Learning to stumble with grace

I manage projects with complex robotic systems for a living. No matter the brand, type, or function of a machine, there is a manual. There is no manual for losing a child. No step-by-step guide, no checklist, no timeline for when things are supposed to feel “normal” again. When Alana died, the world didn’t just change, it stopped making sense.

Grief is strange like that. It’s loud and silent at the same time. Some days you feel like Atlas. The Greek titan cursed to carry a weight that never lifts. Other days it sneaks up on you in the middle of doing something mundane. A song over the radio, a memory post on Facebook, someone laughing that sounds too much like her. Those moments are the worst. I can get up and bear the weight because I know it will be there. Getting caught off guard while carrying that weight will make you stumble every time. You don’t “move on” from losing a child. You learn, slowly and imperfectly, how to move with the loss. You learn how to carry that weight and stumble with grace.

I’ve learned that well-meaning people often don’t know what to say. And I get it, grief makes people uncomfortable. But what I didn’t expect was how lonely it can feel, even when you’re surrounded by support. Being 4 months into this horrible journey, I can remember the first few days. Sitting on my deck surrounded by people that traveled in from across the country to be with us, and while my appreciation and gratitude for them is immeasurable, I felt alone. There’s a part of this journey that only parents who have buried a child truly understand. It’s a club no one ever asks to join. Even within this terrible club, there are layers. The grief a parent feels when losing a child at birth is different than the grief a parent feels when losing an adult child, and neither of them are the same as losing an adolescent, or a toddler. They are all valid, they are all complex.

What I miss most are the little things. The everyday moments. The things you don’t realize are sacred until they’re gone. Her voice. Her energy. The way she filled a room without trying. Alana had a light about her and losing that light changed us forever.

But here’s the part people don’t talk about enough: grief doesn’t only break you, it also reshapes you. It forces you to look at what really matters. It strips away the noise. It teaches you compassion in ways nothing else can. I am not the same person I was before Alana, and I never will be. But I am trying to be a better one because of her.

Alana’s Wings of Hope was not my idea. It was Sarah’s.

In the midst of unbearable loss, she told me she had made a promise to Alana. A promise that her life would continue to matter, that her light would not fade, and that something good would grow even from the deepest pain. Alana’s Wings of Hope exists because of that promise. It is an extension of a mother’s love and a commitment to carry Alana’s spirit forward.

The foundation doesn’t fix the pain. Nothing does. But it gives it purpose. It allows us to turn grief into action, heartbreak into hope, and love into something that reaches beyond our family to others who are hurting.

If you are grieving, I want you to know this: you are not weak for hurting. You are not broken for struggling. And you are not alone, even when it feels like you are. There is no right way to grieve. There is only your way.

I carry Alana with me every day, in my heart, in my choices, and in the responsibility of honoring the promise Sarah made to our daughter. Alana’s story didn’t end. It changed. And as long as we are here, her name will still be spoken, her impact still felt, and her light still shared.

Because love doesn’t die.

And neither does she.

Adam VanMeter