The Grief That Comes Back for You

My kids showed me a photo.

 

They were all gathered around his bed.

 

He’s at home. In a hospital bed set up in the middle of everything that used to be normal life.

 

And there he was.

 

My first husband.

 

The father of my children.

 

The man I haven’t been married to in 48 years.

 

He looked so… gaunt.

 

Frail in a way that didn’t seem possible for someone who used to feel so solid in my memory. His face was sharper. His body smaller somehow. Like life had been slowly taking pieces of him, and I hadn’t been there to see it happen.

 

And I thought I would feel… removed.

 

Distant.

 

Like that part of my life was so far behind me it couldn’t really reach me anymore.

 

But I lost it.

 

Not in a quiet, composed way.

 

I mean lost it.

 

Because the second I saw him like that—

 

I didn’t just see the man he is now.

 

I saw the boy I fell in love with.

 

The Card That Found Me: Six of Cups

 

I pulled a card later.

 

I wasn’t even asking anything specific.

 

Just… trying to understand why it hit me like that.

 

Six of Cups.

 

Of course.

 

Not just memory.

 

Not nostalgia in the way people talk about it—soft, filtered, almost sweet.

 

This was different.

 

This was the kind of memory that moves through your body.

 

The kind that doesn’t stay where it belongs.

 

Because I wasn’t just remembering him.

 

I was feeling us.

 

And underneath that—

 

I was feeling her.

 

It Wasn’t Just Him

I wasn’t just grieving him.

 

I was grieving the girl I was when I loved him.

 

So open.

 

So certain that love was enough.

 

She didn’t know how it would end.

 

She didn’t know what it would cost her.

 

And when it did end—

 

it broke something in her.

 

Not loudly.

 

But permanently.

 

She’s still in me.

 

Quiet.

 

Until something wakes her up again.

 

The Space I’m Sitting In: Death

 

He’s not gone yet.

 

But he’s going.

 

And that grief starts early.

 

Before anything actually ends.

 

That slow, quiet unraveling.

 

That’s what Death feels like.

 

Not dramatic.

 

Just inevitable.

 

And you’re sitting in it while it happens.

 

What Healing Feels Like: The Star

 

Healing isn’t clean.

 

It isn’t finished.

 

It’s softer.

 

Like I can hold this now without it breaking me.

 

And maybe that’s enough.

 

Three Things I’m Holding Onto

 

Six of Cups — This isn’t just the past

 

Death — This in-between space is real

 

The Star — Softening is enough

 

There’s a version of me that loved him first.

 

And she’s still here.

 

And maybe this moment…

 

isn’t just about losing him.

 

Maybe it’s about remembering her.