It took me seven years to finally let go of my husband. Here’s what I’ve learned about grief over that time.

I placed the box on the security conveyor belt and hefted my packed backpack into a bin to be scanned. A young woman, around my daughter’s age, noticed me as I gently patted the box.

“It’s cremated remains.”

“Thank you for telling us,” she replied kindly, “so we can ensure it’s handled with respect.”

After inspecting it carefully, she handed the box back to me. “I’m so sorry for your loss,” she said, her voice sincere. “Thanks,” I replied, nodding, and walked toward the gate for my flight to reunite with my now-adult children.

My husband, Kai, passed away seven years ago. By the time we received the diagnosis, it was too late for treatment, and the cancer took his life in just five months.

He had been healthy and active. The kids were nearing college graduation, and we had so many plans for our empty-nest years: traveling, watching beach sunrises, reading and writing books. Maybe even spoiling future grandchildren.

The future we had envisioned was torn away, like pages from a book set ablaze and never to be read again.

The shock of his death was all-encompassing. A traditional burial and memorial service seemed impossible. The grief was too overwhelming—too personal—to share with others.

Before he died, I was known for being hyper-organized and meticulous. I often called myself a “type A-plus.”

When Kai passed, I lost the ability to concentrate or even form coherent thoughts. I left my keys in the door and once put laundry in the refrigerator.

The months that followed his death are a blur. Each day felt like a sleepwalk. I’d find myself at the grocery store holding a box of his favorite cereal, with no idea how I got there or how long I had been staring at it.

I became a stranger to myself. One moment, I was numb; the next, I was seething with anger at a person across the street for simply being alive and going about their day.

What hurt the most was the silence. Not just the empty house, but the absence of our shared life. No more texts, no more “I love yous,” no more silly memes or shared moments of frustration. No more little notes tucked into pockets or on the bathroom mirror.

We did nearly everything together, rarely spending more than a night apart.

And then, suddenly, our shared life, our ongoing conversation, just stopped. Full stop. I went from being his wife to being his widow. In an instant, the world I knew became unrecognizable.

It’s basic brain science that our habits—our repeated actions, thoughts, and routines—literally carve grooves in our brains.

That’s why our shorthand, our inside jokes, and our special ways of communicating worked so well, built over years of repetition and mutual understanding.

With my life partner abruptly removed from my life, my brain didn’t know what to do. It had to start over—constantly forging new pathways that didn’t include Kai, time and time again. I had to try to carve new grooves that matched my new reality.

Even now, after all these years, I still pick up my phone to text him, before my brain remembers. The shock still hits, fresh and raw, as if it just happened.

These moments come at me like the pop of a firecracker or slamming into a brick wall.

For a long time, it was impossible to think about anything else. The weight of my grief felt endless and bottomless.

Anger, in some ways, was easier to handle — anger at others, at the life we lost, at what felt like fate’s unfairness, at God. At least anger felt like something I could control, something I could act on rather than being acted upon.

We don’t often think of grief as trauma, but that’s exactly what it is. It’s not something you simply “get over,” like a dental appointment. As the years pass, the heavy clouds of grief might part for longer stretches, but they’ll never fully clear. Grief becomes as ingrained in you as your own hands.

In some ways, my tragedy — Kai’s tragedy — wasn’t all that exceptional. Death comes to all of us, and it’s absurd to think we have any real control over when, how, or where it happens.

But we were so young. It came so suddenly. We had so much life still ahead of us.

And yet, despite the overwhelming trauma that reshapes everything, the moment after which nothing will ever be the same, life somehow continues. The Earth keeps turning.

For me, the “important dates” aren’t harder than any other day. I don’t miss Kai any more on his birthday, the anniversary of his death, or our wedding anniversary than I do on any random Tuesday.

It still seems unbelievable to me that someone so full of life is simply gone, no longer here. The recurring milestones — anniversaries and such — just bring the emptiness back to the forefront of my mind.

So, on what would have been our 30th wedding anniversary, I realized Kai deserved a resting place more fitting than a box on a high shelf in my closet.

It was time to take his physical remains to the extended Kiser family plot, up in the Blue Ridge Mountains, a place Kai always called home.

At the cemetery, the kids and I stood together in the warm sun, listening to the breeze rustle through the familiar mountain grass. Seven years may seem long, but in the grand scheme, it’s just a fleeting moment. And this led me to a sobering realization: someday, my kids will do this again, at this same place, for me.

The thought hit me hard — a grief for them, for a future pain I can’t shield them from.

Grief doesn’t follow a neat path. It’s a Mobius strip, looping back on itself, never moving in a straight line.

As my son put it, “You don’t miss him less. You just get a little better at missing him.”

“He loved us more than anything,” I said, wiping my tears at the gravesite. “More than anything.”

We know, they nodded in understanding.

The trauma of grief isn’t the only thing that lingers. Love stays with us, too.

Helene Kiser is working on a memoir. She is the founder of the Butterfly Blueprint and the writer of the free weekly Editorial Notes newsletter, where she teaches other writers to self-edit like pros. Find her online at helenekiser.com and @HeleneTheWriter.

This article was originally published on HuffPost.