A WidowRISE Reflection on the Grief Wave, Moment, and Day

They say grief lasts a lifetime because it’s rooted in love. Blaine died, but my love for him didn’t. That love is still here. It’s in every memory, every milestone, every quiet pause when the weight of his absence steals my breath.

That truth has helped me reframe grief. But let’s be honest—it doesn’t make the reality of grief any less brutal. This walk through widowhood is long and often lonely. It’s exhausting. And sometimes it just feels cruel.

Year One: Shock and Survival
The first year after Blaine passed, the grief was so raw, so physical, it shocked me. No one warned me how grief would hijack my body—how it would make me forget to breathe, eat, sleep, function. My heart wasn’t just broken; my entire being felt crushed. Every part of life felt unfamiliar. I was surviving, not living.

Year Two: The Weight of Permanence
By the time year two approached, the grief changed. It wasn’t as constant, but somehow it hurt more. The shock had worn off, and what settled in was the understanding of permanence. That he really wasn’t coming back. That all the dreams we dreamed, the future we pictured, would now happen without him. That kind of grief is silent but suffocating—it drains your desire, your joy, even your hope if you’re not careful.

Year Three: The Wave, The Moment, The Day
Now, in year three of widowhood, I’m learning that grief still visits, just differently. I’ve come to name its visits in three ways: the grief wave, the grief moment, and the grief day.

The Grief Wave
This is the one that hits out of nowhere. A smell, a song, a Little Debbie Swiss Cake Roll in aisle three—Blaine’s favorite—and I’m suddenly clutching the steering wheel in a Target parking lot trying not to collapse. Or I’m at my grandson’s baseball game, surrounded by couples and grandparents, and realize once again that I’m an incomplete representation. That panic, that ache, it rises like a tide I didn’t see coming.

Grief waves are the worst because they’re unpredictable. There’s no bracing for them. You just have to ride them out and find your footing again.

The Grief Moment
These are the ones I can see coming. Tender, beautiful, gut-wrenching. Like watching my grandsons walk their aunt—our daughter—down the aisle. Or gathering around his gravestone on Father’s Day to celebrate the kind of dad he was. These moments hurt, but they also honor. They give me space to pause, remember, and acknowledge that Blaine’s life mattered deeply. And so did our love.

The Grief Day
Then there are the grief days—the full-stop, time-out days. The days where it all just feels too heavy to carry. Where smiling feels fake and carrying on feels like a betrayal. On those days, I stop. I write. I nap. I get a massage. I binge a ridiculous show. I don’t try to fix it—I just try to breathe. I give myself permission to say, “Not today, grief. You win today. But I’ll rise tomorrow.”

And I do. I rise. I always do. Because I’m still becoming.

When Grief Goes Blue
After Blaine passed, we created Go Blue for Blaine to honor his legacy in the soccer community. Blaine was a referee for over 17 years—known for his calm presence and his ability to de-escalate even the most chaotic situations. Coaches, players, fans—they trusted him. He was steady in the storm.

We created blue cards for referees to use in those tense moments. BLUE stands for:
Breathe. Listen. Understand. Empathize.

Simple, powerful. De-escalation by compassion.

What I’ve realized is that Go BLUE isn’t just for the field. It’s for grief too. It’s for me.

When a grief wave hits, I breathe.
When a grief moment breaks my heart, I listen to what I’m feeling.
When a grief day weighs me down, I seek to understand why and offer myself grace.
Always, I choose empathy—for myself, my story, my sorrow.

Because grief isn’t something to fix. It’s something to companion. Something to witness.

And when I Go Blue in my grief, I remember Blaine—not just the loss, but the legacy. The calm. The love. The life we had. The story we wrote.

I’ll carry it forever.
And I’ll keep rising—wave by wave, moment by moment, day by day.