When The World Feels Shattered
When we lose someone we love to suicide, it can feel as though our entire world has been shattered. The pain is overwhelming, and in those early days, weeks, and months, it may seem impossible to imagine a future where we can breathe freely again. We wonder how life can possibly go on when someone so precious to us is no longer here. These feelings are natural, valid, and shared by so many who have walked this difficult path before us.
Willie Nelson’s Journey: 33 Years of Getting Through
Country singer Willie Nelson knows this pain intimately. In 1991, he lost his son Billy to suicide, and 27 years later, in 2018, he released a song called Something You Get Through. The title itself carries a profound message for all of us who are survivors of suicide loss. Willie’s willingness to share his journey after more than three decades reminds us that healing is possible, even when it feels impossibly far away.
The Heart of Grief: Love is Bigger Than Us All
The lyrics of Willie’s song speak directly to the heart of grief: When you lose the one you love, you think your world has ended. You think your world will be a waste of life without them in it. You feel there’s no way to go on, life is just a sad, sad song. But love is bigger than us all, the end is not the end at all. These words capture the devastation we feel, but they also point toward something beyond the pain, the enduring power of love itself.
Getting Through, Not Over
The song’s central message is one we need to hear, especially in our darkest moments: It’s not somethin’ you get over, but it’s somethin’ you get through. This distinction matters deeply. We are not expected to get over the loss of our loved ones, to somehow erase them from our hearts or pretend the pain never existed. Instead, we learn to move through our grief, carrying our love for them as we go. We learn to live alongside our loss, not in spite of it.
Love is Forever
There’s a headstone near my son’s grave that carries a simple but powerful message: While life may end, love is forever. These words echo the truth that Willie Nelson’s song expresses so beautifully. Our loved ones may no longer be physically present, but the love we shared with them doesn’t disappear. It remains with us, a testament to the relationships that shaped our lives and the bonds that death cannot sever.
Understanding Suicide as Illness
It’s important for us to remember that our loved ones were taken from us by a disease, a disease that affected their brain and distorted their thinking in ways we may never fully understand. Mental illness betrayed them, making them believe things that weren’t true, convincing them that the world would be better without them when nothing could be further from the truth. Understanding suicide as the result of illness, rather than choice, can help ease some of the guilt and confusion that so often accompany our grief.
The Path Forward: Holding Love and Loss Together
The path of a suicide loss survivor is not an easy one. There will be days when the weight of grief feels unbearable, when anniversaries and memories bring fresh waves of pain. But there will also be moments of unexpected peace, times when a memory brings a smile instead of tears, days when you realize you’re carrying your loved one’s legacy forward in meaningful ways. Healing doesn’t mean forgetting. It means learning to hold both the love and the loss together.
Hope from 33 Years Later
Willie Nelson has been a survivor of suicide loss for 33 years now, and his willingness to create art from his pain offers us something precious: hope. If he can move through three decades and still honor his son’s memory while finding meaning and purpose in life, then we can too. You are stronger than you know, more resilient than you feel right now, and you are not alone. The love you carry for your lost one is a bridge between the past and the future, and it will light your way forward. You will get through this, not over it, but through it, and on the other side, you will find that love truly is bigger than us all.
You May Also Find Helpful
- When Music Becomes a Bridge to Healing – Understanding how music can reach into the deepest corners of grief and become a companion on your healing journey.
- What Does Healing Look Like – Understanding that healing means learning to carry both love and loss together, not erasing the pain but moving through it.
- Time After a Suicide Loss – Understanding how grief changes over time and why healing doesn’t follow a predictable timeline.
- Life After Loss: Honoring Our Stories and Our Loved Ones – Proof that there truly is life after loss, that meaning can be found, and that love endures even in the face of unimaginable loss.
- Is the Second Year Harder? Understanding Your Unique Grief Journey – Understanding that getting through grief happens gradually, with different challenges emerging over time.
- Ritual and Remembrance – Creating ways to carry your loved one’s legacy forward in meaningful ways as you continue living.
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