I still mother them….

I know that sounds cliché, but I believe it with everything in me because I have met them. I have been carried by them. And for the second time in my life, they are carrying me again.

Today marks 60 days since Gabriella died.

Sixty days.

Somehow it feels impossible that it has already been 60 days, and at the very same time it feels like I have lived a thousand years inside these last two months. Grief does funny things to time. Some days I still pick up my phone to text her. Some days I still cannot believe this is real. Some days it feels like she was just here and other days it feels like I have been missing her forever.

Tonight, I got a text from one of my girlfriends I work with. Just random. Out of nowhere. It said:

“Just wanted you to know I’m thinking about you and I miss you Queen. I know your saving the freedom world but you are missed and loved.”

It was simple. Just a text. But if you have ever been deep in grief, you know those little things are never little. Sometimes they are everything.

Right after Gabriella died, my brother sent me a really long voice message. One of those messages you save. One of those messages you replay on the days when breathing feels hard and getting out of bed feels harder. In it, he says, “Just breathe.” Such simple words, but somehow they settle me every single time. I cannot even tell you how many times I have listened to it on the really bad days.

And then there are the people who somehow just know.

The people who text and simply ask, “How can I support you?” Not because they have to. Not because they want credit. But because they genuinely want to help carry something impossibly heavy.

The people who leave flowers at my door for no reason other than they know today might be hard.

The people who send beautiful angel paintings all the way from Turkey because somehow they saw something and thought of my babies.

The people who mail succulents because they know I love plants. The ones who sent me two braided plants because I lost two children. Tell me that is not love. Tell me that is not someone seeing your pain and trying with everything they have to hold part of it for you.

The friends who make pins with Vincent and Gabriella’s pictures so they can still go places with me.

The silly sarcastic cups that somehow make me laugh on days I do not think I can.

The bath kit that came with the note that said, “Vincent would say go take a tub and wash away all the sadness.” And honestly? That one undid me. Because anybody who knew Vincent knows he absolutely would have said exactly that.

The cards. The flowers. The wind chimes that somehow feel like messages blowing in the breeze. The gifts that show up on my porch. The star named after Gabriella. The endless reminders that people are loving my children even in their absence.

The list truly goes on forever.

And here is what I have learned. Grief is impossibly lonely, but somehow love finds a way to sit beside it.

People always say they do not know what to say to someone grieving. They worry about saying the wrong thing. They worry about making it worse. But let me tell you something from someone living in it. You do not have to fix anything. You cannot. Nobody can.

But the texts matter.

The flowers matter.

The cards matter.

The “I’m thinking about you” messages matter.

The random porch drop offs matter.

The remembering matters.

The saying my children’s names matters.

The tiny things are not tiny when somebody is drowning.

For the second time in my life, I have been carried by people who stepped in and loved me through the unimaginable. Some days they have held me together when I was sure I was coming apart.

And I hope every single one of them knows this.

You may never fully understand what your kindness has meant to me, but pieces of me are standing because of you.

There are angels that walk this earth.

I know because I have been loved by them.