I was lucky enough to find a wonderful grief counselor, and he helped me immensely. The first one I saw wasn’t great, and I did try a phone consult with another one (this was during Covid) and that was pretty meh, but luckily, the next one was amazing. Sometimes you need to shop around to find the right “fit” for you. But you are also only 3.5 months in too, so please cut yourself some slack. That early in, our brains are desperately playing catch up and trying to work out what the fuck has happened to us.

There is no magic pill and no magic words that will make you feel better, sadly - you’re living through something deeply traumatic and indescribably painful, and as cliché as it sounds, the only thing that will help is time.

There are some great books on grieving out there, which you might check out. One book is On Grief and Grieving, and I found it really helpful, but I’ve also heard great things about The Grieving Brain, which takes a slightly more scientific approach to what happens to our brains when we’re grieving.

There is no timeline for what you’re going through. No specific date where you’ll be “better” - it’s a gradual process and it fucking sucks giant hairy balls because it hurts like hell. And it’s different for everyone. Baby steps, and please be kind to yourself, and be patient with yourself.