Watching The One You Love, Lose Someone They Love

Watching someone you love lose someone they love is a unique kind of pain.

You know there is nothing you can do to fix it. You know your words, no matter how thoughtful will keep falling short.

Your heart is broken too, but you have to be strong for them. You swallow down your sorrow, straighten your posture, gather yourself.

They need you now and you must keep it together, keep them together, keep it all together.

You tell them eventually it will get better. Someday it won’t feel this bad. We can do this. We just need time. It will be ok.

But it’s hard to feel any warmth in your words, because you don’t quite know if you believe them.

You hope there will be joy again, but wonder how that joy will ever not feel tarnished by this grief.

Will even the best things to come always feel bittersweet?

You pray for happy moments, for them to smile again and laugh like they mean it.

But you fear those moments too. Because you know even the brightest of days will have a shadow cast upon it, a hole of darkness you cannot fill.

So you try to be the sun, but you don’t always know how.

You try to capture each ounce of joy, every flicker of light and hold it up to them in a jar.

See? You can do it.

You can find joy here too, you say to them…you say to yourself.