Quotes

I started a journal to write things that reminded me of Steve or things I wish I could say to him still and poems I wrote. A couple of the pages I filled with quotes that I found about grief:

The Lord watches over the fatherless and the Widow. Psalm 146:9

I am not a widow. I'm a wife. My husband waits for me in Heaven.

I aspire to be the widow that my husband would be proud of...still.

It's not the kind of sadness to where you cry all the time, but more like the sadness that overwhelms your entire body, leaving your heart aching and your stomach empty, making you feel tired, and yet you can't even sleep because the sadness is in your dreams too. It's almost a sadness you can't escape.

Today is one of those days that I'm getting through minute by minute.

I look up at the sky and talk to you. What I wouldn't give to hear you talk back. I miss your voice. I miss your laughter. I miss everything about you.

No rule book. No time frame. No judgement. Grief is as individual as a fingerprint. Do what is right for your soul.

You can't be strong all the time. Sometimes you just need to be alone and let the tears out.

Grief is learning that it's possible for a part of you to die while you are still living.

God is the only reason I made it this far.

For many grievers tears come in private places like the car, the shower,  the garden, the closet. Just because you don't see us crying doesn't mean that we aren't feeling the loss. On the contrary, we feel the absence deeply.

Grief is the last Act of love we have to give those we love. Where there is deep grief there has been great love.

I wish you were here to tell me that everything is going to be okay.

When I simply say 'I miss him', I really mean I miss his smile. I miss his voice. I miss his laugh. I miss him next to me. I miss his jokes. I miss him holding my hands. I miss him teasing me. I miss him so much I can feel my heart breaking.

Grief is a nasty game of feeling the weakest you have ever felt and morphing into the strongest person you will ever become.

Sometimes when I say 'I'm okay', I want someone to look me in the eyes, hug me and say 'no you're not'.

You realize how much you truly miss someone when something happens, good or bad, and the only person you want to tell is the one person who isn't there.

Missing you comes in waves. Tonight I'm drowning.

I still don't understand.

The hardest thing is not talking to someone you used to talk to everyday.

In French you don't say 'I miss you' you say 'tu me manques', which means you are missing from me. I love that.

Grief, I've learned is really just love. It's all the love you want to give or cannot. All of that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in the hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.

Sometimes the person who's been there for everyone else needs someone to be there for them.

Time passes but not a day goes by that you are not here in my heart. The day you died was not just a date on the calendar, it was a day when my very existence changed forever.

My mind knows you are in a better place where there is no pain. You are at peace. I understand that. I just wish I could explain that to my heart.

My mind is still trying to wrap itself around the fact that you are gone.

Don't tell me how strong you think I am. I survived only because in the end it was all I could do.

Your wings were ready but my heart was not.

There are moments in life when you miss someone so much that you want to pick them from your dreams and hug them for real.

I think the hardest part of losing someone isn't having to say goodbye but rather learning to live without them. Always trying to fill the void, the emptiness, that's left inside your heart when they go.

To keep on going since you're gone the hardest thing you've ever done. I wear a mask from day-to-day and try to cope in my own way. I'll miss you till we meet again and long for you each day till then. There's now a hole no one can feel within my heart. I love you still.

You never said goodbye. Only God knows why. A million times I've needed you, a million times I've cried. If love alone could have saved you, you never would have died. In life I loved you dearly, in death I love you still. In my heart you hold the place no one can fill. It broke my heart to lose you. But you didn't go alone. For part of me went with you the day God took you home.

Please know that hug helps a lot. Please know that your smile helps me heal. Please know that I appreciate your patience. Please know that I love and appreciate you.