Opening Reflection — The Dinner Table Without Her
The other night, I found myself at a long dinner table. Four couples sat opposite one another, pairs matched naturally, as they’ve done countless times before. I was at the head of the table — not because I’d chosen it, but because there was nowhere else to sit without highlighting the fact that I was alone. Across from me, at the other end, there was an empty seat.
In my mind, that seat had a name: Angé.
It was more than an empty chair. It was a mirror reflecting my reality back at me. She wasn’t there. She would never be there again. And in that moment, I felt a pain that didn’t punch me all at once, but sat heavy — like a weight that I couldn’t set down.
That night, I realised grief doesn’t just hurt once. It finds new ways to make itself known — in the chest, in the mind, in the plans you make, in the spaces you navigate. It is a pain that exists in different times: now, later, and forever.
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Introduction: Pain Has Layers
When people speak of “the pain of loss,” it’s often said as though it’s one singular thing — a lump of hurt you carry around. But grief’s pain isn’t one shape or one size. It moves. It changes form. Some days it feels like someone has kicked the wind out of you; other days, it’s like a slow, dull ache in your thoughts that you can’t seem to switch off.
Through my own mourning, I’ve come to see that grief’s pain arrives in four distinct ways:
1. Current physical pain of loss – the gut punch, the chest squeeze, the tears that come without warning.
2. Current mental pain of loss – the thoughts that loop endlessly, the longing, the mental exhaustion of missing them.
3. Future physical pain – the promise of pain. The knowledge that what you are planning or attending will bring pain. Example accepting a dinner invitation that puts you as the one without a partner.
4. Future mental pain – the quiet ache of planning life without them, the awareness of future moments they won’t be part of.
And for each type of pain, there are things we can do — not to make it vanish (because grief doesn’t work like that), but to make it bearable, liveable.
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1. The Current Physical Pain of Loss
This is the pain that most people think of when they imagine grief. It’s immediate, bodily, and overwhelming. It’s the sudden kick in the chest, the tightening throat, the tears that arrive before you even know you’re crying. Sometimes it’s triggered by a memory, a smell, a photo, or simply waking up and remembering all over again. Other times, it just arrives unannounced.
I’ve felt this pain walking past the bakery where we bought pastries together. I’ve felt it in the middle of the night when I reached across the bed and found only cold sheets. It’s physical, because your body is part of your grief — it stores the memory of touch, of warmth, of routine. Losing that is like losing oxygen for a moment.
How to Cope with Current Physical Pain:
• Move your body. Sometimes, the best way to counter a physical blow is with physical action. Stand up. Walk. Stretch. Go outside.
• Change the space. If the pain hits hard in a certain room, step into another. Movement creates a shift in sensory input.
• Anchor with breath. Slow, deep breaths can interrupt the panic-like surge that comes with this kind of pain.
• Touch something grounding. Hold a warm cup of tea, run your fingers over a textured object, wrap yourself in a blanket — tactile sensations can help bring you back to the present.
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2. The Current Mental Pain of Loss
This is the pain that lives in the mind. It’s not a kick to the chest — it’s a slow, constant gnawing. It’s the thought that loops over and over: “I miss her. I miss her. I miss her.” It’s the remembering of a hundred small things they would have loved or hated. It’s the inability to switch off the part of your brain that replays conversations, moments, even arguments.
Sometimes this mental pain can feel worse than the physical pain, because there’s no off switch. You can’t walk away from your own mind. It’s there when you try to sleep, when you wake, when you’re brushing your teeth. It’s the “always on” part of grief.
How to Cope with Current Mental Pain:
• Create a mental diversion. Read, watch something engaging, call a friend — give your brain another thread to follow.
• Set a time limit for memory spirals. Tell yourself, “I will let myself think about this for 10 minutes, then I will get up and do something else.”
• Write it down. Journaling can help move looping thoughts out of your head and onto the page.
• Learn a “switch-off” activity. For some people it’s puzzles, for others it’s cooking or music — find something that demands enough focus to pull you away from the loop.
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3. The Future Physical Pain — Reminder Pain
This one can take you by surprise. You think you’re doing okay, then you walk into a familiar space, attend a gathering, or take part in a tradition — and it hits you. They’re not here. This is the pain of absence made visible.
The dinner table without her across from me. The empty seat in the car. The space in a photograph where she would have stood. These moments can cause an actual physical reaction — your chest tightens, your stomach drops, you look away quickly because the sight hurts.
How to Cope with Future Physical Pain:
• Acknowledge it out loud. Sometimes saying, “This is hard without her,” gives the pain somewhere to go.
• Bring a substitute presence. A friend, a family member, even a memento — something to occupy the space and soften the emptiness.
• Change the arrangement. If a particular seat or place is too painful, shift where you sit or stand.
• Give yourself permission to leave. If a reminder pain is overwhelming, it’s okay to step away rather than endure it.
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4. The Future Mental Pain — Planning Without Them
This is the pain that comes not from the now, but from imagining the later. It’s the quiet, sometimes invisible ache when you start to make plans and realise they won’t be there for any of it. It’s looking ahead to a holiday, a birthday, a family event — and seeing the gap.
For me, it came when I planned to visit family. I thought about the meals we’d share, the outings we’d take — and then I thought about how Angé wouldn’t be there to laugh with me, to make comments on the drive, to hold my hand. The future I was imagining was incomplete before it even happened.
How to Cope with Future Mental Pain:
• Invite others in. If you can’t have the person you want, choose people who bring joy, warmth, or good conversation to share the experience.
• Adjust the vision. Instead of recreating what you would have done together, try something entirely new.
• Make room for their memory. Bring something of theirs with you — a photo, a piece of jewellery, a ritual — so they remain part of the plan in spirit.
• Focus on what is possible. Grief’s future pain thrives in the gap between what you wish could happen and what can happen. Redirect your energy to what you can do.
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5. Embracing the Pain
Here’s the truth no one wants to hear: you cannot avoid grief’s pain. You cannot outrun it, silence it, or bargain it away. You can distract yourself for a while, yes — but sooner or later, it will find you again. The only way through it is to face it.
This means acknowledging all four types of pain — physical and mental, present and future — and accepting that they are part of your life now. Not forever at the same intensity, but for as long as you live with the love you had.
Embracing pain isn’t about loving it. It’s about owning your place in the fight. It’s about standing strong and saying, “I see you, I feel you, but you do not get to destroy me.”
When you embrace pain:
• You stop wasting energy on pretending it’s not there.
• You learn its patterns, its triggers, and how to meet it on your terms.
• You regain a sense of control — not over the loss, but over your response to it.
This is the work: to stand eye-to-eye with grief and refuse to let it dictate the rest of your life. It is hard, exhausting work — but it’s also the path to living fully alongside your loss.
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6. The Pain Caused by Others
There’s another kind of pain in mourning — the one people inflict. Sometimes without thinking, sometimes deliberately. And sometimes, unfortunately, with a kind of cruel satisfaction.
It can happen in the form of a “joke” that isn’t funny. Like the friend who asked me, grinning, “So, you miss having Angé in your bed?” As if my loss could be reduced to loneliness between sheets. That comment didn’t just sting — it felt calculated, a little twist of the knife.
People also ask questions they shouldn’t:
• “So what are you going to do now that you’re alone?”
• “Don’t you think it’s time you moved on?”
• Or they boast about what they’re doing with their partner — knowing you’re sitting right there without yours.
Sometimes they’re just clumsy, speaking without thinking. Sometimes they’re genuinely trying to make conversation and stumble into an exposed wound. And sometimes, yes, they mean it. They want the reaction.
How to Cope with Pain Caused by Others:
• Identify the intention. If it’s ignorance, you can choose to educate them or simply move away from the conversation.
• Call it out if it’s deliberate. A simple, firm, “That was cruel, and I’m not interested in continuing this conversation,” draws a clear boundary.
• Don’t give them the performance they’re looking for. Refuse to reward cruelty with visible upset if you can help it. Leave, redirect, or disengage.
• Protect your circle. Limit access to your personal grief for people who have shown they can’t be trusted with it.
• Remember their words are not truth. Their comment is about their character, not your worth or your loss.
This kind of pain can trigger all four of the others — the physical jolt in your chest, the mental loop of replaying it, the reminder of absence, and the mental ache about the future. Which is why dealing with it firmly matters. You cannot control what others say, but you can control how much access you give them to your pain.
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Pain Will Change, But It Won’t Disappear
One of the hardest truths to accept is that the pain of grief never truly leaves. It shifts. It changes its voice. Sometimes it whispers; sometimes it roars. But it will not be the same on day 500 as it was on day 5. And that change, while not erasing the loss, can make life possible again.
The goal is not to get rid of the pain — it’s to learn its patterns, to recognise its forms, and to carry it in a way that lets you live alongside it.
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Because of Angé: The Tea Mug in the Cupboard
Every morning, I open the cupboard and see her favourite tea mug. I could have moved it months ago. I could have put it away. But I leave it there, because it reminds me not only of her absence but of her presence. It’s a small sting, yes — but also a small comfort. Because of Angé, I understand that pain and love often live in the same space, and sometimes, the most loving thing I can do is let them both stay.
