Same Book, New Chapter

The Year of the Fire Horse: Moving forward without leaving behind.

February 17th is a big date for me.

It’s my and my first husband’s wedding anniversary. It’s a date that hurts because we only ever got to celebrate one before he died during my pregnancy. I can’t help but reflect on who I was when I look back at photos from that day. My happy smile, the future wide open, no idea about what came next. The word ‘suicide’ barely on my radar.

The date holds weight. The kind you feel in your chest before you even realise what day it is.

This year, though, it feels even more amplified.

There’s an eclipse.
Lunar New Year energy.
Fire horse symbolism  - movement, intensity, transformation.

I’m not an astrology expert. I don’t pretend to understand the mechanics of eclipses or the deeper mythology of zodiac years. But I do understand feeling. And this year, February 17th feels charged, for everyone, not just me.

I don’t know if it’s because these things are colliding, and I don’t know if it’s coincidence. I just know it feels significant, and I’m not sure why.

And after loss, I’ve learnt to trust that feeling.

As usual, the small signs have been there. Ladybirds appearing when I’m not expecting them (there are currently two camping out on my bedroom ceiling, despite the freezing February temperatures). Our song has been playing in the supermarket and as I’ve just sat down in a restaurant. Those tiny nudges that make you stop and catch your breath,

You can explain them away if you want to. Probability. Algorithms. Seasonal insect behaviour.

But grief makes you sensitive to timing. When someone you love dies,  especially suddenly  - time fractures. Life becomes ‘before’ and ‘after.’ Certain dates don’t just represent memories. They represent entire versions of the future that never unfolded.

But here’s what makes this year different.

I am remarried.
I am deeply, happily in love.

And I am raising a six-year-old boy who reminds me so much of his ‘other daddy.’

I see Ant in him constantly -  in flashes of expression, in the way he moves, in the way he laughs. And I also see something else: continuation.

Not replacement.
Not rewriting.

Continuation.

Moving Forward Isn’t Erasure

There’s an unspoken fear that sits inside grief.

That if you move forward -  really forward - you are somehow leaving them behind.

That joy might dilute what you had.
That new love might dishonour old love.

For a long time, I was careful with my happiness. As if it needed to be balanced against the loss. As if I might be judged for showing too much of it.

But life doesn’t work like that.

Love isn’t a finite resource. It doesn’t divide; it expands.

This isn’t a new book.

It’s the same book.

None of it cancels the other out.

Closing a chapter doesn’t mean you start a different story. It means the story deepens. The character evolves. The context shifts.

The earlier pages still matter.

What I Couldn’t Find  - And What I Did

People often tried to find meaning in what happened. They searched for lessons. For purpose. For something redemptive that might make the pain more digestible.

I couldn’t find that.

There was no tidy explanation waiting for me at the bottom of it.

What I did find , slowly, and much less dramatically ,  was choice.

Not the choice in what happened.
But the choice of how I responded.

In the months after his death, I began noticing the gaps.

The language people didn’t have.
The check-ins that stopped too soon.
The discomfort around the word ‘suicide.’
The way sympathy felt muted and outdated when what I felt was anything but muted.

I noticed how quickly support thins out after the funeral.
How people want grief to be linear and private.
How prevention is often talked about like policy instead of humanity.

And that noticing became the beginning of something.

Not a grand mission.
Not a heroic transformation.

Just a decision to build differently.

Building a Life that Honours Them

When I say I’m building a life that honours Ant, I don’t mean I’m living in his shadow.

I mean in the way I move through the world. In what I’ve learnt from his silent struggles. In how I could possibly help others.

It informs the business we built  - bright, modern cards that make it easier to check in on someone. That bring colour into spaces that felt drained of it. That encourage people to say the things they’re scared to say.

We built something for people like him.

And for people like me.

Not because his death needed to ‘mean’ something.

But because that kind of love needs somewhere to land.

If I had tried to freeze time at the moment of loss, everything would have stayed suspended in pain.

Instead, I let it move.

Not away.
But forward.

The Fire Horse and the Same Story

Fire Horse years are said to symbolise transformation. Intensity. A kind of burning away of what no longer fits.

And maybe that’s what this February 17th feels like.

Not an ending.

But an acknowledgement.

An acceptance that my life now holds multiple truths at once.

I am a widow.
I am a wife.
I am a mother to a child who has so much to learn as he grows up.
I am someone who speaks openly about suicide because silence didn’t serve us.

Those identities don’t compete.

They coexist.

This isn’t a brand-new narrative where the past gets neatly archived. It’s the same book.

The grief is still written into it.
So is the joy.
So is the second chance at love.
So is the business born from noticing what was missing.

When I speak up about suicide prevention, I’m not speaking from theory. I’m speaking from lived experience. From the understanding that this is painfully human work.

And when I love again, I’m not betraying what was. I’m honouring the fact that love changed me  - and continues to shape me. And I now know more than ever just what a treasure true love is

When a Date Feels Big

Maybe it’s the eclipse.
Maybe it’s symbolism layered on memory.

Or maybe certain dates just hold energy because of the stories we’ve attached to them.

February 17th will always belong to Ant and me.

But it also belongs to who I am now.

A woman who survived unimaginable loss.
Who carried a baby through it.
Who sees that baby -  now six, dark hair that never quite sits right - running through the present moment.
Who found love again.
Who chose to build something instead of collapsing inward.

Moving forward didn’t mean leaving anyone behind.

It meant allowing the story to continue.

In the same book.

And this year, February 17th feels like it belongs to everyone else as well.
All of those chapters. All of those stories.

And that feels beautifully poetic.

Even if I’m still not entirely sure why.