Grief: Learning To Live While My Heart Still Hurts

I’m not talking about my regular health-related content today.

Today, I want to talk about a word that I have come to understand in a way I never thought I would: "grief".

The Day My World Stopped

For the past two weeks, I have been grieving my younger brother. And honestly, I still don't know if I know how to talk about it.When I first found out, I was in denial. For a few hours, my mind just refused. I kept sitting there, waiting for someone to say it hadn't happened; maybe it was a prank .

Then reality started settling in. Slow and heavy.

“He wasn't coming back”.

There’s something about that sentence that breaks you. One day someone is here and the next day they’re only memories. Their voice becomes something you try to remember. Their face becomes pictures on your phone. Their name becomes something that makes your chest go tight.The wildest part is that life continues, even though a part of yours has stopped.

Grief Doesn’t Look Like What I Thought.

I used to think grief was just crying.Wake up sad. Cry all day. Sleep sad. Repeat.But grief isn’t always like that.Sometimes grief is crying until your head hurts.Sometimes it’s silence.Sometimes it’s being completely numb and wondering, “why am I not breaking down? Does this mean I didn’t love him enough?”

Sometimes you laugh at a meme and then feel guilty two seconds later. Sometimes you’re fine for hours, and then a song, a smell, a random word drops you back to day one.I’ve learned grief doesn’t have one face.Sometimes your mind protects you by going numb because if you felt it all at once, it would be too much. The heart needs time to catch up to what the mind already knows.

In the middle of all of this, I did something people didn’t really understand. I went for my church’s youth conference at Osun state.Not to pretend nothing happened; I went for two reasons.The first was to have a real conversation with God. I had questions. I had anger. I had hurt. And I needed somewhere big enough to pour it all.

The second was to escape. Just for a bit. To get out of the four walls that kept reminding me that whatever had happened, had happened. I needed air that didn’t feel like grief.And so I did the things people do at youth conference. I worshipped. Loud. With my hands up and tears running down my face.I cried to God. Like, ugly cried. The kind where you don’t even have words, you’re just sobbing and saying “God, why?” over and over.

I had conversations with God in the quiet moments.I danced. Yes, I danced. With people I love. We laughed, we sang, we danced , we made videos and we posted on social media. For a few days, I felt a bit of relief. Like I could breathe. Like the weight on my chest lifted just a little.

People probably wondered how I could be posting, dancing, laughing, days after losing my younger brother.But nobody knew; I had crazy crash outs at the campground.And when the conference ended, I came back home.And grief came back with me.After I got back, an uncle of mine criticised me for going for the youth conference. He didn’t understand.And for the first time, I had to make him know: you can’t dictate to me how I grieve my brother.

That’s the thing. You can travel away from the place, but you can’t always travel away from the pain.The distractions were gone. The music stopped. The crowd left.And I was back to my normal life, except my normal had changed.Some days I felt like I was almost sinking into depression.Wake up. Eat. Sleep. Think. Remember. Repeat.Existing more than living.But somehow, through all of it, God kept me. And for that, I am grateful.

I don’t want to pretend I have figured grief out. I haven’t. I’m still learning that healing doesn’t mean forgetting.I’m still learning that moving forward doesn’t mean leaving him behind.I’m still learning that grief has no timetable.People expect you to be “okay” after a certain number of days.But grief doesn’t work like that.You can be okay today and not okay tomorrow.You can smile today and cry tomorrow.You can think you’ve accepted it, and wake up feeling like you’re back at the beginning.And that’s okay.

The hardest part is that the world doesn’t stop with you.The sun still rises. People still go to work. Schools still open. WhatsApp still pings. People still laugh.Life keeps happening, even when yours feels interrupted.And somehow, you have to learn how to exist in a world that continued after the person you loved left it.Maybe that’s what grief really is.Learning how to carry love after you can no longer carry the person. Grief is love with nowhere physical to go.It’s missing someone because they mattered.It’s the ache of wanting one more conversation, one more hug, one more ordinary day.

Maybe I don’t need to rush through it.Maybe I don’t need to be strong every day.Maybe I don’t need to explain why I went to that conference……Why I danced. Why I posted. Why I cried. Why I didn’t.Maybe I’m allowed to grieve in whatever way my heart knows how.

So if you’re grieving someone too, I want you to hear this:

You are not doing grief wrong.

If you cry, you’re not weak.

If you don’t cry, you’re not heartless.

If you laugh, you’re not forgetting them.

If you have a good day, you haven’t stopped loving them.

And if you have a terrible day after several good ones, it doesn’t mean you’ve failed at healing.

Take your time.

Talk to God if that’s where you find comfort.

Talk to people if you need someone to listen.

Be quiet if you need silence.

Dance if your body needs to move.

Post if it helps you process.

Cry if you need to cry.

And rest when you are tired.

I am still grieving my younger brother.

I don’t know what healing will look like.

Maybe I’ll never completely stop missing him.

Maybe that’s not the goal.

Maybe the goal is to learn how to live again while carrying the love, the memories, and everything he meant to me.

Life actually continues. And I’m trying to continue with it too.

For now, that’s enough.

I am here.

I am grieving.

I am healing slowly.

And by the grace of God, I am still here.