Why I Still Set a Place at the Table for My Dead Son

There’s a chair at our dining table that no one sits in. The plate is always the same — white with a thin blue ring around the edge, the kind you find in discount stores. The fork and knife lie in their proper places, and I still pour a glass of water like he’s about to walk through the door. Every evening, I set it there, quietly, without ceremony but never forgetting. Some find it odd, even unsettling. But for me, it’s comfort. It’s memory. It’s love that refuses to die just because he did.

My son, Joshua, died four years ago in a car accident. He was 19. It was a rainy night, and he was coming home from his part-time job. I remember the knock on the door — the two officers, the pity in their eyes, the slow, careful words. I remember the scream that tore out of me, not even recognizing it as my own. Grief doesn’t come gently. It erupts.

For the first few weeks, the house was full — casseroles, visitors, flowers, silence wrapped in awkward conversation. People meant well. They always do. They said the usual things: “He’s in a better place,” “At least he didn’t suffer,” “God has a plan.” As if any of that could pad the sharp edges of a mother’s loss.

Eventually, the calls slowed. The fridge emptied. People went back to their lives. That’s what we’re supposed to do — move on. Be strong. But what does “moving on” even mean? Does it mean forgetting how he laughed at his own jokes? Or how he always made sure I had a cup of tea when I looked tired? Does it mean cleaning out his room and pretending like he never lived in it?

I couldn’t do it. I still can’t.

One evening, a few months after the funeral, I was setting the table — out of habit, mostly — and I realized I had put out five plates instead of four. Joshua’s plate. I stood there frozen, tears streaming down my face. But then something strange happened. I didn’t put it away. I left it there. And that night, we ate dinner like always, with his place untouched but somehow still full of him.

I didn’t plan to keep doing it. But I did. And now, four years later, it’s still part of our routine. Every birthday, every Christmas, every ordinary Tuesday — his place is there.

Some say I’m clinging too hard to the past. Maybe. But I don’t think grief is something you conquer. It’s something you carry. You don’t “get over” the death of your child. You build a life around the hole they left behind. You patch yourself together with memories, rituals, and love that keeps whispering even in the silence.

Setting that plate reminds me that Joshua lived. That he mattered. That he still matters.

My youngest, Ellie, once asked if Joshua knows we still think about him. She was seven then, and I didn’t know how to answer. I just said, “I think he does.” And she nodded and helped me pour water into his glass.

It’s not just about remembrance. It’s about presence. That empty chair gives us permission to talk about him. To say his name. To tell his stories. So many families lock grief away, afraid that speaking of the dead will reopen wounds. But our wounds don’t need closing — they need air. And his chair gives us that.

When friends come over, some are taken aback. “Oh, I didn’t realize someone else was joining us,” they might say. And I explain. Sometimes they get quiet. Sometimes they share their own stories — a mother they lost, a sister, a child. It’s as if that one empty chair makes room for more than just my son. It holds space for everyone’s grief.

Grief doesn’t look the same for everyone. Some box up their pain. Others bury it under busyness. I lay mine at the table every evening, alongside the spoons and the napkins. Not to dramatize or dwell, but to honor. Because love doesn’t vanish when breath does.

There are days I don’t cry anymore. There are days I laugh — real belly-laughs that shake something loose. That’s healing too. But there are also days when the sound of a certain song or the scent of his shampoo on a hoodie I refuse to wash can send me spiraling back to that night. And when those days come, his place is there. Waiting.

I don’t know how long I’ll keep setting it. Maybe forever. Maybe one day I’ll stop. But today, and tomorrow, and probably next week, it will still be there. A quiet rebellion against the finality of death. A mother’s promise that she will never stop making room for her child.

Not in her heart.
Not at her table.
Not ever.