Four Months Later: The Weight of Time and the Path to Healing

Today marks four months since everything changed. Four months since our world shifted in ways we could never have imagined. In that time, we've packed up our life in New Jersey, moved to Chicago, set up a new home, and I even started working again. Yet despite all the external changes, the pain remains constant, unyielding. Time, which is supposed to be this ever-moving force, hasn't felt dynamic in our healing process. Healing begins when you can fully process your grief. For us, the months from February to May feel like a blur—fragments of memories and emotions, but nothing in its complete form. It’s as if we’re living in a fog, where pieces of our reality slip through our fingers, leaving us unable to grasp the full picture of what happened. As a family, we’ve come to realize that we need help to begin this journey of healing. We've decided to see a grief counselor, hoping it will help us face the trauma we've been suppressing. I know some people are skeptical about therapy, but when you're in the depths of grief, sometimes the only way through is with professional help. Therapy and, when needed, medication, can provide the support your mind needs in times of extreme distress. The brain is an incredibly complex organ. When it's overwhelmed by pain or trauma, it has ways of shutting down to protect you from feeling the full force of the emotions. Therapy is a way to gently unravel that protection, to process the layers of grief and confusion that might otherwise remain locked away. It won’t make the pain of losing Sana any less, and we will never miss her any less than we do now, but it can help us survive together as a family. If you're dealing with grief, trauma, or mental health struggles, my advice is this: don’t be afraid to seek help. There’s no shame in needing a professional to guide you through the darkest times. Healing isn’t about erasing the pain but learning how to live with it. For us, therapy is a step toward finding that path.