Grieving the Living: A Mother’s Threshold

My son isn’t dead. But he’s not himself anymore. And I’m grieving someone who still walks this earth.

Most mourn the dead.

But not me.

I mourn the living.

I grieve a light that was once vibrant—suppressed, buried, fragmented, shattered—until all that remained was a shell, wrapped in psychosis and pain.

I bargained.

I pleaded.

I wept.

I denied.

I raged.

I collapsed into despair.

And finally… I grieved.

But grieving wasn’t the end.

It was the beginning of acceptance.

It was learning to live inside the liminal space—the place between love and loss, presence and absence, memory and madness. And I let it consume me. Because trying to resist only made it worse.

And that’s not all.

There was shame.

I called myself a failure in every way imaginable.

I blamed my blood.

I blamed my body.

I blamed myself for carrying the gene.

And the worst part?

The world made it worse.

Where I saw someone I loved—

they saw an addict.

Then a schizophrenic.

Then a statistic.

“No hope,” they said.

And in some ways… they’re right.

This world wasn’t meant to hold such sensitive souls.

The One Who Came

For those who grieve the living, there is only one...

And it couldn’t be Hecate.

What mother can ask such a thing of her child?

She knew I would need someone else.

Someone who would not flinch.

Someone who could carry what I could not.

So she sent Anubis.

I know—not what you expected to hear.

And no, he didn’t save my son.

That’s not what he came to do.

He came because he saw a grieving mother holding her son,

and the world had no place for them.

So he stepped forward.

He drew a circle in the sand around us.

He stood at the threshold—between what was and what would never be again—and he began to speak.

Not in words I could understand.

But in a language my soul knew.

I rocked.

I cried.

I screamed.

And still—he stood there, arms open,

not asking,

not forcing,

but saying only:

“Betta. It’s time.

Let me carry him.”

And I handed my son

to the only one who could hold him safe between realms.

Final Words

My son is not dead.

But a part of me died.

And so did a part of him.

You, my dear soul,

cannot save what’s already been fragmented.

You cannot repair the pieces of another’s shattered light.

The only “right” left to do—

is to gather the shards of your own broken heart,

and hold them tender.

Live for the lost

like they never got the chance.

Breathe again.

Smile again.

And show the world that love can exist even in pain.

We are not one or the other.

We are both.

And that’s okay.

Some days you grieve.

And on others—you live.

Love is not lost.

It is suspended in between,

and it is safe in the arms of Anubis

until you meet again

in another liminal space.