When Bob moved to Heaven in October 2020, I couldn’t imagine ever experiencing genuine happiness again. How could I? The person who had been at the center of my happiness for nearly four decades was gone. Even in those rare moments when I found myself laughing or enjoying something, guilt was never far behind.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to be happy. I simply couldn’t seem to allow myself to be.

That first Thanksgiving, just weeks after Bob’s death, the kids and I went to Disney World. We were hoping to escape, at least temporarily, the overwhelming reality of our first holiday without him. But grief traveled with us.

Disney World is supposed to be one of the happiest places on earth. At least it had been on our annual trips with the children and grandchildren before. And, that happiness is carried into our home with many decorations of the Disney characters and sets. 

Yet, surrounded by all that happiness, I couldn’t find my own. Even when something made me smile or laugh, there was that familiar guilt. How could I possibly be enjoying myself when Bob wasn’t there to share it?

Looking back, I understand that we couldn’t escape our grief simply by changing our surroundings. We had lost someone who was part of everything that made our family what it was. His absence was just as real at Disney World as it was at home.

Nearly four years later, I returned to Disney World under very different circumstances.

My brother had invited me to join his family as he took Mom to Disney World around July 7, the anniversary of Dad’s moving to Heaven in 2021. It was another time when our family was especially conscious of someone we loved and missed.

But something happened during that trip that I hadn’t expected. I was happy. Genuinely happy. ot just smiling for a photograph or laughing briefly before being overcome by sadness. I found myself experiencing real happiness. And for the first time since Bob moved to Heaven, I didn’t feel guilty about it.

I hadn’t stopped missing him. I hadn’t forgotten what our lives had been like together or wished away the years we shared. I still wanted him beside me, sharing the experience, laughing with our family, and making another memory.

But I was beginning to understand something that grief had made difficult for me to accept. My happiness didn’t diminish my love for Bob.

For so long, happiness and grief had seemed incompatible. Somewhere along the way, I had begun to feel that allowing myself to enjoy life meant somehow leaving him behind. I knew intellectually that wasn’t true. But knowing something and being able to feel it are two very different things.

That July, I experienced the difference. I could be happy and still miss him. I could laugh and still wish he were there. I could enjoy the people I loved without feeling that I was betraying the person I had lost.

What encouraged me most wasn’t simply that I had experienced happiness again. It was that I had finally allowed myself to experience it without guilt.

I don’t believe grief is something we conquer or leave behind. I don’t believe there comes a magical moment when we are suddenly healed and life returns to what it was before. My life will never be what it was when Bob was physically here, and I wouldn’t pretend otherwise. But perhaps part of learning to live with grief is discovering that sorrow and happiness can occupy the same heart.

I will always miss Bob. I will always wish we had more time. There will always be moments when his absence feels as overwhelming as it did in those first weeks. But that doesn’t mean there cannot also be laughter, beautiful memories, family adventures, and genuine happiness.

The trip didn’t change how much I loved him or how deeply I grieved. It changed something about what I could allow myself to experience while carrying that grief.

Nearly four years after losing the love of my life, happiness found me again. And this time, I let it stay.

Moving forward with love…