Tag Archives: grief

Destinations, Grief

Place-Anchored Grief: Returning Home

2 Comments
sunset at the fort in st augustine place-anchored grief

(Note) *Place-anchored grief is when grief is tied to a place. Deferred grief is exactly what it sounds like. I wanted to give these contexts before continuing.

A Healing Holiday

The holidays have come and gone. I just arrived back at the apartment after two and a half weeks away. Two of those weeks were spent in Florida. It wasn’t the trip I expected, but it was healing in its own way. What I didn’t expect was how I felt while I was gone versus how I feel now that I’m back. I expected to move through the trauma and grief feelings of the past few months, and I thought I had.

What’s strange is that while I was gone, I barely cried over Greg or Eric. Once, maybe — when I was really drunk and alone, and the weight hit too hard. But otherwise, the grief stayed quiet. The trauma had minimal impact. I could talk to strangers about both of them and feel it without drowning in it. I didn’t expect that.

A New Kind of Grief: Place-Anchored

Now that I’m back, it feels like I’ve been dropped straight back into October when the trauma first happened. I’m learning this is called Place-Anchored and Defered Grief, and it’s hitting me different.

It’s the new year, almost the middle of January. Suddenly, I’m immersed in memories of Greg, our time together, and losing him in such a tragic way. Not in a reflective way. In a physical way. Like my body remembers before my mind can catch up. It feels like hitting a wall I didn’t know was still standing. A weight I don’t know how to lift.

I think the grief waited here.

While I was away, the grief and memories of all my loss and trauma softened. Not because it was gone, but because I was gone. Distance gave me space to breathe. My nervous system finally exhaled. But this apartment holds everything from my past three-plus-year relationship. Every piece of furniture. Every object. Where we placed things. How we used them. Nothing here is neutral.

Everything was a mutual decision.

That realization hit me today. Greg will always be here because we built this space together. I will always feel his presence as long as I’m here. Right now, I don’t know if that’s a comfort or a burden. Maybe it’s both.

The Unexpected Comfort

There’s something strange about being thrown back into a grief you thought you had moved through. It doesn’t feel like I am going backward. It feels like there is unfinished business. Like the grief was deferred, waiting for the place where it was born to pick up where I left off.

I just want to sit with it.

There is comfort in this ache, even as it hurts. This space knows everything. It knows the life we were building. It remembers even when I can’t hold it all at once. And maybe that’s why it feels so heavy — because it’s holding too much for me, too much of me.

I don’t know yet what comes next. I don’t know if staying here will help me heal or keep me tethered. I’m not ready to decide that.

For now, I’m allowing the grief to exist where it belongs. I’m letting this place speak. I’m letting myself feel what waited for me to return.

Thanks for reading — xxooC

anchored-grief me on a boat in florida
Grief, Thoughts and Notes

Alone But Not Abandoned

Leave a comment

Releasing Control

I worked a white magic spell a few days ago. Nothing dramatic. No expectation that it would fix anything. Just an intention to release what I can not control and find peace in that knowing.

I didn’t expect much to come from it, especially this soon. But yesterday and today have been the most peaceful days I’ve had in the many weeks since Greg left.

That doesn’t mean I don’t miss him. I do, every day. I miss his presence. His energy. I miss my person and the home we were building together over the last three plus years. I miss the life I thought we still had time to grow into. That grief is still here. It hasn’t disappeared at all. It probably never will.

But something is different.

Solitude and Silence Reframed

I’m learning to embrace the solitude and the silence instead of fighting them. To welcome them as friends, not foes. And that feels strange to admit, because for a long time, silence terrified me. The trauma of Eric, the PTSD, the anxiety that followed. Being alone felt like a punishment. Something I was trying to outrun.

There was a time not long ago when I wanted this. When I wished for quiet. For independence. For space to breathe without managing someone else’s pain alongside my own. I didn’t choose how I got here, but here I am.

Eric is proud of me. I know that in my soul. He always believed in my strength more than I did. I am caring for myself and for Odin and Freija on my own. All while managing a life that feels impossibly heavy some days. And he would smile, quietly, the way he used to when he knew I was doing something hard and necessary.

I am surviving.

Independence Without Isolation

Not just existing. Surviving. I’m showing up for myself. I’m engaging with friends and family instead of disappearing, which I got so good at the first time around. I’m letting people check in. I’m allowing myself to be cared for without feeling like it erases my independence.

I still miss both of them. I always will. I miss being a “we.” I miss the shared moments, the inside jokes, the energy of another person in this space. But I’m also learning that I can hold that grief without it swallowing me whole.

There is pride here, too. Quiet pride. The kind that feels almost wrong to name, but deserves acknowledgement. I am doing this. Alone, but not abandoned. Independent, but not isolated.

The Truth

This peace may not last. I know that. Grief is not linear, and nights are still hard. But it exists right now, and that matters. I’m allowing myself to sit inside it without questioning how long it will stay.

For now, that is enough.

Thanks for reading –xxooC

Grief, Thoughts and Notes

The Ritual of Letting Go and Keeping What Matters

Leave a comment

Coming Home to a Space That Feels Different Now

I came home yesterday and walked into my apartment. It felt different. Not better or worse, just heavier in some places and strangely calm in others. Like the walls remembered what happened here and were waiting for me to say something about it. I kept grounding myself by repeating, in my head, that this is my home now. It all still feels shared with ghosts, echoes, and memories that don’t quite know where to sit.

And then I opened the closet.

Touching His Things for the First Time

For months, that door held its own weight. I didn’t realize how much it represented until I was standing in front of it, staring at his clothes. My body remembered how many times he emptied it during those spiraling nights. How fast things moved, how loud everything felt. Every shirt and pair of pants felt like a landmine wired to some memory I wasn’t sure I could survive touching.

But yesterday, I touched them anyway.

Sorting, Touching, Choosing

I started moving his clothes into bags, one slow piece at a time. My hands shook a little. My breath caught at moments I didn’t expect. It felt like grief and relief and guilt and peace all tangled in the same knot. I kept thinking: letting go isn’t the same thing as throwing him away. It isn’t betrayal. It’s protection and self-preservation. It’s making sure my heart has room to keep beating.

I kept a few things. A sweatshirt, a couple of pairs of lounge pants — the soft stuff that still feels like comfort instead of chaos. I don’t know what will happen to them. They’re not shrines. They’re just pieces of the past that don’t hurt to hold.

Everything else… was put away.

What Gets Put Away, What Gets Let Go

I took down the artwork that was “us.” I rolled up the rug and moved the futon he brought into this space. Slowly, quietly, I started packing things into storage. I didn’t have a dramatic moment about it — just this steady realization that my apartment doesn’t need to be a museum to a relationship that broke under the weight of its own storms.

And something shifted.

As soon as I moved my own coats into the closet, I felt it: a strange, tender peace. Sad, yes. Heavy, yes. But also… clearer. Like some part of me had been holding my breath for months and didn’t know it until now. I stood in that room, and it finally felt like mine again. Not all the way, but enough.

Wanting to Stay, Wanting to Leave

There’s still confusion, of course. Part of me wants to stay in this home another year because it’s familiar and safe. Another part wants to flee the moment my lease ends because everything here is haunted. I’m trying to let that be okay — the not-knowing—the living in two truths at once.

Because that’s what letting go looks like right now.

What Letting Go Really Means

Not erasing him.

Not pretending he didn’t matter.

Just giving myself the space to grieve and breathe without drowning.

Yesterday was painful and sacred. It wasn’t a purge, a cleansing, or a revelation. It was just me. With my hands and my memories. Somehow, I managed the courage to take the next small step. A step into a world I didn’t choose. My home is changing shape. I like to think I am, too. And this slow, intentional releasing of things and energy is the closest thing to healing I’ve felt in a long time.

Thanks for reading –xxooC

rituals of letting go
rituals of letting go, our christmas tree from 2024
rituals of letting go our stockings from 2024
Grief, Thoughts and Notes, Uncategorized

When Home Isn’t a Place Anymore

Leave a comment

This morning, I walked through my daughter’s house and caught glimpses of my late husband Eric in photos. Pictures of him, frozen in time. It’s strange how someone who was once my entire world can now feel so far away, like he belongs to another version of me I can barely access. Another lifetime. Another self.

There was a time when seeing his face in a photo could split me wide open. Now it barely moves the needle. And that feels like a betrayal, even though I know it isn’t. I know this is what time does. I know he would understand. He always understood everything about me before I ever had to say a word.

He was my partner, my home, my biggest cheerleader in life, for 23 years. He knew me in ways no one ever had before, and maybe ever will again. But that part of my story feels dim right now, not gone, just buried under something heavier.

Because then came another.

Greg… he opened my heart but in a different way. He was the love of my life in this chapter. He was my twin flame, and it was hard for me to admit at first. This was the kind of love that makes the rest of the world feel blurry. We had our chaos, our plans, our morning hopes. We had our laughter, our softness, and a future we kept building even while the ground beneath him was crumbling.

Losing him has rearranged something inside me.

It’s the kind of grief that overshadows every room you walk into.

It’s the grief that doesn’t ask permission.

Sometimes I can’t even feel my old life because this pain is too loud, too present, too immediate. It isn’t fair, but it’s the truth. And I guess the heart can only hold the fire that’s burning hottest.

I keep thinking about this idea of home.

Because home used to be a person.

Twice.

And now both of those people are gone, and I’m here trying to figure out where I live inside myself.

I miss the security of being known so deeply.

I miss being understood without explaining.

I miss having someone to come back to at the end of the day, someone who felt like mine and who saw me as theirs.

Today I’m sitting alone in the quiet house after everyone left for work and school, and I’m realizing this:

My grief today isn’t really about losing either of them.

It’s about losing the version of me who existed when I still had a home in someone else.

Maybe one day the memories of Eric will soften and return.

Maybe one day the pain of losing Greg won’t crush my chest.

Maybe one day “home” will be something I feel inside myself, instead of something I chase outside of me.

But today, in this exact moment, I’m just a woman. Alone in the quiet, learning how to occupy my own life again.

Learning how to breathe through the emptiness.

Learning how to be here without the people who once held my world together.

It’s raw, and it’s real, and it hurts.

But I’m still here.

Thanks for reading –xxooC

me hiking in colorado
Journal Entry

Living Minute by Minute: How Grief Rearranges Time

2 Comments

Journal Entry

I made it to Kentucky yesterday, and for the first time in weeks, I feel like I’m sitting inside a tiny bubble where I don’t have to carry everything. I don’t have Odin and Freija depending on me. I’m not surrounded by reminders or tasks or the weight of an apartment that feels too big and too quiet. I’m here in a space that has always held me gently, and I can feel myself breathing again in a way I haven’t since the moment everything collapsed.

It’s strange how grief rearranges time.

Before Greg died, I was always thinking ahead — planning the weekend, the next trip, the next move, the life we wanted by the water. Now I can barely see past the next hour. My world has shrunk down to the smallest increments: wake up, breathe, take a shower, sit still, cry, drink coffee, breathe again. It’s not weakness. It’s survival.

I’ve talked a lot since I got here. Cried a lot too. But something is shifting in me. I’m not angry anymore — not the sharp, chaotic anger that used to rip through me. If anything, I’m angry at the circumstances… at the weight I’m carrying… at the reality he left behind. But him? No. His darkness was bigger than either of us. I see that now. I wasn’t meant to save him. I couldn’t have. His mind spiraled into a place I couldn’t reach, and he slipped away.

The sadness is quieter now, but deeper.

I keep thinking about the life we were building — not just our life, but mine and his. Two separate lives woven together with plans and dreams and all the little rituals that made us feel like a team. He always said I would thrive without him, and I hated hearing that because I believed I needed him. Now it’s just me. And I have to carry on with the pieces I still have.

I wish I had understood everything better. I wish I had recognized the signs sooner. Not out of guilt — I don’t blame myself — but out of sadness. For us. For everything we could have been if his mind weren’t fighting him every day. I’ll always carry him softly in my heart. He’ll always have an imprint on my soul. But the future we planned together died with him, and now I’m standing in this strange place of rebuilding a life I never wanted to live alone.

I know I’m on some kind of path. I can feel it even if I can’t see it. Right now, I’m just living moment to moment, because that’s all I have the capacity for. The future is too big and too blurry to look at. Maybe one day I’ll be able to picture it again. Maybe not. But for now, the minutes are enough.

Sometimes healing looks like doing nothing but existing in the safest place you can find.

Sometimes that’s all you can do.

And right now… that’s where I am.

Journal Entry

The Hole That Was You

1 Comment

Journal Entry

I hate that you gave up on life.

It hurts so badly, all the time.

There are these tiny moments — little flickers — where I forget that you’re really gone. Gone gone.

And in those brief moments, I feel almost whole again, like the world hasn’t shattered and left me standing in the ruins…again.

I know you didn’t mean to knock the wind out of me a second time, but you did.

You didn’t mean to leave me with all of this.

I’m sitting here in the hole that was you —

now responsible for everything you left, and everything I already had:

Odin, Freija, this apartment, this life that keeps moving forward without your love, without your presence, without your support.

The train still goes by as if nothing has changed.

But everything has.

We’ve gone from four souls to three in this “home” we created, and all of us are trying to adjust in our own ways. Odin curls into me because he feels the shift. Freija pretends the world is steady. And I… I’m just trying to survive inside a reality I never wanted.

Just know that we loved you. We still love you and we still look for you.

And we will keep loving you long after you’re gone.

We’ll miss the laughter, the dancing, the playfulnest, the lazy days spent with all of us snuggled on the bed, the little adventures, the quiet, meaningful mornings, the feeling of belonging to someone who felt like home.

We’ll miss it all for the rest of our days.

Reflection

Grief keeps teaching me that love doesn’t end just because a life does. The pain I feel isn’t proof that something is wrong with me — it’s proof that something mattered. That he mattered. That the life we built, the routines we shared, the future we dreamed of, all had weight and meaning.

In these moments of writing, I’m learning to let myself speak without polishing, without shrinking the truth. I’m learning that mourning isn’t linear, dignified, or clean. It’s jagged and contradictory. It’s loving someone and resenting them in the same breath. Missing the moments that made life feel soft, while trying to survive the ones that broke me open.

I’m beginning to see that healing isn’t about replacing what I’ve lost — it’s about creating space inside myself to carry it. A quieter space, maybe. A gentler one. A space where anger and love can coexist, where memory doesn’t have to be tidy to be sacred.

And even in the ache, even in the absence, there is still some part of me whispering: I’m still here.

That has to be enough for today.

Thanks for reading –xxooC

Journal Entry

The Part That Stayed

1 Comment

Journal Entry

I have so much anger and rage. I hate you for making me go through this again. All you had to do was come home or call me to pick you up. That was it. What was so bad that you had to leave me like this?

I love you, and now I hate you. The trauma bond is the worst part because not only am I grieving you being gone — because you were my morning, my afternoon, and my sunset — but I’m grieving the emotional tether we shared when things were bad. Even then, we still had each other. Now I have nothing.

I was so good without you in the aftermath of the first loss. You helped me believe again, and then you accused me of making you dependent on me. But we were dependent on each other — we knew that, we acknowledged it, and we accepted it. And then you left me.

I learned so much about him because of you. You showed me around your hometown and filled in the pieces of his story — the childhood memories, the places, the things he couldn’t tell me himself. Through you, I felt closer to him. You were my comfort in the painful absence of what was my former life. You filled in the gaps I couldn’t fill on my own — the ones I didn’t even know I still needed. And now, all of that is gone too. There is no more. I grieve it all, every bit of it. All at once, it’s all-consuming.

Reflection:

Love can be both the wound and the salve — and in that contradiction, I am learning to breathe again. Some pieces of love remain, even when the person doesn’t.

Mantra:

I am still here.

I am still Love.

I am still Becoming.

Grief, Thoughts and Notes

When One Loss Reopens Another

1 Comment

Layered grief is what happens when one loss sits on top of another—when old wounds are reopened by new pain, and the lines between them blur. It’s not just mourning one person. It’s mourning the parts of yourself that each loss took away.

Until this past week, I wasn’t familiar with the term. While some of the emotions and thoughts feel familiar, others are entirely new. Through therapy, I’ve come to understand what “layered grief” means, and now I can see it written all over my days. I knew pieces of Eric would resurface, but I wasn’t prepared for how deeply it would shake me.

Since Greg left, I’ve found myself struggling to look at photos of Eric. I almost can’t. It’s not because I don’t want to, or because the love or memories have faded. I believe my mind and body can only process one unbearable absence at a time. This new trauma has reactivated all the old pain, but it has also numbed parts of it. My system is overloaded. It feels like my grief has stacked itself in layers I can’t separate—one beneath the other, one heartbreak pressing into the next.

With Greg, the shock is still raw, still in motion. My body hasn’t yet caught up to the truth. But Eric’s loss was already scarred over—tender, but survivable—until now. Looking at him brings back the entire first collapse, and my heart can’t hold both at once. So, for now, I don’t look. Not because I’ve forgotten, but because I remember too much.

Reflection:
Layered grief isn’t just revisiting the past—it’s reliving it, all at once. The pain compounds, the memories intertwine, and healing becomes less about progress and more about endurance.

Mantra:
I am carrying more than one loss, and it’s okay if I can only hold one at a time.

Thanks for reading. –xxooC

Greg and Eric
Me with Greg and Eric

Grief, Thoughts and Notes

Existing in the Echo

Leave a comment

Living In the Space We Shared

It wasn’t something I could do with Eric. After he died, I packed up my things and had everything else boxed and stored. Then I took off on a journey that lasted more than two years. I didn’t have the strength to stay in the same space we shared. Every wall, every room, every item breathed his memory back into me, and I could barely breathe at all. Leaving was the only way I knew to survive.

But this time, I told myself I wouldn’t run. I wouldn’t make sudden decisions I might regret later. I promised myself I’d sit still and let this grief settle where it needed to, even if that meant letting it take root in the place Greg and I built together. Somehow, I have to live in our apartment. The life we shared lives in its corners — the art he made, the kitchen he claimed as his own, the furniture we picked out together. I walk through each room and feel him there, but it’s not the same as before. It’s quieter. The echo of us lingers, and I’m learning to exist within it.

Everything outside continues on just as before — the city hums, people hurry past, and life keeps moving as though nothing has changed. Only now, I feel the distinct separation of what life was before and what it is now, for me, Odin, and Freija. We lost Dad. His presence is still felt every day, only now it’s just me. I have to take care of myself and them, all alone, and that is extremely difficult sometimes. The apartment is now quieter and less lively. Joy is something we haven’t experienced much of since he left. Sometimes the silence is deafening, and I think about running, but I know that road and I’m not ready to take it yet.

For now, I exist here -in the echo, in the in-between. Somewhere between what was and what will be. There’s a strange comfort in the stillness, even when it hurts. Sometimes I catch a flicker of him in the corner of my eye, a small reminder that love doesn’t disappear, it just changes shape. The echo isn’t just the sound of what’s gone; it’s the pulse of what remains. Maybe this is what surviving looks like right now. Learning to breathe in the quiet, to coexist with absence, and to trust that one day, the echo won’t only sound like loss.

Me and greg existing in the echo
greg holding up freija with one hand existing in the echo
odin and freija in the hallways of the apt
my street corner
Grief, Thoughts and Notes, Uncategorized

Sedona Was Waiting

1 Comment
Home » grief

I woke up with an unusual heaviness this morning, not really understanding why. Then I looked at the calendar and remembered — this week was supposed to be our vacation.

We were just about to ask for time off when he left. On his phone, I found searches for “day trips in and around Sedona.” “Things to do in Arizona” was there, too. Quite a few pages were there. I didn’t dare click on any of them. That’s a secret I’m not ready to mourn.

I think about what fun this adventure would have been — packing up the kids, the drive, the playlists, the snack stops. We both loved road trips. The sightseeing and detours, stopping to see something special — that was Greg’s utmost joy. His family used to take detours on their trips when he was young, and that childlike excitement still lived in him when he talked about it. “It breaks up the trip, it’s just a few minutes, and it may be something you never see again.” He was so right. We had a few before and even I got excited about them now.

And then there was always the arrival. My anxiety would kick in as soon as we got there, my fear of the unknown, but Greg was steady. He would unpack, get us settled, and then take me somewhere to unwind. Navigating the unknown was his specialty.

I miss that already — the release, the freedom, the newness. I yearn for that sense of discovery, to be out of the city and exploring somewhere new. To come home with stories and memories we’d made together. We haven’t had a trip since March.

Now I’m mourning something that will not only not happen, but will never happen again. My timeline has changed yet again — abruptly, unexpectedly — and I’m not quite sure how to navigate what comes next.

We had talked about so many trips. Every trip we planned together still lives somewhere — in the space between what could have been and what remains. Maybe that’s where love goes when the body can’t follow.

Mantra for today:

I can still carry the love, even when the map has changed.

He always had this uncanny way of stepping into my photo frame. Not knowing if it was intentional or not. I would just wait until he walked off and take another photo. I always kept the one of him in it 🙂

new orleans photo bomb sedona is waiting
pit stop on a road trip sedona is waiting
balloon glow in louisville photo bomb sedona is waiting
cemetery in macon sedona is waiting
indiana dunes taking photos
Grief, Thoughts and Notes

Their Absence, My Presence

Leave a comment

Some mornings arrive differently — heavy, familiar, or impossibly quiet. Grief has a way of circling back, reminding me of all that’s been lost and all that somehow still remains. Today was one of those mornings.

This morning I woke with a heaviness in my chest and a sad heart. I remembered the last time we danced in the kitchen. It wasn’t that long ago. I can still hear the song, see his eyes soften for a moment, and everything else just fell away. For a second, we were just two people moving together — no pain, no chaos, no words needed. Just connection.

Now, I sit here with his phone in my hands, the same way I used to hold Eric’s. It’s strange how grief repeats itself, how the rituals have resurfaced—the checking, the scrolling, the need to still tend to something of them. Messages and notifications come through like echoes from another life. Each one is a reminder that time is passing, that the world still moves, even when mine feels as though it has stopped.

Eventually, the service will end. The number that once lit up the screen will just… disappear. The notifications, the emails, all of it — sent into a void, meant for someone who isn’t here anymore. Then, I’ll just turn it off. It hurts in a way that’s hard to put words to. It feels like another goodbye, another layer of letting go.

It’s bitter and sweet, this space I’m in. I still live in the echo — the ghost of a life that once felt so full. And yet, life keeps happening around me. People laugh, cars go by, the sun rises. Their absence is still my reality, but so is my presence. And I don’t know what to do with that most days.

But maybe that’s the work right now — to just keep existing in the space between. To carry their memory without being swallowed by it. To remember that even in all this loss, I’m still here. Breathing, feeling, remembering, existing.

Their absence. My presence. Both are true. Both still matter.

Grief doesn’t fade on a schedule. It loops, it resurfaces, and it softens only when it’s ready. But in that looping, there’s a quiet kind of survival — the proof that we keep waking up, even when it hurts.

Today’s Mantra for Presence Through Loss
What is gone shapes what remains.
What remains is love.
What remains is breath.
What remains is me.
I am still here.

me holding odin's paw
Journal Entry

Liminal Space

Leave a comment

Journal Entry — Nov 3rd, 2025

Our souls connected in a time and place when I was lost. I didn’t know what I wanted or where I was headed. I only knew that I couldn’t continue on the path I was on. Then Greg came into my life and showed me something different—something that felt stable, something that felt like home. Feelings I thought were lost and I would never be able to recapture.

Our time together was often tumultuous. There were times that were unbearable for both of us. But one truth was clear, we always sought comfort in one another. In the quiet discussions of the morning coffees, eating together, or just sitting, I now look back and I think he brought me through a liminal space—an in-between world. One I was stuck in but wasn’t meant to stay in forever. A space I had to pass through. Maybe he wasn’t meant to stay either.

There was such duality in him. The person I saw was so full of hope and life, yet he was also self-loathing and chaotic. He was joy and pain all at once. When things were still and quiet, I could see the gentleness in his heart. I think I fell in love with that version of him—the one who dreamed, who believed we could rebuild something beautiful out of all our brokenness.

Through him, I learned how to live again. All that I had learned before—especially through losing Eric—didn’t prepare me for saying goodbye to Greg in the way I had to. But even in the tragedy, there were gifts. He reminded me how to smile again. How to feel wanted. How to dance in the living room and not care who was watching. He showed me that life doesn’t always need to be so serious, and that sometimes, if we just let go, we can still find small miracles waiting for us in unexpected places.

I meant it when I told him he brought me back to life. He did. And while I wish, down to my broken core, that it hadn’t ended this way, I’m still here. I’m learning that the love, the laughter, and even the chaos all became part of my story. They live in me now, just like the parts of Eric that never left.

Maybe Greg’s purpose was to help me bridge the gap between who I was after losing Eric and who I’m still becoming. Maybe he and I met to help each other remember that love, no matter how fragile or fleeting, can still change us in the deepest of ways.

*Note: I’ve always been a huge proponent of affirmations. I now use them daily to ground, remind myself I’m still here, and to just get me through the pain.

Closing Reflection & Affirmation

I honor the love that was, the lessons that came, and the parts of myself I found through it all.
Both Eric and Greg touched my life in ways that shaped who I am today — and even though their absence feels unbearable at times, the love remains.
It lives in my heart, in the way I care for others, in the way I keep choosing to breathe, to move, to feel.

I am still here.
I am still learning.
And even in this space of grief, I am growing roots again.

Today, I will let myself rest in the truth that I have survived love and loss before, and I will again.
I carry their memory with gratitude, not a weight, but as a quiet light guiding me toward peace.

Thanks for reading. I love you all –xxooC