I am writing this to you, the one who feels like you can’t go on because your parent died and the world is now an upside down foreign place. This is a message specifically for the person who feels broken by grief.

I see you staring into nothingness as cars go by and people loudly chatter around you about their plans and busy schedules. I feel you sinking inside and feeling like no one understands the depth of your grief when people advise you to heal through self care and think suggestions like a Starbucks treat or fancy bath bombs are what you need. Keep going. Yes, fake it until you make it. Please stay. I see you. I know right now nothing is really going to make it better.

It is spring in the Pacific Northwest. Green things are sprouting everywhere. New life is blooming. And yet an icy, rain soaked storm blew in and brought snow in April, for the first recorded time ever in 82 years. It began with rain, then the skies poured down snow. Trees bent, broke, and fell, blocking roads and cutting power.

As the sun tried to warm the city, the snow turned to slushy rain. The cold outpaced the sun and kept coming, and soon we were pelted with hailstones. Cloudy pearls of ice cut through the cherry trees and blanketed the streets with tender white, pale pink, bubblegum, and deep magenta petals they tore from the branches.

Today is clear but cold. The sky is periwinkle, with fat, dense white clouds. There are still cherry blossoms to see. Some were lost, but many remain. Droplets of water cling to the tiny flowers and make them sparkle. I wish my mother were here to see them. The sudden thought of her is painful, as if the cherry trees are dripping tears instead of last night’s storm.

My mother died of grief. Her husband suddenly died, and she couldn’t imagine the world without him in it. Of course her death certificate doesn’t say “died of grief” under the cause of death, but I imagine it should. Her husband died, and she stopped seeing the meaning in life.

She couldn’t keep going. She ate less and less, and eventually stopped eating. She turned in and turned off. She had me, my brother, seven grandchildren, and many friends who loved her, but somehow we just weren’t enough. She didn’t get help. She fell frequently. Her face was gaunt. Her eyes sunken. Her body became small, weak, and frail. A shovel fell off a peg in the garage and gave her a black eye.

It’s been three years since she died, and I’m still too scared to get her autopsy report. She fell one last time, smashing her head on the corner of the heavy coffee table. There was so much blood. She didn’t get to the phone. Did she even try? The cause of death? Grief.

I wish I had been enough. I wish that she saw her children and grandchildren as reasons to stay, reasons to not give up on life. But she was worn out, worn down, and done suffering. Grief begets grief. She laid it down when she died, and I flew to New York to pick it up. It feels bigger now. Heavier. I’ve added my own grief to her pile that I carry.

I know grief can feel like too much. Some days you feel like you just might break. It’s so important to reach out. Connect with another human. Call a friend. Smile at someone on the sidewalk rather than looking down.

Check in with a therapist. (Call their phone number and request an appointment if you are new! I truly know how excruciating this step can be.)

Hug your dog. Pet your cat. Go outside and look for birds. Watch them hopping and fluttering–chirping, beeping, and cawing to communicate with one another.

When I was outside, a squirrel froze, staring at me, as it stood on the top of my wooden fence, clutching a peanut, perhaps fearful I’d try to take it away. I saw it’s shiny black eyes, the little belly moving in and out with quickened breath, and the fluffy tail twitching. Go on, little one. Live. Be happy. Enjoy your peanut.

There are reasons to stay. There are still beautiful things in the world for you to see. No, they will not replace your lost person or fill the gaping hole they left in your heart when they died, but if you stay, if you keep going, putting one foot in front of the other, someday you will find something beautiful again, too, or something very funny that actually makes you laugh again. It may be a small thing, but it is coming, and maybe after a while you can be a bright spot for someone else who is hurting, too.

My neighborhood is strewn with broken cherry blossoms, and somehow even the wreckage is beautiful. There are still flowers on the trees. I wish my mother could have stayed. I wish she would have made it through the storm. Grief made her feel hopeless, but it doesn’t have to be that way. We can look up. We can look ahead.

Thank you for reading my message, dear grieving friend. Leave a comment below with your message back to me. And stay. Live. Be here for the beautiful, happy moments ahead. I promise they are coming.