After The Last Embrace

“There was no funeral. No farewell. Only the silence that settled between us, like an invisible wall. And since then, I’ve been mourning a mother who still breathes.”

There was no burial. No flowers. No people dressed in black, no awkward hugs. But I was in mourning.Because she left. Because you’re gone. Because even though she breathes, she no longer looks at me the same way. And that, too, is a kind of death.

People think grief only arrives when someone dies. But there are losses with no certificate, no record, no date or time — and yet they break you just the same. Maybe even worse. Because no one walks with you through it. No one says “I’m sorry.” No one understands that you’re crying for something that can’t be seen.

I lost my mother. Not to illness, not to an accident. I lost her in a conversation that never happened. In a hug that never came. In a look that stopped searching for me. And since then, I carry a grief with no name. A mourning with no coffin. She’s still alive. But I’m no longer her daughter. Not like before. Not like when she used to comb my soul with her words.

There are days when I wake up wanting to call her — to tell her that my chest hurts, that I don’t know how to keep going. But then I remember: she’s gone. That if I dial her number, she won’t hear me. That if I speak, she won’t understand. And so I swallow my words like shards of glass. Slowly. Painfully.

The grief without a death is the cruelest of all. Because it has no ritual. No farewell. No permission. It forces you to go on as if nothing happened, while inside, everything is falling apart. You look in the mirror and smile, because the world won’t accept your sadness. But your eyes know. Your eyes scream. Your eyes remember.

And the worst part is — no one validates it. No one says, “You’re grieving.” Because there’s no body. No grave. No official death. But you know. You feel. You bleed.

Today I write this because I need someone to tell me that yes — this counts too. That this loss deserves respect. That this pain deserves space. That I’m not crazy for mourning someone who’s still alive.

Because some bonds die before the bodies do. And some griefs never get buried — because no one dares to recognize them. But here, in this corner, they do. Here, we cry for what cannot be named. Here, we honor what left without leaving.

🌿 Words for Those Grieving Without a Coffin

You’re not crazy. You’re not exaggerating. You’re not alone. What you feel is real — even if no one names it, even if no one understands it, even if the world keeps spinning as if yours hasn’t stopped.

There are losses with no ceremony that still deserve reverence. There are griefs with no body that weigh like a stone on your chest. And you’ve been carrying that — day after day, without applause, without recognition, without rest.

But here’s a truth no one may have told you: not everything that breaks is lost. Sometimes, what breaks reveals what was hidden. Sometimes, pain doesn’t come to destroy you, but to show you where you can no longer stay the same.

Look at your pain as a mirror — not to get trapped in it, but to understand what needs to be healed, what needs to be released, what deserves to be mourned.

And if today you can’t see the light, that’s okay. Not every day is for moving forward. Some days are only for surviving. For breathing. For not giving up.

You’re not broken — you’re in process. And that process, though it hurts, is sacred.

🤍 From Me to You

If you’re reading this with a trembling heart, know this: I’m with you. I don’t know you, but I recognize you. I recognize that emptiness, that confusion, that nameless sadness. I too have cried for what cannot be seen. I too have felt that the world doesn’t understand what hurts.

This space isn’t just for telling stories — it’s for holding them. So you know there is someone here who won’t judge you, who won’t demand that you heal quickly, who won’t ask you to get over it.

Here, you can stay as long as you need. You can cry, scream, write, fall apart — and when you’re ready, you can rebuild.

I’m walking beside your pain — not to take it away, but so you don’t have to carry it alone.

I embrace you from here.

— Luz 🤍