An Unanswered Love Letter
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By Abby Scarlett

Experiencing grief for the first time will ultimately knock you over, as with all our psychological advancements and accolades, there will never be a possible way to prepare anyone for it, especially when we all grieve differently. Whilst inevitable, it’s consuming, and the inability to predict and control loss will only keep you up at night when it is too late. Despite this, its inevitability shapes grief into a collective journey- the one uniting element across humanity, from all our different paths. Most significantly, the presence of overwhelming pain is an indicator of the presence of love. Perhaps one of the harshest thoughts to stomach is that sometimes grief is needed to realise this. It taught me one of the many complex, intricate shapes and forms that love resides within, only to remember that my friend would never know what I learnt. We weren’t nine years old playing with numbers and just learning sums anymore, and there was no longer two of us. 

Language can only articulate it as a loss, but our loved ones will never leave us entirely. Their existence is permanent: in memory, in spirit, in thoughts and words. Where the hollowness in your heart will live forever, there is an uncomfortable reassurance in believing that you will never walk alone again, that they live in your every footstep and every heartbeat.

Healing is personal: a process encumbered with aching vulnerability.

It’s a bittersweet taste as a community blossoms to observe how many lives have been enriched by an individual so adored, how many stories shared and intimate memories reminisced. The support network that emerged when my friend passed so inexplicably, made it feel as though if I shut my eyes hard enough, it was like they never left. Their laugh, their walk, their hair. It’s knowing that no one can tell you how to grieve, or when, but they can remind you that you needn’t swim through a tsunami alone. Often, navigating grief can make it an intangible task to look after yourself, fighting a losing battle not to become a shell of the person you are. I was not okay, and I did not want to heal. I was waiting for someone who wasn’t coming, to save me from the confusion and to tell me it wasn’t reality. I was waiting for my friend, when I could only rescue myself. Yet if everyone handling grief were to lose grasp of themselves, there would be no stories or memories shared, and no one to keep our loved ones’ narrative alive. We are both fortunate enough to see the sun rise every morning and set every evening, and to have known beautiful souls such as my friend.

There is a truth to those that will tell you that you need to heal, for them.

Sometimes, days will wash over where the need to persevere for them will feel like too much pressure, because it is an understandably insurmountable feeling to exist in the same place where they no longer do. Of course, their presence was one of the greatest privileges. At the time, I could only see healing as an arduous thought- why would I want to reach a point where the pain doesn’t run deep enough to bleed? But, a new forever will unfold, where learning to live with loss will fluctuate between moments that proceed to paralyse you, and days where you have room to breathe. The absence of intense emotional overwhelm does not equate to you having forgotten them, and there is no betrayal to anyone in having days, weeks, months where you feel okay. To heal is a path that only you carve, at your own pace, with their soul by your side.