So much has occurred since I last wrote, yet, it seems like yesterday I received the gut wrenching call that Travis was missing. During the past 2.10 years, my children, our families and I have learned much about grief and unexpected loss.

Our society is broken in the way it deals with grief.

Travis’s death revealed an entirely different world.

At the time that each of us most needed love and support, each one of us felt abandoned, alone, misunderstood,  and judged.

Like many grieving people, we stop talking about our pain to family and friends, for it was easier to pretend that everything was fine.

Grief and loss happen to EVERYONE.

No words or actions can ever make it right.

Grief is looked at as something to fix or overcome, in reality, its something to support and walk with.

Grief is not a disorder- its our natural response to deep loss and love.

We need to talk about grief, instead of shunning it and rushing it.

I’ve been a person who’s unable to eat (or eat too much), unable to leave the house for just a minute, unable to purchase groceries, unable to make a simple decision, unable to sleep.

Instead of “solving” the pain, we need to “tend” to the pain.

GRIEF SUCKS, IT IS AS BAD AS WE THINK IT IS

What has happened cannot be changed, cannot be made right.

What is lost cannot be restored.

We are in pain. IT CANT BE MADE BETTER.

The reality of grief is so different than what others see from outside. There is gut wrenching pain that no one can make better- no words or actions can fix.

We do not need solutions, we do not move on from our grief, we need someone to see it and acknowledge it.

Grief cannot be fixed- we walk with it, we carry it- ALWAYS.

EVERYTHING in our world is different now. EVERYTHING changed.

There is a hole within you, the world around you continues, your life was normal, now, nothing makes sense.

TIME HAS STOPPED, nothing seems real.

We hope for a different outcome, replaying the events over and over in our head.

The everyday world feels cruel and distant.

THERE IS NO PLACE THIS LOSS HAS NOT TOUCHED.

OUR LOSS IS EXACTLY AS BAD AS WE THINK IT IS.

GRIEF IS A PART OF LOVE- it’s a healthy response to LOVE.

Love and Grief are hard, excruciating and suffocating at times.

Others may think nothing has really changed, but your grief transports you to another entirely different world, you see everything differently.

This is pain that no one wants to talk about and no one wants to hear about.

Since we don’t talk about it, what is available falls short of what we need.

This is pain that is immovable and a part of our lives forever.

Our hearts get broken and they cant be fixed.

You are not “OK” and you might not ever be “OK”.

Whatever grief we are carrying, we need to acknowledge how bad and how hard this is, its suffocating, horrendous and unsurvivable.

WE MUST LIVE INSIDE OUR LOSS.

WE MUST LEARN TO CARRY WHAT CANNOT BE MIXED.

WE MUST LEARN TO SURVIVE- first- we must speak the truth- we can begin to talk about living with our grief, LIVING INSIDE THE GRIEF AND LOVE THAT REMAINS.