Living Grief
Nobody Warns You About the Living Grief
They tell you motherhood is beautiful.
They lie.
They tell you about labor,
sleepless nights,
first words,
first steps.
Nobody tells you
about the day your child walks away
while you're still holding
every version
they've ever been.
The deepest grief
isn't always death.
Sometimes it's loving someone
who's still alive...
and missing them in every way.
No flowers.
No condolences.
Just an empty chair,
a silent phone,
and another,
"Sorry... can't make it."
Again.
You spend eighteen years
pouring yourself
into another soul.
Your youth.
Your dreams.
Your body.
Gladly.
Then one day
you're no longer
their kind of people.
How strange.
You were once
their whole world.
You watch them earn degrees,
build careers,
become everything
you prayed they'd become...
while somehow forgetting
the hands that lifted them there.
I've never been
so proud
and so heartbroken
at the same time.
A mother's heart
doesn't break once.
It breaks
every time
her child chooses
not to come home.
People say,
"At least they're happy."
Of course they are.
We spent our lives
making sure of it.
Maybe one day
life will hand them
the same mirror.
Maybe then
they'll recognize
their mother's tears...
only after they've become
the reason
she cried.
Copyright © Odette Oprean | Year Posted 2026
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