I have often spoken about death with what I believed was realism.

When I spoke about Zach and Xena’s imminent passing this year, I believed I was simply acknowledging reality. The doctors had already told us in November that their time was short — a matter of months. I carried that knowledge quietly within me, almost like a preparation.

Somewhere inside, I even suspected that Zach would go first. And he did, in January.

What I did not anticipate was the violence of the pain that followed.

We tell ourselves that knowing something in advance will soften the blow. That if we prepare, if we brace ourselves, the fall will not hurt as much. But grief does not care for preparation. It arrives with its own force.

It takes the wind out of your sails.

I can literally feel my heart break.

I have spoken about death before in other contexts too — even about my mother. I know, with the clarity that comes from loving someone deeply, that one day she too will go. Death is the most certain event in every life. And yet, when that day arrives, I know it will devastate me in ways I cannot fully imagine today.

There is something strange about how I experience death. I often sense its approach. I can feel when the end is near. But when it finally happens, it still shatters me.

Knowing does not protect the heart.

Psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross famously described grief through what are now known as the five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. They are often spoken of as if they are steps on a staircase — neat, sequential, and orderly.

But grief is rarely so obedient.

These stages are not destinations we visit once and leave behind. They are currents that move through us, sometimes overlapping, sometimes returning when we least expect them.

Denial is the mind’s first shield. It is the quiet disbelief that whispers, This cannot be real. Even when we know someone is dying, a part of us still behaves as though the moment will somehow not arrive. Denial protects us from the full force of the loss all at once. I have never gone through this stage though. (This could be the denial.)

Anger follows close behind. It may be directed at fate, at doctors, at the universe, at God, or even at the one who left us. It is the protest of the heart — the refusal to accept that something so loved could be taken away. Yes, I’ve felt this, mostly at myself. 

Bargaining is grief’s attempt to negotiate with the inevitable. If only I had done this. If only we had caught it sooner. What if I had tried one more treatment? These thoughts are not rational, but they arise from love’s desperate wish to undo what cannot be undone. Our family keeps doing this. My sister wants to meet the doctors. To find out what happened exactly. 

Depression is perhaps the stage most people recognise. It is the heavy stillness that follows the storm. The absence where presence once lived. It is the quiet realisation that the loss is real and permanent. I am feeling this keenly. 

And finally there is acceptance — not happiness, not relief, but a form of peace. Acceptance is the moment when grief finds a place to sit within us. The loss remains, but it no longer consumes every breath.

Yet even Kübler-Ross herself later clarified that these stages were never meant to be rigid or universal. Grief does not follow a timetable.

It moves like weather.

I know this because I have lived through grief before.

Years ago, I lost Zoe. At the time, the loss felt unbearable. I dreaded it even before it happened, and when it did, it devastated me in ways I thought I might never recover from.

But grief changes shape over time.

Thirteen years later, the pain is still there, but it has folded itself neatly into the corners of my memory. It no longer overwhelms my days. Sometimes I cry when I think of her, but those tears carry the quiet weight of accumulated years rather than the sharp edge of fresh loss.

Grief does not disappear.

It simply learns where to live.

These recent heartbreaks are different because they are new.

They arrive like waves crashing against my being.

There are moments when the grief rises suddenly, and I feel as though I cannot breathe. As though the air itself has thickened around me.

But I know something else too.

These waves will pass.

They always do.

Not because the love fades, but because the human heart slowly learns to carry its losses without collapsing beneath them.

And yet, even knowing that the pain will soften one day, I do not wish to rush through this anguish.

Because this grief has meaning.

It is the measure of my love for them — for all my children who came into my life with wagging tails, trusting eyes, and hearts that knew nothing but devotion.

I cannot say they would want me to suffer.

But I can say this: in feeling this pain, I understand the depth of how much I loved them.

And perhaps that is the quiet truth grief leaves behind.

Love does not end with death.

It simply changes its form.