Grief never feels the same twice

When I lost Charlie in 2020, the pain was crushing. I thought the relationship was over, that death had drawn a hard line separating me from him forever. The silence he left behind felt absolute. I didn’t yet know how to look for him in the world around me.

Losing Ollie this summer has been devastating too, but the grief feels different. This time, I know that the relationship doesn’t end. I’ve seen enough, felt enough, and listened enough to understand that love has no expiration date. It changes form.

Three days after Ollie passed, I looked up and saw a cloud in the sky that looked like him. For a moment, I felt him. It wasn’t imagination, it was recognition. The way love continues to find you, even after the body is gone.

That knowing has made this loss a tiny bit easier to carry. Not easy. Never easy. But softer. Like I can lean into the pain without fearing it will consume me, because I know he’s still with me in another way.

When Charlie died, I didn’t yet believe in these small returns. I didn’t know how to recognize the ways our animals reach us when we’re willing to notice. Losing Ollie after Charlie has shown me: the bond does not break. It bends, it shifts, but it remains.

If you are grieving or bracing for that goodbye, please hold on to this: your relationship doesn’t end. It continues. You’ll see it in clouds, in songs, in fleeting comforts that arrive without explanation.

Their bodies leave. Their souls do not. And love, once shared, will always find a way back to you.