🕊️

Then reality hits all over again.

Next week you would have turned 27.

And somehow that hurts more than I can explain.

Not because I forgot how to live without you.

But because every year that passes is another year of memories you never got to make.

Another birthday.

Another summer.

Another Christmas.

Another year of wondering who you would be today.

There are so many things I wish I could tell you.

So many moments I wish you had been here for.

People say time heals.

Maybe it softens the pain.

But it never changes the fact that I miss you.

I miss your laugh.

I miss your voice.

I miss having my brother in this world.

No matter how much time passes, there will always be a part of me that carries you everywhere I go.

I hope wherever you are, you know that you are loved.

And you are missed.

Almost five years.

Five birthdays without you.

It feels impossible that so much time has passed, because some days it still feels like yesterday.

People think grief gets smaller with time. Maybe it does. But then a date appears on the calendar, a song starts playing, or a memory comes out of nowhere, and suddenly you’re right back there.

Next week you would have turned 27.

I often find myself wondering who you would be today. What your life would look like. What we’d talk about. What you’d laugh about.

The hardest part isn’t that you’re gone.

The hardest part is that life kept moving while you didn’t get the chance to.

I miss you in the big moments.

I miss you in the ordinary moments.

And sometimes I miss you for no reason at all.

No matter how many years pass, there will always be a part of me that wishes I could call you one more time.

I love you.

I miss you.

I was 20.

Right in the middle of becoming someone.

I hadn’t finished my training yet.

I hadn’t figured out who I was.

I hadn’t experienced the things I thought we would talk about one day.

Love.

Marriage.

A future I was still building.

And you were supposed to be there for all of it.

You were supposed to see me grow.

See me succeed.

See me become someone I’m proud of.

But you never will.

You will never see the life I’m creating.

You will never meet the person I might fall in love with.

You will never know the version of me that came after you.

And that breaks something in me every time I think about it.

Because you didn’t just miss my life…

you missed my hardest moments too.

You weren’t there when I was at my lowest.

When I went through a relationship that broke me in ways I didn’t think were possible.

I needed you.

And you weren’t there.

And I hate that I even feel angry about that.

Because it’s not your fault.

But it’s still my reality.

I’m angry that I had to survive things without you.

I’m angry that I had to grow without you.

I’m angry that the person who was supposed to know me the longest…

doesn’t know who I am anymore.

And at the same time…

I miss you more than anything.

I wish you could see me now.

Not because everything is perfect.

But because I made it through things you never got to witness.

And sometimes it feels like I’m living a life that you were meant to be part of.

But instead, I carry you through it alone.

In every step.

In every version of me you’ll never meet.

And that’s the part no one talks about.

Grief isn’t just missing someone from the past.

Like after a certain amount of years, you’re supposed to be “okay” again.

But no one really talks about what it means to lose a sibling.

Because somehow, that kind of loss gets quieter.

Less visible.

Less important to everyone else.

When you lost your child, the world stops with you.

When you lost your partner, people understand your loneliness.

But when you lose your brother…

people expect you to just keep going.

They don’t see that you didn’t just lose a person.

You lost your past.

Your inside jokes.

The one who knew you before the world changed you.

You lost a piece of yourself.

And the hardest part isn’t just that you’re gone.

It’s that I’m grieving you alone now.

Your name comes up less.

The conversations stopped.

The world moved on.

But I didn’t.

I just got quieter with it.

I still think about you in random moments.

In songs.

In memories that hit without warning.

In the kind of silence that feels too loud.

And sometimes it feels like I’m the only one still holding on.

Like everyone else learned how to live without you…

while I’m still learning how to live with the absence.

People don’t realize that sibling loss doesn’t fade.

It just becomes something you carry differently.

Heavier on some days.

Almost unbearable on others.

And even after all these years…

there are moments where it still feels just as raw as day one.

I don’t talk about it the way I used to.

But that doesn’t mean it hurts any less.

It just means I learned that not everyone stays long enough to understand it.

So I carry you quietly now.

In everything I do.

In who I’ve become.

Yesterday it came over me all at once. It started with my last name and suddenly my brother was in the room. The person I was talking to didn’t know me well, and he didn’t know my brother deeply either, but he knew him. They once shared a classroom, a time, a place in life, and that alone was enough. I don’t talk about my brother much, not with my family and not with people around me. I’ve learned to keep it together. But yesterday I couldn’t.

I cried right there, and instead of stepping back, he stayed. He held me, let me cry, told me it was okay, that it wasn’t embarrassing, that I didn’t need to explain myself. That kind of presence is rare in grief, someone simply being there without trying to fix anything. Everything is close together right now. My birthday has already passed, the fourth one without him. Christmas too. And now January 20th is coming. Four years. It’s heavy. It’s too much sometimes. And it’s hard to keep holding it all inside.

And losing a sibling is different. It’s not just losing a person. It’s losing a witness to your life. Someone who knew you before you became who you are. Yesterday it hurt again, but for a moment, I didn’t have to hold myself.

I sit there, and I don’t know where to put myself. My head is so full that it feels like it might burst.. and at the same time, completely empty.

Some days I’m okay. Some days I even think I’m getting better. And then suddenly, it all collapses again.nNo warning. No reason. Just that heavy, familiar darkness creeping back in.

It’s like everything inside me gets too loud. Thoughts. Memories. Noise I can’t turn off. And to make it stop.. even for a moment..

I need something that makes me feel again. Just to silence it. Just to breathe.

I know it’s not the way out. But sometimes it’s the only thing that feels like control when everything else spins out of reach.

some days i feel everything too deeply, and other days i feel nothing at all.

my mind keeps replaying moments that don’t even exist anymore, and my heart… it’s tired of trying to make sense of it.

i keep pretending i’m okay,

but truth is.. i’m just confused.

caught between healing and breaking again.

between wanting to move on and secretly hoping someone will come back.

it’s messy in here.

I thought I healed.

I thought time had finally stopped pulling me back to you.

But it’s strange, you know?

You move on, you laugh again, you live again.. and then out of nowhere it hits you.

Like a wave that forgot you were already drowning once.

It’s been months. Years maybe.

And yet there are days where it still feels like yesterday.

The same pain, the same breath caught in my chest, the same silence that screams louder than any argument we ever had.

You were my home, and my hell.

You broke me in ways I didn’t think I could survive.

And still… I find pieces of you in songs, in smells, in random nights where I can’t sleep.

I’ve rebuilt myself a thousand times.

But some parts still ache where your name used to fit.

And maybe that’s what toxic love does.. it burns so deep that even when you heal, you still glow in the dark from the scars.

I don’t miss you.

I miss the version of me that still believed love could save us.

Now I just try to save myself.

it rebuilds you in silence.

It strips you of illusions,

forces you to meet the version of yourself

that exists without approval, without comfort,

without anyone telling you that you’re enough.

Pain changes you..

grief is strange.

sometimes i forget how much time has passed.

it’s been years now - three, almost four..

and somehow that feels unreal.

long enough for the world to move on,

but close enough that it still feels like yesterday.

some days i barely think about it.

i laugh, i live, i breathe like it’s fine.

and then out of nowhere, it hits again.

not because of a song or a smell,

sometimes for no reason at all.

just this wave that reminds me

that grief never really leaves,

it just changes shape.

last year on my birthday i turned 23.

older than my older brother ever got to be.

and that thought still sits heavy in my chest.

it’s strange to outlive someone

you never thought you’d have to live without.

some days it feels okay,

and some days it feels like the ground disappears beneath me.

pain changes you.

not suddenly, not beautifully,

just quietly.

it softens you in some places,

hardens you in others.

you learn how to smile with the ache,

how to carry what can’t be fixed.

grief becomes a part of you..

a language only you understand.

and maybe that’s what healing really means:

not forgetting, not moving on,

just learning to live with the version of yourself

i don’t know why.

some days it just finds me,

like a wave i didn’t see coming.

the kind of sadness that sits heavy on your chest

and reminds you that grief never really leaves.

i miss him in ways i can’t explain.

just in the quiet moments

not with words, not with tears.

when the world moves on

and i still feel the empty space

when my brother died, the world didn’t stop and that’s what hurt the most.

the sun still rose, people still laughed, and i was standing there, stuck between disbelief and the ache of knowing he’d never come back.

at first it felt like falling into silence.

every sound too loud, every breath too heavy.

grief wasn’t crying, it was emptiness.

it was reaching for someone who isn’t there and realizing how infinite absence can be.

time passed, and people stopped asking.

but grief didn’t leave, it just learned to hide.

sometimes it’s quiet, sometimes it hits out of nowhere, in a song, a smell, a random thought.

and every time it reminds me, love doesn’t die.

it just lives somewhere else now. 🕊️