🌤️ WEEK 10 — Learning to Live Again: My First Year Without Zack (2021–2022)

Healing Journey Series — From Darkness to Light

There are parts of grief no one prepares you for — the long, quiet months after the funeral, after the shock fades, and after the world moves on while you’re still standing in the same shattered place.

The first year without Zack was nothing short of survival.

It wasn’t healing.

It wasn’t acceptance.

It was learning how to exist in a life that no longer felt like mine.

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⚪ Life Felt Like an Empty Shell

Waking up without him didn’t feel real.

Every morning, it took a few seconds for my mind to remember:

“He’s gone.”

And every day, it felt like losing him all over again.

Eating felt forced.

Sleeping felt impossible.

Being around other people felt too loud.

Being alone felt too quiet.

Grief is strange — it makes you want company and isolation at the same time.

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⚪ The Pain That Shows Up in Everyday Moments

People think the hardest part is the big days —

birthdays, holidays, anniversaries.

But it’s the ordinary, unexpected moments that rip you open:

• Passing a store, he liked

• Hearing a song, he used to play

• Cooking something he enjoyed

• Seeing someone on a motorcycle

• The passenger seatbelt alert going off

• Driving through an area where he once shared a memory

• Watching a mother laugh with her son

• Seeing an empty chair at the table

Those were the moments that knocked the wind out of me.

The world kept going.

My life felt paused.

But grief kept moving through me every single day.

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⚪ Trying to Function When Nothing Made Sense

I went through the motions of life:

• working

• cleaning

• grocery shopping

• paying bills

All the normal things.

But none of it felt normal.

I wasn’t fully in my body.

I wasn’t fully in my mind.

Some days I felt numb.

Other days I felt everything too strongly.

And some days, the only thing I could do was sit and breathe.

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⚪ The People You Learn About in Grief

During this period, you learn who the true people in your life are.

You learn who was meant to stay.

You learn who was meant to leave.

Grief reveals people’s true colors.

Some show up quietly and consistently.

Some disappear.

Some surprise you.

Some hurt you.

And some simply cannot meet you in this kind of pain.

It can be a lonely road.

Not only because you lost someone you love —

but because you begin to see relationships differently.

You learn about all kinds of relationships:

• who can sit with discomfort

• who needs you to stay strong for them

• who makes space for your grief

• who avoids it

• who loves you in action, not words

I didn’t just grieve Zack.

I also grieved versions of people I thought would be there.

That was another layer of loss I didn’t expect.

But it taught me something important:

Not everyone is capable of walking beside someone in deep grief.

And that isn’t always about cruelty.

Sometimes it’s about capacity.

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⚪ The Tools That Held Me Together

My healing practices became the only structure I had:

🌿 Grounding — the same instinct that saved my life

✨ Breathwork — to keep panic from shutting me down

🙏 Faith — the only thing stronger than the pain

🤍 Feeling my emotions — even when they scared me

🧘‍♀️ Honoring my body — resting when I had to

✨ Talking to Zack — because the bond didn’t end

These tools didn’t take the pain away.

But they gave me a way to survive it.

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⚪ Being Met When I Couldn’t Carry It Alone

In the months that followed, I found support in unexpected places.

A priest met me where I was — without judgment, without urgency, and without telling me to come back another day. He understood that grief doesn’t live on a schedule, and that sometimes survival is the only prayer a person has.

He helped me make room for anger, questions, and a relationship with God that belonged to me — not one shaped by fear or obligation. That support didn’t remove the pain, but it helped me learn how to stay present inside it.

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⚪ Finding Others Who Spoke the Same Language

Another lifeline during that first year was a healing support group for parents who had lost a child.

Being in a room — or a shared space — with others who truly understood this kind of loss changed everything. There was no need to explain the pain, the confusion, or the way grief comes in waves. Everyone there spoke the same language of love and loss.

That group reminded me I wasn’t alone in this world, even when grief tried to convince me I was. It gave me permission to grieve openly, to listen, to share when I could, and to simply exist on the days words weren’t available.

Community didn’t take the pain away.

But it made the weight more bearable.

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⚪ Understanding Trauma Helped Me Survive It

Because of my psychology background, I understood what grief was doing inside my body.

I knew:

• the shock response

• panic surges

• emotional numbness

• anger

• dissociation

• exhaustion

• intrusive memories

were all normal reactions.

Knowing this didn’t make it easier —

but it made me feel less “broken.”

I wasn’t failing.

My nervous system was trying to protect me.

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⚪ Moments When I Felt Zack

Even through the heartbreak, I felt him.

Not in a dramatic way —

but in quiet moments:

• a breeze at the right time

• a song that played when I needed it

• a thought that softened the fear

• a feeling of warmth in the darkest nights

There were times I smelled his cigarette smoke in the house —

even though he never smoked inside, only in the garage.

There were moments I felt his presence beside me.

Times he came to me in dreams to let me know he was okay.

He spoke my language when it came to the other side.

He knew I would understand.

It wasn’t imagination.

It wasn’t coincidence.

It was connection.

Losing a child doesn’t end the relationship.

It changes it.

He was still with me —

just differently.

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⚪ Still a Mother, Even in Grief

When a parent loses a child, we often hear:

“Get over it.”

As if life were that simple.

But I wasn’t just Zack’s mother.

I still am Zack’s mother.

And I am also a mother to another son who is alive.

In the months after Zack’s death, I didn’t know how to be both.

Even though Bryan was an adult, my fear wrapped itself around him.

The calls became more frequent.

The texts became constant.

I worried about him in ways I never had before.

That’s what losing a son did to me.

It didn’t just break my heart.

It rewired my nervous system.

Panic attacks became worse.

Not because I feared death —

but because I now knew what death feels like.

Not abstract.

Not theoretical.

But lived.

One of the hardest truths I faced was this:

I am still Zack’s mother.

Even without his physical presence.

Even with the pain.

Love doesn’t disappear.

It transforms.

And motherhood doesn’t end.

It becomes spiritual.

That realization became one of the first steps toward rebuilding myself.

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⚪ The Shift Toward Rebuilding

I didn’t wake up one day magically healing.

There was no “aha moment.”

But slowly — very slowly — I started noticing small things:

• A moment where I didn’t cry

• A breath that didn’t hurt

• A sunrise that felt comforting

• A day where I felt a little stronger

• A smile I didn’t have to force

• A memory of him that felt warm, not crushing

Even years later, grief still finds me.

There are moments when it hits without warning —

when I cry,

get angry,

feel sad,

feel the ache deeply,

and let it move through me.

And yes — sometimes guilt shows up when joy shows up.

That’s real.

I try my hardest not to let it take over.

I remind myself that I am grateful to be alive,

while many didn’t make it.

That is one of the ways I honor Zack.

I don’t try to stay there,

and I don’t let guilt take over when joy appears.

I let both exist —

sending love to Zack while continuing to live.

These moments didn’t replace the pain.

They existed alongside it.

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💫 Takeaway:

The first year without Zack didn’t make me stronger.

It didn’t heal me.

It didn’t “fix” anything.

But it taught me how to live again — in a different way.

Slowly, painfully, gently — one breath at a time.

It taught me that grief and love walk together.

That just because someone is no longer here physically,

doesn’t mean they no longer exist.

They are still remembered.

They are still loved.

They are still part of us.

And that I can keep moving,

not because the pain fades,

but because I am continuously learning,

day by day,

how to live through it —

and how to live with it.

Because grief can, at any time, pull a person under

if they don’t learn, again and again,

how to make it through the darkest days.

Because there are still dark days.

And because the love remains.