Love With Nowhere To Go: Grief That Remakes You

Leticia Francis Author

Mehr’s story: when grief bulldozes your life, you don’t “move on”—you move through it: awareness, reprogramming, reinvention.

Some losses don’t knock. They bulldoze.
For Mehr, grief wasn’t a season to “get over.” It was a sudden, permanent change in atmosphere after her husband died from cardiac arrest. One breath she was a wife, a partner, a future-builder; the next, she was a widow trying to keep three children fed while her nervous system froze to protect her from the impact.

On the outside? Functional.
On the inside? Numb.
Stress-induced asthma said what her voice couldn’t: this armor is crushing me.

If you’ve ever “held it together” until your body revolted, you know this terrain. That’s survival mode. It looks like strength; it feels like shutdown.

This episode is a love letter to every woman who’s been told to “move on.” No. We’re moving through—and we’re doing it in three phases: Self-Awareness, Reprogramming, Reinvention.

Phase 1 — Self-Awareness: Stop Arguing With Reality

Grief made Mehr invisible in plain sight—answering texts felt impossible, sleep was a stranger, food tasted like cardboard. She called it out with a sentence that should be framed on every wall:

“Grief is not a problem to solve. It’s a reality to tend to.”

Read that again. Survival mode tells you your worth = performance. Self-awareness says, baby, you’re human. The shift begins when you stop asking, “Why am I not over this?” and start asking, “What is true right now?”

Self-awareness moves:

• Name what’s happening: I’m numb. I’m exhausted. My body is carrying what I won’t let myself feel.

• Track how grief lives in your body (tight chest, shallow breath, clenched jaw).

• Identify where you’re over-functioning to avoid feeling (cleaning, fixing, working, caretaking everybody but you).

Acceptance isn’t approval. It’s retiring from the unwinnable war against what is. When you unclench your fist, you finally have a hand free to hold yourself.

Phase 2 — Reprogramming: Retire the Strong Girl Costume

When the casseroles stop and everyone goes back to their lives, survival mode will beg you to keep sprinting. Mehr chose differently. She slowed down. She let herself be seen. She let support in—selectively.

Reprogramming is where we dismantle the rules grief culture handed us:

• Old rule: “If I don’t cry, I’m strong.”
  New truth: Suppression is not strength; it’s a slow leak.

• Old rule: “Do grief right.”
  New truth: There’s no gold star for neat healing. Messy is honest.

• Old rule: “I can carry everyone.”
  New truth: Oxygen mask first—especially when you’re the only parent left.

Reprogramming moves:

• Daily presence check: “What am I feeling? What am I avoiding? What does my body need?”

• Replace react with respond: Step away, breathe, then choose one caring action (drink water, open a window, step outside, ask for help).

• Redraw the circle: Not everyone gets access. Let the right three people close.

• Language swap: From “move on” to “move with.” From “get over” to “tend to.”

This is where the nervous system learns safety again—slow, repetitive, gentle. Think rituals over resolutions. Think enoughness over excellence.

Phase 3 — Reinvention: Becoming the Woman Grief Revealed

Reinvention isn’t becoming someone new; it’s becoming truer.
Mehr didn’t “bounce back.” She rebuilt forward—mother, entrepreneur, grief coach—a woman who holds space for what the world avoids. That’s what grief does: it carves you open so your life can get honest.

Reinvention asks:

• Who am I now that everything shifted?

• What version of me ended with that loss—and who is being born?

• What standards protect my peace? (Yes to help. No to pressure. Yes to slowness. No to performance.)

Reinvention moves:

• Create micro-rhythms that honor your reality (a daily walk, a “sit and feel” timer for 10 minutes, a weekly truth-check journal).

• Choose purpose without betraying your pace. Mehr serves the grieving because she still grieves. Healing and helping can coexist.

• Let love reroute: grief is love with nowhere to go—so give it places. A ritual, a letter, a candle, a cause, a conversation.

You won’t be who you were when they were here. That’s not failure; that’s fidelity to the truth. The goal isn’t to erase the ache. It’s to carry it with dignity, choice, and breath.

Five Gut-Punch Lessons from Mehr’s Journey

1. Numb is a nervous system strategy, not a personality trait. It kept you alive; it doesn’t get to run your future.

2. Acceptance is not agreement. It’s ending the argument with reality so you can act.

3. There’s no timeline—only touchpoints. Today’s win might be a shower and three deep breaths. That counts.

4. Control is a grief mirage. Presence beats perfection—every single time.

5. You’re allowed to become new. You didn’t lose yourself; you’re meeting yourself—again.

If You’re Here, You’re Ready

If this cracked something open, that’s not an accident—it’s an invitation.

• Join Disrupting Survival Mode (our free FB community) where grief, healing, and messy truth are welcome.

• Grab Survival Mode Exit Plan—my raw, step-by-step blueprint for moving from autopilot to authorship.

• And when you’re ready to do this work with support, my 1:1 spaces are for women who refuse to keep performing strength at the expense of their peace.

You weren’t built to break.
But you also weren’t built to just survive.

Choose ease. Choose power. Choose you.