The Weight of the Empty Couch:

There is a common misconception about grief—that it is a mountain you eventually summit, leaving the valley of sorrow behind for good. But anyone who has lost their "person" knows the truth. Don’t be fooled: the death of your spouse is not a season you pass through; it is a landscape you inhabit for the rest of your life.

For me, everything is a reminder of Keith. It’s in the way our son, Liam, giggles—a sound so familiar it catches my breath. It’s in the quiet stillness of a Saturday morning. I’ll walk into the family room, expecting to see the two of them huddled over a video game, lost in their own world. Instead, I find Liam playing alone, or worse, an empty couch. In those moments, the silence is deafening.

The Duality of "Normal"

Loss creates a strange, bifurcated existence. There are "normal" days now—days filled with the mundane rhythm of running errands, working, driving Liam to and from practice, and paying bills. I’ve reached a point where I no longer feel guilty for those days. I used to think that feeling okay was a betrayal of his memory, but I’ve learned that the terribleness of grief isn’t found in the act of living.

The true weight comes in the ambush. You’ll be fine for weeks, and then you’ll hear a specific song, catch a stray scent of his cologne, or simply catch a glimpse of someone with his stride. Suddenly, you are back at day one. Your hand feels empty, your heart breaks all over again, and warm tears fall before you can even process why.

When that gut-crushing pang of unimaginable loss hits, you realize the cruelest irony of losing a spouse: the one person who could always comfort you is the very person you are mourning. There is no magic word or quick fix.

In those moments, the only thing you can do is gut your way through it. You hold on until the sharpest edges of the pain ease, eventually distracting yourself with meaningless chores or hobbies just to keep your hands busy.

Carrying the Pieces

The grief doesn't end, and it doesn't leave. You simply get better at putting the pieces of your shattered world back together. You learn how to shift the weight. The loss doesn’t necessarily get smaller, but you get stronger, and carrying it becomes just a bit less heavy every day.

Obviously, I'm having a bad day. I hope it passes soon.