After six and a half years and more than 300 episodes, I took a month away from the podcast to rest, spend time with my family, and tend to my own heart.

When it felt right to return, there was only one person I wanted to talk with.

Stephanie — Keyan's mom — was the very first bereaved mother I ever interviewed when this podcast began. Even before that, she was someone I met in a grief support group just weeks after Andy died. She was further down the road of child loss than I was, and I remember quietly watching her, wondering how she was still standing. Somewhere in that watching was a small hope: If she can do this, maybe I can too.

Now, eight and a half years into her grief journey, Stephanie shares honestly about what life looks like today.

She talks about the days that still knock her off her feet, the complicated guilt that can come with laughing or enjoying time with her living children, and how grief doesn't disappear—it changes shape.

For five years, Stephanie poured herself into serving other grieving families at Starlight Ministries. It was good work. Holy work. But somewhere along the way, the work that once helped her heal began to crowd out her own healing. As her therapist told her, "Anything you give energy to takes away from your healing energy."

So she stepped away.

We talk about what it means to reassess. To recognize when something that once brought relief no longer does. To admit that even good, sacred things can become too much.

Together we talk about:

• what it means to be years into grief and still hurting • the tension of holding joy and sorrow at the same time • the freedom of allowing grief to change as the years pass • the difference between being healed and being cured

This episode is about scars, seasons, and the quiet courage it takes to keep learning your grief as it changes.

If you are years into loss and wondering why it still hurts sometimes… you are not alone.