When Grief Sneaks Up On You

Grief has surprised me more times than I can count. I thought I had “finished” with it — only to find tears rising in the middle of a grocery store, or while driving with the radio on, or in the stillness of an ordinary afternoon.

At first, I thought these moments meant I hadn’t healed enough. But over time, I learned what so many others discover too: grief isn’t linear. It doesn’t obey calendars or tidy up on schedule. It lives in the body, and it returns when something stirs it awake.

My Story of Loss

I lost my mother when I was seven. In truth, I began losing her when I was four, when she got sick. By the time she died, I had already lost her presence. Around the same time, our family moved across the country, cutting me off from the place I was born and everyone I knew there. Soon after, we left the suburbs for a rural area, and with that move came even more disconnection.

When my father neglected me, it was another layer of loss. Then, when I was twelve, he had a heart attack while driving me to school. He was in a coma for six weeks, and when he woke up, he was no longer himself. That was an ambiguous loss — he was still alive, but I had lost the father I knew. He spent the rest of his life in assisted living.

So much grief, stacked one loss upon another, waiting in my body. It stayed there for decades, until I began working with psychedelics at forty. Only then did I start to meet what had been waiting.

Why Grief Comes in Waves

Grief isn’t only sadness. Sometimes it’s longing, anger, or numbness. Sometimes it’s a heaviness in the chest, a knot in the stomach, or a sudden emptiness.

For me, it has shown up not only for people I’ve lost, but also for what was never there — the safety or recognition I needed and didn’t receive. Those moments can sting as sharply as any goodbye.

Our nervous systems can’t process all of that at once. So grief comes in pieces. A wave today, another wave years later. Not because we’re broken, but because some part of us trusts that now we can face a little more.

Meeting Grief With Gentleness

When grief sneaks up, my instinct has often been to push it away, to power through. But I’ve found more peace when I can pause and simply notice: “Ah, grief is here.”

Gentleness doesn’t mean drowning in it. It can be as small as a breath, a hand on the heart, or a moment of connection with another person. In safe relationship, the grief that once felt unbearable can soften into something I can carry with dignity.

The Nonlinear Path

Grief has taught me that it moves in spirals. There are moments of heaviness, and then — just as suddenly — moments of unexpected lightness. Both belong.

And strangely, grief has made me more alive. It has broken me open in ways that deepened my capacity for tenderness, love, and joy. By allowing myself to feel loss, I’ve also discovered a fuller sense of connection to life itself.

With presence and support, the body learns it doesn’t need to hold grief forever. It can move. And in that movement, it makes space for the whole spectrum: sorrow and sweetness, ache and aliveness, all woven together.

Closing

If grief has been sneaking up on you, know this: nothing is wrong. You’re not failing, and you’re not going backwards. You’re living inside the rhythm of how grief moves — and you don’t have to meet it alone.