The Quiet Grief of Someone Living

Do you think values can change over time?

That is one question I haven’t made up my mind about yet.

Another one is this:

Is it okay if they do, or should they not?

Even though I’ve made my peace with change, there are times I still struggle. This week I discovered a new fault line: values that shift. This time, the discovery wasn't my own making.

I recently experienced how a person who is still very dear to my heart so easily casted me aside.

I questioned her values. Was this what we called our sacred friendship once? Or have I been playing the fool since day one?

One way or the other, I’ve started to grieve someone who is still alive.

The grief of death and the grief of distance overlap in one ache: you’ll never have them back the way you once did.

That is the heartbreak I’m struggling with.

Yet I discovered there is also a sense of strength rooted in grieving someone who is out of reach. It didn’t come all at once but arrived gradually. I still feel it scatters sometimes yet, that is the pain of a friendship breakup.

When someone dies, denial is the silence after the last goodbye. You still check your phone, expecting a message that will never come.

When someone is alive but gone from your life, denial is different. You half-expect them to walk back, to call, to change their mind. The door isn’t locked, and that hope hurts more.

These past few weeks, I’ve been waking up with one eye staring at my phone to see whether my so-called best friend texted me. ‘She must have texted. Didn’t she miss me?’

Even though deep down the harsh realisation was settling in me, I inevitably woke up to the biggest heartbreak when my hopes weren’t met, every morning these past two weeks.

Hope soon had to die, as it had nothing left to linger on.

I felt like a sense of identity was being ripped away from me. I wasn’t ready to let go, so I held onto the next stages of grief.

Anger over death has no target. You rage at fate, at illness, at a universe that steals.

Anger over the living finds a face. You’re furious at them for leaving, at yourself for holding on, at the unfinished sentences between you.

Being that disposable hurt me. Yet, I still cared, wholeheartedly. Moving on was easy for her, why wasn't it for me?

‘How could she had not miss me? Did she even notice I was gone?’

Since she disrupted an image at the core of my identity, I cursed her entirety.

Bargaining with death is a prayer. If I could trade time, trade places, give something of mine, maybe they’d return.

Bargaining with the living is a text you don’t send. If I say the right words, if I change, if I wait, maybe they’ll come back.

I considered reaching out, thinking she must have a problem with me. Otherwise, she’d reach out, right?

That was only my wishful thinking.

Conflict has always been a struggle for me. She knew that yet, she used it against me.

Every time I thought about reaching out I said, ‘Wait, how long can she wait?’

She waited perfectly.

Depression after death feels like weight. The world is moving, but you stand still, carrying absence like a stone.

Depression for the living is shadowed by presence. They breathe, they laugh, they exist; just not with you. And somehow that feels heavier.

I could no longer avoid the inevitable. She moved on, carrying her life without me.

A rupture stormed in my soul. I found myself bursting into tears in my father’s arms. Maybe the first time in my life even that space didn't felt safe enough.

The final stage lingered. I wasn’t ready to accept the defeat yet.

One morning, I found myself going back to the first stage.

I hated myself when I woke up wishing to see her text again. I trusted the process, yet the process didn’t trust me, realising I still held on to bits and pieces of what remained of our friendship.

I had to overcome my fear. Even conflict without resolution felt right at this point. I knew I’d regret it all my life if I didn’t send her that text.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedGood morning,
A matter has been pressing my heart lately.
In my world,
silence between us feels like a season gone missing.

I felt wounded,
and I thought it mattered.
Even worlds apart,
our hearts have always been the closest.

I stepped back,
yet no word came from you either.
I began to wonder —
was there a shadow sitting in your heart?

For days now,
This thought has lingered,
a quiet sorrow,
that became my rupture.

Today we had the conversation. I know it didn’t appear that way to her, but my heart did not intend to stay.

What I heard, the way she spoke; I know that will linger.

I have no intention of continuing if my friendship is viewed as a burden.

Acceptance after death is learning to carry their absence as part of you. The chair is empty, yet it becomes sacred.

Acceptance with the living is stranger. Strength is born in letting the truth stand unsoftened, in losing the tree in your darkest storm and finding yourself standing only on the roots where you truly belong.