was the life of the party. She worked at a local elementary school and she was everyone’s favorite teacher. She’d host Thanksgiving and Christmas for our extended family and she made it look so easy. She did everything with love.” While he often shares stories about his mom, his dad played a huge role too.

His dad was the steady, quietly supportive figure in his life. “Dad worked at the pulp and paper mill in the valley nearby for 38 years,” he said. While his father wasn’t the most outwardly expressive, his support was just as integral to the golfer’s journey. His dad helped fund his tournament fees and worked hard to make sure his son had every chance to chase his dreams in golf. “He funded a lot of my entry fees,” he said. Dahmen’s early golf experiences were all thanks to his father’s hard work and Jolyn’s relentless support.

How did he find out about his mother’s illness?

Dahmen’s life was just like any other normal kid, going to school, playing with friends, and time spent with his mom. As a kid, he dreamed of being like Ken Griffey Jr. or Gary Payton. But by high school, golf became his thing. And not just because he loved it, but because it gave him a chance to get an education “I knew it would make my parents proud, too. That’s what mattered to me,” he said.

But in the fall of 2004, everything changed. One Friday night, after a usual evening watching football with his friends, Dahmen came home to hear the words no one ever wants to hear: “Joel, your mom has cancer.” Those five words hit him like a ton of bricks. “Nothing bad had ever happened to me. I just started crying. I hugged my mom for 10 minutes. I didn’t know what to say. What to do. I just wanted to be with her, to be comforted by her, by her smell — by all the things that made her my mom.”

After battling cancer for a year, Jolyn passed away on April 18, 2005. Dahmen admits he never really processed any of it. “I was never really able to process … any of it. Not the first time they sat me down, or the second. Not her being sick. Not seeing her grow weak. Not her dying.” It’s impossible to fully understand how tough that was for him as a young kid. And even now, as an adult, Dahmen wishes he could tell his younger self something. “I wish I could tell him to just grieve, to just miss his mom. I wish I could tell him that it’s O.K to be sad.”

But even though he lost his best friend, Dahmen found her again in the place he loves most: golf.

Golf eternalised Joel Dahmen’s bond with his mother

“On the course, I found solace. I found my mom again.” The golf course isn’t a typical place for comfort, but for Dahmen, it became where he found his mom again. “I’d be in a fairway somewhere, alone in my thoughts — and I’d look up to the green, and I’d see her. She’d be off to the side, with a coffee mug or a notebook, smiling and watching me,” he recalled. At first, it freaked him out, but after a while, those moments felt like her way of watching over him, even after she was gone.

But, for years, the grief stayed unresolved. College life came and went, and Dahmen, still grieving, didn’t take his game seriously.“I didn’t do anything with it. I had no clue what I wanted out of life.” He dropped out of the University of Washington, and turned pro, but wasn’t aiming for the PGA Tour. He was living in the moment, not thinking about the future. Then, everything changed.

Dahmen found a lump in his testicles. He was then diagnosed with Testicular Cancer, and even at that moment, he just wanted his mun. It was a wake-up call, reminding him of the fight his mom had gone through. As he went through chemotherapy, he began to understand the fear she must have felt. “Yeah, Joel, you got dealt a bad hand. You’re 23 and you have cancer. It sucks. But you’re going to beat this and you’re going to make something out of your life,” he said to himself.

That’s when things clicked. “Some of my talent was a gift from above, yes — but it was also a gift from my dad, my mom. They gave me this chance.” He realized he was wasting it and started taking golf seriously again.

Dahmen knows that eventually, the visions of his mom on the course will start to fade, but her presence will always be with him. Her memory might not be as sharp, but the sense of pride and support she gave him will never go away. It’s no longer about the trophies—it’s about living in a way that would make her proud.