What Grief Revealed About My Heart (Continuing to Learn to Trust God After Loss)
This March caught me off guard.
Not just because it felt heavy, but because of what God began to show me in the middle of it.
The emotions, the memories, the fatigue are often things that show up during a heavy season.
What I didn’t expect was what was underneath it.
As the month unfolded, I found myself holding my family a little tighter than usual.
My husband.
My kids.
There was this fear of uncertainty I hadn’t fully acknowledged before.
And little by little, God began to bring it into the light.
I realized that I’m still holding onto them.
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Why Grief Feels Heavier in Certain Seasons (When Your Body Remembers)
This has been a long winter.
And if you live in New England, you know how it can feel like it will never end. The gray days stretch on, the cold lingers, and you start to wonder if spring will ever actually come.
But for me, March has felt heavy in a different way.
For a while, I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. I would just notice it—feeling off, more emotional, more tired, a little foggy. Like I was carrying something I couldn’t fully name.
Until I remembered.
Eighteen years ago, Jon spent the entire month of March in the hospital, going through intense cancer treatments. Every day was long. Uncertain. Heavy with decisions and fear.
One year later, March came again—and this time, he was getting sicker and sicker, and we didn’t know why. There were no clear answers, just a slow decline that didn’t make sense. And no matter what the doctors did, he kept getting worse.
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The Endless To-Do List
Lately, I’ve been in what I like to call “solving mode” — constantly tweaking my schedule, trying new systems, and chasing that elusive balance. It seems like every time I finally get into a good rhythm… something happens to derail it.
And then the stress hits — not because I’m lazy or unmotivated, but because my to-do list is (if I’m honest) completely unreasonable. Every time I look at it, I can feel the weight settle in my chest, knowing I’ll never accomplish everything I’ve written down. So why do I keep adding more?
I think there are a few reasons.
Sometimes, it’s because I don’t want to forget something I’d like to do “someday.” Other times, it’s because I love the idea of a project — even if I know deep down I’ll probably never get around to it. But if I’m really honest, the biggest reason is that I’ve bought into what our culture keeps shouting: that my worth is tied to how much I do.
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One of the hardest parts of sending my kids off to college—especially when they’re nearly 900 miles away—is not being able to be there for the little things. I can’t bring them home when life feels overwhelming, and I can’t drop by with soup when they’re sick. But over the past few years, I’ve found some practical ways to stay connected and care for them, even from a distance.
Here are a few things that have made a difference for us:
Handwritten notes and care packages. College students love mail! In an age of texts and emails, a letter in their mailbox is special. Care packages with snacks, small gifts, or even inside jokes always brightened my kids’ days.
Supplements for their health. Cafeteria food isn’t always the most nutritious. Making sure they had vitamins and supplements gave me peace of mind that they were supporting their health in the gaps.
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Back to school happened about a month ago for us. Many of you have already made this transition, and some of you may even be sending your child to college for the very first time. Since this is my fifth year of sending one or both of my kids to Cedarville University in Ohio—nearly 900 miles away—I thought I’d share what I’ve learned about supporting them from afar.
I won’t sugarcoat it: leaving them there was hard on my heart. I knew it was where God wanted them, but supporting them from nearly 900 miles away has been a learning curve. At times, I felt like I was failing—like I wasn’t doing enough or didn’t have the right answers for their hard questions. But God…those two words have carried me through. He is sufficient when I am not. He has provided for them in ways I could never have orchestrated myself.
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