Why Back-to-School Season Can Bring Grief Back to the Surface for Parents, Too

Back-to-school season isn’t only an adjustment for kids.

For a grieving parent, it can quietly highlight who’s missing.

You might reach for your phone to send your mom that first-day picture before remembering you can’t. Wish your dad were here to hear about the teacher your kid got—or laugh at the story they came home telling after their first day.

Maybe you’re standing in the school supply aisle and suddenly feel emotional over notebooks and pencils. Or watching your child walk into school and realizing just how much your parent would have loved to see who they’re becoming.

Sometimes it’s not the big anniversaries that catch you off guard. It’s the ordinary milestones. The traditions they should still be part of. The pictures you should still be sending. The phone calls you should still be making.

And underneath that unexpected ache is often one simple thought:

They should be here for this.

Then the calendar fills up. Practices start, homework comes home, mornings get earlier, and suddenly everyone needs to be somewhere at the exact same time. You’re trying to remember lunches, permission slips, appointments, backpacks—and somehow there is always a missing water bottle.

And you might notice you’re more irritable than usual. Something tiny makes you snap. A normal Tuesday feels strangely overwhelming. You’re exhausted even though you don’t feel like you’ve done anything that exhausting.

Sometimes that’s the part of grief we don’t recognize.

Grief doesn’t always show up as crying or consciously thinking, “I miss my mom.” Sometimes it looks like having less patience. Feeling overstimulated. Wanting everyone to stop needing something from you for five minutes. Or realizing that this season would feel different if your parent were still here.

So try making the transition a little smaller. You don’t have to adjust to the entire school year in the first week. When you can, leave a little white space on the calendar instead of filling every open moment. Let dinner be easy. Say no to the thing that doesn’t actually need to happen right now. Give yourself ten quiet minutes after drop-off before jumping straight into work, errands, or the next person who needs you.

And pay attention to the moments when your reaction feels bigger than what’s happening. If the missing water bottle makes you want to cry, or one more request from your kid feels like way too much, get curious before you criticize yourself. Maybe you’re overstimulated. Maybe you’re exhausted. Maybe grief has been quietly sitting underneath the busyness all week and this is simply where it finally found a way out.

You can even ask yourself, “What am I actually needing right now?” Maybe it’s five minutes alone. Maybe it’s texting someone who understands. Maybe it’s looking at an old picture, saying their name, or admitting, “I really wish my mom were here today.”

Because sometimes the kindest thing you can do isn’t make the grief go away—it’s make a little room for it.

And most importantly, give yourself permission to miss them during moments that are supposed to be happy. Your child can have a wonderful first day and you can ache because your parent didn’t get to see it. You can be proud, excited, grateful—and still have that little voice in the back of your mind saying, They should be here.

Joy and grief don’t cancel each other out. Sometimes they show up in the exact same moment.

You don't have to choose between being excited about the life happening in front of you and grieving the person who should have been here to see it. Both can be true.

Two things can be true. ❤️

You can be excited for your child AND wish your parent were here to see it.

That doesn’t mean you’re grieving wrong. It means this season holds something tender for you.