When my 19-year-old son died two months ago, it felt like there had been an apocalypse and I had gone underground to survive the news. My days were consumed by grief and by all the tasks that came crashing in after his death — funeral home appointments, burial plans, the viewing, the celebration of life, distributing ashes, family and friends coming to visit, flowers, cards, donations, death notifications, and deciding what to do with his belongings. It all came at me like a storm.
I was in the thick of it, making decisions no mother should ever have to make.
Then eventually, things quieted down. I came up for air and slowly rejoined this thing we call life. I remember walking the dog for the first time after the tragedy and feeling as though I was seeing the world for the very first time. I noticed the color of the sky, the sound of cars passing by, the breeze against my face. What struck me most was realizing that while my world had completely stopped for a short time, 99.99% of the planet had no idea of what had happened and it was life as usual.
Eventually, I returned to the ordinary responsibilities of life — grocery shopping, paying bills, cleaning the house, making dinner, and going back to work. Some people might say it was too soon, but for me, work felt like a refuge. During years of navigating my son’s mental health crises, work had been one of the few places where I felt capable and steady. It gave structure to my days. It was something I could control.
Did I return as the same leadership coach I was before the tragedy?
Impossible.
My life had been turned upside down.
As I returned to work after my son’s death, here is what I noticed about myself.
I was distracted at times.
After years of living in crisis mode, my brain had been conditioned to expect emergencies. Now it was trying to make sense of what had happened and figure out how to emotionally recalibrate. In the middle of conversations, my thoughts would drift backward into stressful memories, replaying moments and wondering if there could have been a different outcome for my son.
Then suddenly, I would snap back into the present and realize I had missed parts of the conversation entirely.
My nervous system had not yet realized it no longer needed to stay on high alert. For six years, my mind had been trained to scan for danger, prepare for bad news, and brace for impact. I also had not yet figured out what to do with all the time, energy, emotion, and vigilance that had been devoted to my son for so long.
The distraction wasn’t carelessness. It was my brain trying to make sense of a reality it never wanted to accept.
I had forgetful moments.
At times, I would stop in the middle of a sentence and say, “Wait… what was I talking about?”
That can feel frightening at my age because your mind immediately wonders if something is seriously wrong. But I think grief consumes cognitive energy. So much of my emotional and mental capacity was being used to process loss and survive overwhelm. I later read that forgetfulness can actually be a protective response after trauma and tragedy.
That brought me some comfort.
I could feel steady one moment and emotional the next.
I discovered that grief sits just beneath the surface of everything. I could be having a productive conversation or enjoying a perfectly normal moment when suddenly a wave of emotion would rise from nowhere.
Sometimes all it took was a song, a word, a memory, or a place.
Even though I know this is normal, it still catches me off guard. What I’m learning is not to resist the emotion when it comes. I let it move through me instead of trying to shut it down.
There is healing in that.
I became more contemplative than usual.
I wanted solitude. I wanted quiet. I wanted to move slowly and think deeply. I found myself replaying the last six years, trying to make sense of the crises, the fear, the exhaustion, and how life had brought us here.
I needed space to digest what had happened and begin imagining a future that no longer included my son physically beside me.
Sometimes the most helpful thing was simply having no one around me at all.
My listening was inconsistent.
Listening requires presence and concentration. When your mind is overwhelmed and emotionally preoccupied, your ability to stay fully present can suffer.
For years, I had been listening for the 2 a.m. crisis call from my son. Listening for the “Mom, I want to come home” call. Listening for the “Ma’am, this is the police and we have som3 bad news” call. My brain was trained to remain alert for signs of danger.
Now I am slowly retraining myself to understand that those calls are no longer coming.
I was tired in a way that sleep could not fully fix.
There was the exhaustion that came from all the activities surrounding my son’s death, but there was also a deeper exhaustion that arrived after years of living in fear and hypervigilance. My body finally crossed a finish line it had been sprinting toward for years.
I found myself going to bed early, needing naps in the middle of the day, yawning even during meaningful conversations.
I think my body was finally beginning to understand that it no longer had to stay on standby for the next emergency.
If you are someone returning to work after a tragedy — or if someone on your team is returning after profound loss — please lead with compassion.
There is no formula for grief. No predictable timeline. No “right” way to come back into life or work after trauma.
Offer grace if someone seems distracted or underperforming. Be patient if they need reminders or lose their train of thought. Offer both companionship and space. Be gentle with their reentry into the workplace. Be generous by offering time off when possible.
People eventually find their footing again.
And often, after walking through deep suffering, they return with greater depth, empathy, perspective, and humanity than they had before.
