What People Don't Understand About Widowhood (part 2)

Missing Someone Isn’t the Same as Being Stuck in Grief

Why love and loss can coexist long after life moves forward

One of the things people often misunderstand about widowhood is the idea that if you still miss someone, you must not be “moving forward.”

I’ve heard versions of this over the years, sometimes spoken and sometimes just implied. The assumption is that healing means the absence of grief. That if you are doing well, functioning, rebuilding life, or even finding joy again, then the missing should disappear too.

But that’s not how grief works.

And it’s not how love works either.

Missing Jon today does not mean I am stuck in the past. It simply means he mattered deeply in my life. There is a difference between being stuck in grief and still carrying love for someone who is no longer here.

For me, grief has changed shape over the years. It is no longer the constant, heavy weight it once was in the early days. I am not living in survival mode anymore. I am not waking up every day trying to figure out how to get through the next hour.

Life is full now. There is laughter. There is purpose. There is family. There is peace in many moments.

And still, there are times when something will remind me of Jon in a very ordinary way.

A memory.

A phrase someone says.

A moment with my kids.

A situation where my first thought is still, “Jon would have loved this,” or “I wish I could tell him.”

Those moments don’t mean I have gone backward.

They simply mean love has a long memory.

Ecclesiastes 3:1 reminds us:

“To everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.” And later in verse 4 it says there is “a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.”

Grief does not cancel joy. And joy does not cancel grief. They often live side by side in ways that are hard to explain unless you’ve lived it.

What I’ve learned over the years is that missing someone becomes less about constant pain and more about quiet moments of remembrance.

It’s not always tears anymore. Sometimes it’s just a thought that passes through my mind in the middle of an ordinary day. And I let it be there for a moment. Not because I am dwelling in sadness, but because I am remembering someone who was part of my life story.

I think one of the most damaging misunderstandings about grief is the pressure to “get over it.”

As if love has an expiration date.

As if healing means forgetting.

As if the absence of visible pain means the absence of love.

But healing has never meant forgetting for me.

It has meant learning how to carry both memory and life at the same time.

There were years when missing Jon felt sharp and constant. It was woven into everything I did. I couldn’t separate grief from daily life because I was still learning how to survive it.

But over time, something shifted.

The grief didn’t disappear, but it softened.

It became something I could carry rather than something that carried me.

And in that space, something beautiful happened.

Life began to grow again.

Not in place of Jon.

Not instead of him.

But alongside the reality that he is gone.

Psalm 147:3 says,

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”

I’ve learned that healing is not always about erasing the wound. Sometimes it is about learning how to live with what has been healed, even if a scar remains.

Missing Jon is no longer something that defines every day of my life. But it is still a part of me. And I think that is important to say out loud, because so many widows feel pressure to either be “fully healed” or “completely broken.”

There is often very little space for the in-between.

But the in-between is where most of us actually live.

A place where grief is quieter but still present.

A place where love remains.

A place where life continues to unfold in new and unexpected ways.

Missing someone is not a sign of failure in healing. It is a sign that love was real. And that love still matters.

If you have been feeling a off lately — low energy, brain fog, constant cravings, or just feeling depleted — I’d love to invite you to join me for a simple two-week reset. We’ll focus on simple daily rhythms that support your body and restore steady energy. Nothing extreme, just simple habits practiced consistently. If that sounds like something you need right now, I’d love to have you join us.

You can reach out to me in the comments, or by sending me a message on Facebook or Instagram.