Standing in a grocery store aisle, Saundra was blindsided by grief over lunchables — the exact lunch her late husband packed every single day, with his baby carrots and two Oreos. In this deeply personal reflection, she unpacks why these small, unexpected “grief waves” matter so much: they’re not setbacks, but proof that your heart and soul are slowly catching up to what your mind already knows. She shares the simple grief wave timer technique — as short as one minute for those who avoid their emotions, up to ten for those who struggle to move past them — as a practical tool for giving yourself permission to feel, and then permission to move forward.
It was a gut punch I received standing in front of the Lunchable items in the grocery store. It happened because suddenly I realized I would never buy Lunchables again. This massive grief wave overcame me. And I just had to sit and feel my emotions.
My husband had loved Lunchables. He especially liked the ham and cheese or the turkey and cheese. He was not a fan of the pizza Lunchables. And every single day he would pack himself a lunch of Lunchables, baby carrots, a Coke, and two Oreos. He was a very predictable man. And when he died, he died so quickly that we actually had a stack of Lunchables left in the back of the refrigerator.
When my niece and nephews came for his funeral about 3 weeks after he died, I told them that they might as well finish the Lunchables because I was never going to eat them. When they pulled them out, they discovered that the Lunchables had gone bad, which actually shocked me. I didn’t realize that Lunchables could go bad.
I’ve heard the saying that when someone dies, you don’t lose them all at once, but you lose them bit by bit over time. And I feel like the moment in the grocery store when I realized I’d never buy Lunchables again, and the moment that we took out the last of the Lunchables from the refrigerator and threw them away, were both moments when I lost a little bit of my husband.
And while these moments can be difficult, they can be painful, they are really important for you to allow yourself to feel your emotions. That’s because in these moments, the reality of your loss becomes more real. And this is important because even though you know that your husband died, you were there. Even though your brain knows that he died, your soul, your spirit, your heart still don’t. They’re struggling to believe the unbelievable, to accept the impossible.
Now, we are a grief avoidance society. And so, when these grief waves come over you, you may automatically try to push them away or suppress them or distract yourself. And I get it, they’re painful. But, it is so important to you allow your heart these moments to feel every emotion that you’re going through. Your heart and your soul need to process this loss over and over again until they come to terms with it.
That’s why when we created the Grief App, we added in the grief wave timer. If you don’t have the Grief App, not a problem. You can set a kitchen timer, or you can set the timer on your phone. We generally recommend 3 minutes is kind of a default time. You can make it shorter or longer. If you are a person who really avoids your feelings, doesn’t like to sit with them at all, then we suggest that you set the timer for just 1 minute. Because you can do anything for 1 minute. You can allow yourself to feel your emotions for 1 minute. If you’re a person who has a hard time moving away from their pain, then we suggest maybe you set a timer for 10 minutes.
It’s a safe space to ground yourself and sit with your emotions. And then when the timer ends, give yourself permission to move on with your day, knowing that you gave your heart and soul that time to absorb your loss. Because while it’s important to feel your emotions, it’s also important to give yourself those moments of relief when you’re not in the middle of your emotions.
However you decide to handle these moments, please allow yourself to truly feel them. Your heart and your soul needs these before they can finally accept the reality of your new situation. And you can only build a full and meaningful life when you’re living in reality.
When my husband died, there was no grief support available to me. I had to find my way through grief and rebuild my life all on my own. I’m now on a mission to make sure that no one else has to go through grief alone.
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- Why Does It Feel So Impossible to Recover From the Death of a Loved One?
- Am I Grieving Wrong?
- Unlocking Grief Intensive
- I sold my home to build The Grief App: Here is why
- Why I Cried in the Lunchable Aisle: Understanding Grief Waves
