Rec | FOCUSING ON LOVE IN GRIEF

🤍

my mom passed away last year, and today would have been her 54th birthday so, i grabbed ice cream and i took it to the river. my mom and i used to get ice cream and eat it by the river a lot. my mom loved ice cream. chocolate ice cream. and she loved rivers. i also love rivers. they remind me of my mom. grieving is hard. and it’s hard every single day. but taking moments like this — to do things that my mom and i loved to do together — reminds me of how grief is just love with nowhere to go. today i’m basking in the love that my mom had for me, the love she had for ice cream, for rivers. and i’m sitting in how much i love her. a love that feels trapped inside me. buried. most days it feels like anger and despair and regret. but today i’m focusing on the love. how lucky i was to have a mom who made loving her so easy! happy birthday, mom. i love you immensely

@paiton

Feb 7, 2025

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@SubstanceEnjoyer

Thanks for sharing! My dad passed away end of 2020 and I still have to remind myself that he’s gone and that a lot of time has passed. Love is forever and I’m glad you can still channel it. Hope you have a wonderful anniversary.

Feb 8, 2025

@bigstrongguy

thank you for sharing her and your love with us. sending you so much love and remembering ❤️

Feb 8, 2025

@softshelled

This is really so beautiful, thank you very much for sharing with us. Sending you kind vibes. My Dad passed away almost two years ago now. Grief isn’t linear, and I’m still finding little reminders of him in the strangest (and funniest) places. My Mum is getting older, I’m scared honestly, we’re very close. She’s had some health issues and I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing. Not too sure on the concept of an afterlife, but, I don’t know, it feels like memories still permeate everything someone’s ever touched. I try to hold the thought with me that every vibration of energy that was a person is still a part of the life we continue to live. That every photon, every beam of light who’s path was changed by that person’s shape, or by the touch of their smile, and then raced off to the corners of the universe, with their paths forever changed by that person’s shape, will be a part of this universe, long after we’re all gone.

Feb 8, 2025

@royallmonarch

love that you have this ritual to hold her with you for a moment

Feb 7, 2025

@thenheturnedaround

🫂

Feb 7, 2025

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My heart goes out to you and your family, this kind of this is never easy and is generally pretty fucking terrible all around. I lost my mom in 2018 after a pretty prolonged and slow to cease battle with cancer. When she was in end-of-life care something small that helped her feel a bit better was trying to make the space as homey as possible. Lots of pictures, her favorite blanket, and a friend of hers even brought some large stuffed animals that lived on her bed. It was something small that helped in the immediate moment. I also echo everyone here saying to prepare for the grief but also prepare to sit with it for longer than you think you’ll need. I was only home for about a week after she passed before going back to school across the country, and not having my family/hometown network to grieve with really stunted and prolonged my healing process. Also a bit bleak, but my mom and I were able to have a sort of ”closing” convo where we said goodbyes, and she told me her wishes for me, etc. if you’re able, it was a really powerful conversation to have and something I hold close when I’m having a particularly hard grief day (which still happen 6 years out! All part of the process)💛

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May 24, 2024

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Tell your loved ones how you feel

It's been a week since my brother Jacob passed. He was the last person I expected to go—an extremely active cyclist, hiker, and traveler. We still don't know what exactly happened, but in a matter of only half an hour he went from making his breakfast to his heart stoping. So many of his traits I admired so much felt like things I lacked; he was disciplined, reliable, and energetic. He traveled the world and made friends across the whole globe, it seems. He was always adept at math, a subject I always struggled with. He was only 18 months my junior. I literally can't remember my life without Jacob in it. At some points in our childhood he felt like my shadow. Since we were homeschooled during the early years of my life we spent so much time together. I took that for granted, but now I'm so grateful for all the hours of fort building, hole digging, camping, biking, basketball, getting destroyed by him playing NBA Live and womping on him in Mortal Kombat. I really regret simply assuming he knew how much I loved him. We were brothers. We fought, argued, and teased each-other. He was such an appendage to my day-to-day that I didn't ever stop to tell him how dear he was to me, how proud I was of all he'd done, how grateful I was for all he contributed around the house and with the family, and how jealous I was of his fearlessness with change and travel. People ask how I'm holding up, and it's hard to answer because—all things considered— I am doing alright. The hardest times are when my brain and nervous system still haven't realized he's gone: hearing the creak of a door and expecting him to walk in after a bike ride—his cycling shoes clinking on the tile; learning some soccer news and wanting to text him about it; feeling eager to get his feedback on something I cooked. But the most difficult thing has been encountering the pity and sorrow people have shown toward me, because that somehow reveals the scope of the loss and the depth to which folks cared about him and care about me. Knowing we share some impacts of this loss breaks my heart. I so deeply appreciate all the offers of help and reaching out, and yet I have nothing to offer. I have nothing for which to ask. My brain just short-circuits. Perhaps the best thing you can do for me is to let your loved ones know how you feel. Find one person you have maybe taken for granted and share your love clearly so that they truly know how much you treasure them because they won't always be around.