Why knowing grief has no timeline doesn't stop us from judging ourselves.
Grief has no timeline. Healing after losing your husband isn't measured by how much time has passed.
You don't have to grow or heal on anyone else's schedule.
Anybody who has been widowed for more than a week has probably already come across something that says grief has no timeline.
We hear it. We read it. We might even repeat it to someone else.
But our brains have a strange way of knowing something is true and then making us crazy by doing the exact opposite.
That was certainly the case with me.
After losing my husband, I discovered that knowing grief has no timeline and actually allowing myself to grieve without a deadline were two very different things. Even years into widowhood, I could find myself wondering why something still hurt or why I wasn't further along.
I logically knew that grief had no timeline. And yet, I would beat myself up for still crying after a month, or two seasons, or three years.
It's as though my mind believed there was some magical point in time, some season that would eventually arrive, when I would finally be "fixed."
But grief isn't an illness, even if it sometimes feels like one.
And healing from grief doesn't mean we stop missing the person we love.
For me, healing means learning to feel the waves of grief without having them take my breath away every time.
And I've discovered that releasing the "shoulds" and the expectations I place on myself is one of the first steps in building my grief muscles.
That sounds simple enough.
But I've had to learn it over and over again.
The Thoughts That Tell Us We Should Be Over Grief by Now
They sounded something like this:
It's been a year. I shouldn't still be crying.
It's been three years. Surely being in a crowd can't STILL feel this uncomfortable.
It's been five years. I shouldn't still be sad.
Notice something about those thoughts?
They're not simply acknowledging how much time has passed.
They're telling me what I should be feeling because that time has passed.
And here's something I've had to understand about my mind.
My mind is trying to keep me safe.
Feeling grief is uncomfortable. Sometimes it's downright painful. And my brain would much rather I didn't have to feel all of that.
So it tries to help.
Unfortunately, sometimes its idea of helping is to tell me I should be doing better by now.
You should have figured this out.
You shouldn't still be struggling with this.
What's wrong with you that you're still feeling this way?
Those are the thoughts I call bullies.
But I don't believe there are truly bad thoughts. There are just thoughts that don't serve me.
And these thoughts definitely don't serve me.
I could keep thinking, I should be further along by now.
But how does that thought make me feel?
Like I'm failing.
Like I'm not doing grief right.
Like there's something wrong with me because I'm still missing Gary so much.
And here's the thing.
It's hard to grow and create a life from a place of feeling like a failure.
I know my mind is trying to protect me from uncomfortable feelings. But judging myself for having those feelings only adds another layer of hurt.
Grief is already uncomfortable.
I don't need to bully myself for feeling it.
How Long Should Grief Last After Losing Your Husband?
That's a question I've had to ask myself.
Who decided that after one year, I shouldn't cry as much?
Who decided that after three years, crowds should feel comfortable again?
Who decided that after five years, sadness should no longer be part of my experience?
Where did those deadlines come from?
There isn't a calendar that tells us when missing someone should stop hurting.
There isn't a date when everything that changed because of their death suddenly goes back to the way it was.
And yet, it's so easy to measure ourselves against the passage of time.
We count the months.
We count the years.
We notice another anniversary approaching.
And sometimes, instead of simply acknowledging the passage of time, we turn it into a measurement of our progress.
It's been this long. I should be further along.
But what does further along even mean?
Does it mean I never cry?
Does it mean I never feel lonely?
Does it mean I can walk into any room, attend any gathering, or face any anniversary without feeling Gary's absence?
If that's the measurement, then I'm measuring myself against something that doesn't make sense for the life I'm living.
Because Gary died.
And that changed my life.
Permanently.
Time Has Passed. That Doesn't Mean the Love Has.
Being widowed and missing my person will be with me for the rest of my life.
I've changed because my Gary took his last breath.
I don't expect to become the woman I was before he died. That woman lived in a world where Gary was alive.
I'm living in a different world now.
I've learned things about myself. I've done things I never imagined I could do. I've found joy, made memories, and discovered parts of myself I didn't know existed.
And I still miss my husband.
All of those things are true.
The life I'm building doesn't cancel the life I lost.
The joy I experience doesn't mean the sadness has disappeared.
And the fact that I've learned to do something that once seemed impossible doesn't mean there won't be another day when it feels difficult again.
I can recognize how much I've grown without expecting myself to be finished grieving.
Because there is no finish line for missing someone you love.
I Keep Having to Learn This
Knowing that grief has no timeline hasn't stopped those bullying thoughts from showing up.
I wish I could say I learned this lesson once and never had to think about it again.
But that's not how it's been for me.
Sometimes I catch myself doing it.
I notice that something still makes me sad, or that a situation still feels uncomfortable, and there it is:
Really? After all this time?
And I have to remind myself again.
Any thought that uses time to judge my grief is bullying me.
I don't have to be angry with my mind for offering that thought. It's doing what it thinks will keep me safe.
But I also don't have to believe it.
I can ask myself a simple question:
Is this thought serving me?
Does believing that I should be further along help me grow?
Does it help me care for myself?
Does it help me create the life I want to live?
Or does it leave me feeling like I've failed?
When I look at it that way, I can see that the thought isn't helping me at all.
And I can choose to practice a different one.
I've written before about how changing the way we look at a thought can help us recognize possibilities we couldn't see before. If this is something you're working on, you might find The 180 in Widowhood helpful, too.
I'm missing Gary today, and that's okay.
I've learned a lot, and I'm still learning.
I can feel sad and still be building a life.
That doesn't mean the bullying thought won't come back tomorrow.
It just means I can recognize it when it does.
And decide whether I want to keep believing it.
Over and over again, if necessary.
How to Stop Judging Yourself for Still Grieving
I wonder what would happen if we stopped using time as a way to judge our grief.
What if, instead of saying, It's been five years. I shouldn't still be sad, we simply said, I'm sad today.
Without adding a deadline.
Without deciding that the feeling shouldn't be there.
Without making it mean we're somehow failing.
What if we could notice that something is still difficult without immediately turning it into a problem with ourselves?
Maybe we could give ourselves the same understanding we'd offer someone we love.
If another widow told me she was crying five years after her husband's death, I wouldn't tell her she should be over it by now.
I wouldn't ask her why she hadn't made more progress.
I would understand that she misses him.
Why should I offer myself anything less?
There Is No Timeline on This
Gary will always be part of my story.
His life changed mine.
His death changed mine, too.
And I will continue learning how to live with both of those truths.
Some days will feel easier than others. Some experiences that once felt overwhelming may become comfortable. Others may still catch me by surprise.
I don't know exactly how I'll feel next year, or five years from now.
And I don't need to know.
What I can do is keep building my grief muscles.
Not by forcing myself to be stronger. Not by telling myself I should be over something by now.
But by learning to recognize what I'm feeling, allowing myself to feel it, and trusting that I can move through it.
And by noticing when my thoughts are working against me instead of helping me.
I can't always choose which thoughts pop into my head.
But I can practice choosing which ones I want to believe.
Every time I release a "should," I'm giving myself a little more room to grow.
You Don't Have to Navigate This Alone
Learning to recognize the thoughts that make grief harder is something I've practiced in my own widowhood, and it's part of the work I do with other widows.
Through my one-on-one widow coaching at Ember & Bloom, I offer a compassionate space to explore the expectations you're placing on yourself, recognize your strengths, and find your own way forward.
If you'd like support, you can learn more about working with me or explore a free Holding the Ember introductory conversation.
The passage of time is not a measure of how well I'm grieving.
It's simply the passage of time.
So when my mind tells me I should be further along, I want to remember what I've had to learn over and over again.
Any thought about time is just bullying me.
And if your mind is telling you that you should be further along, I want you to know the same is true for you.
You don't have to believe that bully.
You are allowed to miss your person today.
No matter how much time has passed.
💜💚