Latest / Second Chances: Stories of Survival, Recovery & Starting Over / When They Say 'Move On': Navigating Grief's Unfair Timeline | Second Chances
Transcript
- There is a specific kind of violence in the phrase, 'You should be over it by now.' It doesn’t feel like advice. It feels like a door slamming shut on your pain. I want you to think about the last time someone looked at you with that polite, pitying smile and said, 'Time heals all wounds,' or 'At least it’s not worse.' Maybe they said it when you were still wearing the same sweater you’d worn for three days straight. Maybe they said it while you were staring at a wall, unable to make coffee, unable to answer emails, unable to pretend that your world hadn’t just fractured into before and after. We live in a culture that treats grief like a project management task. There’s a timeline. There are milestones. If you haven’t checked off 'Acceptance' by week four, you’re apparently falling behind schedule. But here is the truth that no one wants to admit out loud: grief does not have a calendar. It has its own weather patterns. Some days it’s clear skies. Other days, you’re in a hurricane, and the only thing holding you up is sheer stubbornness. When people tell you to move on faster, what they’re really saying is, 'Your pain is making me uncomfortable because I don’t know how to fix it.' And that is their burden to carry, not yours. You are not failing at grieving. You are simply grieving at the speed of your own heart. I remember a friend of mine, let’s call her Sarah, who lost her mother suddenly. Three months later, she went to a brunch with mutual friends. Someone clinked their glass and made a toast to how 'strong' Sarah was for getting back to work so quickly. She smiled. She laughed at the right moments. She ate her eggs Benedict. But inside, she was screaming. Because 'getting back to work' wasn't healing. It was survival. It was putting one foot in front of the other until her legs gave out. Afterward, she cried in her car for an hour, not because she was weak, but because she was exhausted from performing wellness. We wear these masks of recovery because we’re afraid that if we show the cracks, people will stop loving us. Or worse, they’ll stop visiting. So we say, 'I’m fine,' even when we’re barely hanging on. We nod along when they say, 'You’ve got this,' because correcting them requires energy we don’t have. But this performance takes a toll. It isolates you in plain sight. You’re surrounded by people, yet you’ve never felt more alone than when everyone agrees that you’re doing okay, when you know deep down that you’re just trying to stay afloat. The pressure to appear healed is often heavier than the weight of the loss itself. It’s important to understand why people do this, not to excuse it, but to protect your peace. Most people are terrified of death, of illness, of change. Your grief holds up a mirror to their own mortality. When they see you stuck in the past, it reminds them that nothing is permanent. So they rush you forward to reassure themselves that everything is under control. They want you to be 'over it' so they can believe that life is safe again. It’s not about you. It’s about their anxiety. Knowing this helps, a little. It shifts the blame from your shoulders to theirs. You aren’t broken because you’re still hurting. They are unprepared for the reality of human suffering. This realization allows you to stop taking their comments personally. When someone says, 'Heaven gained an angel,' or 'Everything happens for a reason,' they are offering platitudes because they don’t know what else to offer. They are handing you a bandage when you need a surgeon. You can accept the gesture kindly without accepting the premise. You can say, 'Thank you,' and keep your sorrow exactly where it belongs: messy, large, and real. You don’t owe anyone a tidy narrative. You don’t owe them a clean ending. We talk a lot about closure, as if it’s a box you can check off. As if there’s a moment when the grief just... stops. It doesn’t. Grief transforms. It changes shape. It goes from a sharp, stabbing pain to a dull ache, then to a quiet companion that sits in the corner of the room. One day, you realize you haven’t thought about the loss for twenty minutes. Then an hour. Then a whole afternoon. But that doesn’t mean you’ve moved on. It means you’ve integrated. You’ve learned to carry it. Think of it like carrying a heavy backpack. At first, it crushes you. You can barely walk. But eventually, your muscles strengthen. You learn how to adjust the straps. You find a rhythm. You might forget you’re wearing it for a while, but it’s always there. And that’s okay. Moving on implies leaving it behind. But some things aren’t meant to be left behind. They’re meant to be carried differently. When people urge you to move on, they’re asking you to drop the pack. But you’re not ready to drop it. And you shouldn’t have to. The goal isn’t to forget. The goal is to remember without being destroyed by the memory. That is a slow, non-linear process. It looks like good days and bad days mixed together. It looks like laughing at a joke and then crying ten minutes later. It looks like living fully while honoring what was lost. So how do you handle these well-meaning but hurtful comments? You set boundaries. Not angry, shouting boundaries, but gentle, firm ones. Next time someone says, 'You’re doing great,' you can pause and say, 'Actually, today is hard.' Watch what happens. Most people won’t know what to do with the truth. They might stumble. They might go silent. But they will also start to learn what you need. You are teaching them how to love you. And that is a gift. You don’t have to explain your grief. You don’t have to justify your timeline. Just stating the fact that you’re struggling is enough. It creates space for real connection. Real friends will sit with you in the dark. They won’t try to turn on the lights. They’ll just sit there until you’re ready to stand up again. If someone can’t handle your honesty, that’s information about them, not you. Keep your circle small. Keep it safe. Let the rest of the world have their platitudes. You save your truth for the people who can hold it. This is part of healing too—learning who stays and who leaves when the mask comes off. Those who stay are worth keeping. Those who leave were never really seeing you anyway. Finally, give yourself permission to be exactly where you are. If you need to cry for another year, cry. If you need to take six months to decide what to do with their clothes, take them. If you need to avoid holidays for a while, avoid them. No one is keeping score. No one is grading you. The only metric that matters is whether you are treating yourself with kindness. Are you eating? Are you sleeping? Are you letting yourself feel the feelings instead of numbing them? If yes, then you are doing it right. Grief is love with nowhere to go. It’s proof that something mattered. Don’t let anyone diminish that love by rushing you through it. Honor your journey. Trust your heart. You are not late. You are not wrong. You are simply human, navigating the most difficult terrain there is. And you are doing it beautifully, even on the days you feel like you’re failing. Because showing up, even in pieces, is enough. You are enough. Just as you are, right now, in this moment, exactly as you are. I’m Jane Gordon. Take care of that beautiful, complicated heart of yours. I’ll see you next time.