Firsts After Loss: The Fork on the Table and the Ache in the Heart

 Firsts After Loss: The Fork on the Table 

and the Ache in the Heart

The day goes by like a shadow o’er the heart, With sorrow, where all was delight. —STEPHEN FOSTER

🍴Grief in the Fork

Sometimes it’s hard to remember how life felt before loss shifted the ground beneath us—like a landslide, like an earthquake. In the early days, we began to track time by “firsts.”

The first trip to the grocery store.

The first movie I watched alone.

The first time setting the table… with one less place.

I remember my first vividly.

My mom died two days before New Year’s. Since then, I haven’t celebrated a single holiday. Not New Year’s, not Christmas, not the Fourth of July. Only birthdays now—and even those feel different. The joy faded with her voice, with her light. Without my mom, the calendar feels hollow.

Tawni—my niece, my girl—used to call me every birthday. I waited for her that year. Then I remembered.

And just last night, Bryce reached into the drawer and grabbed three forks for dinner. Then he paused. Looked at me. We only needed two.

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📖 What the Bible Says About These Firsts

Grief transforms the ordinary. Even dinner becomes a monument to what once was. But we are not alone in this space. Scripture speaks to this kind of pain.

Psalm 34:18 – “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
John 20:15 – “Woman, why are you crying?”
Joel 2:25 – “I will restore to you the years the locusts have eaten.”
Matthew 5:4 – “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

He is not far. Not indifferent. He is near. Near at the dinner table. Near when your phone doesn’t ring on your birthday. Near when the holidays pass in silence.

Jesus asked Mary this at the tomb. He knew her pain but gave her space to speak it. He’s asking you too—not to question you, but to comfort you.

The empty chairs and missed calls do not go unnoticed. Restoration may not look like the past—but it will be real. Gentle. True.

You are allowed to pause. To cry. To skip the decorations and hide from fireworks. In mourning, you are not forgotten. You are blessed. And you are promised comfort.

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🕯 Reflective Closing

Grief has a way of carving deep spaces within us—spaces that ache in the presence of empty forks, silent phones, and uncelebrated holidays. These moments are sacred. They hold the love that once filled them. They hold the people we will never stop loving.

And though the ache may never disappear completely, so too will God never disappear from your side