The relentless tides of grief

To say the past month has brought me to my knees would be an understatement. I’ve lost three loved ones in the span of a month, and it has felt like being swept into wave after wave of grief — just as I begin to come up for air, another surge pulls me under. There are no words large enough to hold that kind of ache.

And yet, in the midst of it all, something has held me like steady ground beneath a trembling body. Not to stop the storm, but to remind me I could weather it.

Resilience, I’ve come to understand, is not something that arrives all at once. It’s built — quietly, slowly — by every drop of presence we’ve poured into ourselves over time. Not by the final drop that tips the cup, but by the accumulation of years of steady, dedicated practice. The gratitude I have for my practice and circle of loved ones I could depend on has never felt more profound. They became my ground when everything else was slipping.

The mind — that part of me still lucid amidst the ache — watched with detachment and clarity. From an intellectual standpoint, I leaned heavily on what I knew about the nervous system, the window of tolerance, and the stages of grief. That knowledge offered a kind of aerial view — I could recognise what was happening, even as I moved through it. The emotional terrain was still raw and turbulent, but I had a map. It felt like I was driving through a storm with poor visibility, but the GPS signal remained strong. I couldn’t always see the road ahead, but I knew where I was.

Interoception became my compass — not just awareness of breath or heartbeat, but the felt sense of when to say no, when to step back, when to rest; Boundaries, not out of disconnection, but out of devotion — were put in place to preserve what little light I could still carry. So I could show up, when it mattered, with integrity rather than depletion. That awareness allowed me to continue fulfilling commitments in ways that felt honest and sustainable, rather than forced or hollow.

This human life is not all sweetness. I knew that. But nothing prepared me for how violently the scale could swing — from ten to one, light to dark, love to loss — with no soft middle to land on.

I spent much of this time in a state of freeze — numbed, shut down, moving through the days without feeling fully inside them. Now, as I begin to thaw, I carry with me a deeper empathy. I understand more intimately what it means to be stuck in that place — to be functioning, but not fully alive.

And so, I write this not as a lesson, but as a reflection - like a hand on the shoulder of anyone who might be in their own storm right now.

I see you, and I honour your survival.

With tenderness,

Gabrielle

“Yet from pain can come wisdom, from fear can come courage, from suffering can come strength - if we have the virtue of resilience."

- Eric Greitens