The Parts of Us That Never Fully Come Home
This past week, someone casually told me to have a “Happy Memorial Day”…. And before immediately returning the sentiment, I caught myself. Have we become so uncomfortable with grief, sacrifice, and collective pain that we turned Memorial Day into distraction instead of remembrance? It’s a question I sit with deeply every year. Every time those words leave a mouth I instantly realized how disconnected they sound from the actual meaning of the day.
Happy? Memorial Day is not really meant to be “happy.” It is meant to be remembered and memorialized..
And yet somewhere along the way, we transformed it into something easier to emotionally tolerate. Sales. Barbecues. Long weekends. Shopping promotions. The unofficial kickoff to summer. We fill the day with noise and activity, perhaps because silence would require us to actually feel the weight of what this day actually represents.
Is this because grief is difficult and the collective pain uncomfortable? Does this mean we cannot acknowledge the true human cost of freedom, that asks something from us emotionally that many people have never been taught how to hold.
The Parts of Them That Never Fully Came Home
My father is a Vietnam veteran, and growing up, he rarely spoke about his time away. Like many veterans of his generation, silence became part of survival. Yet even as a child, I could sense there were pieces of him inside that never fully came back home.
Sometimes I would find him sitting quietly in the basement on a crate near the furnace where he kept his old military trunk. He would be sitting with those belongings and pieces of another lifetime with a kind of heaviness that showed in his body that I did not yet have the language to understand. If anyone came downstairs, he would often pretend he was simply working on the furnace. At the time, I didn’t fully grasp what I was witnessing. Now I do.
It saddens me how many veterans live in isolation, even when they are surrounded by people who love them. Because isolation is not always physical. Sometimes the body shows up to life every day while parts of the psyche remains somewhere else entirely — carrying memories, grief, guilt, loss, or experiences too heavy to put into words.
I think many families have witnessed versions of this quietly unfolding inside their homes without ever fully knowing how to talk about it. And maybe that is part of why Memorial Day matters so deeply. Not only because we honor those who never made it home, but because we must also become more willing to see the invisible weight carried by so many who did.
The Human Cost We Rarely Talk About
In my coaching practice, I have gotten the opportunity to work closely with veterans and military couples, and one thing becomes very clear, very quickly: service does not always end when deployment does.
Many veterans return home carrying experiences the outside world may never fully understand. Hypervigilance. Survivor’s guilt. Loss. Nervous system injuries. Emotional disconnection. Identity struggles. Isolation. Grief that has nowhere socially acceptable to go. Some return home physically. Others are still trying to find their way back physically, mentally, emotionally, socially and spiritually.
And while Memorial Day is specifically intended to honor those who lost their lives in service, I also believe it should challenge us to look more honestly at how we support those still living with the aftermath of service… Who also might have lost pieces of themselves that never came home. Veteran suicide, mental health struggles, and reintegration challenges remain conversations many people still avoid because they feel heavy and complicated. Yet avoiding discomfort has never been the same thing as honoring sacrifice.
When Parts of Us Never Fully Return
Over the years, I’ve come to understand that not all wounds are visible, and not all parts of a person return after survival.
Sometimes grief, trauma, war, and prolonged survival experiences change the internal landscape of a human being permanently. The nervous system changes. Identity changes. The way someone experiences safety, connection, and the world around them can shift in ways too difficult to explain to others. For a long time, I think healing was often framed as “getting back to who you once were.” But healing is not always about the return to orginal self.
Maybe it is more like a forest after a fire. A burned forest does not return to exactly what it was before. Some trees are gone forever. The terrain changes. The ecosystem changes. But over time, if the conditions become safe enough again, new growth slowly begins to emerge through the damaged ground.
Maybe people heal similarly. Not by erasing what happened. Not by pretending the loss did not change them. But by slowly creating enough safety, connection, purpose, meaning, and community for new parts of life to begin growing around the grief.
When Remembrance Becomes Action
Last year, my husband joined with a Navy SEAL the final leg of a Memorial Day awareness trek led by a Recon Marine focused on bringing attention to veteran isolation, mental health struggles, and the very real crisis many veterans silently face after service.
This year, the trek continues — 500 miles across the state of Michigan — with the same mission: to create awareness, connection, and funded support for veterans who often feel forgotten long after their service ends. What impacted me most was not only the physical challenge of the trek itself, but what it awakened in the people around it.
My husband, also a veteran to his native country, is an acupuncturist and bodywork practitioner, who was deeply moved by what this veteran was doing and by the reality so many continue carrying quietly. Rather than simply admiring the mission, he asked himself a different question: “What can I do with the skills I already have to become part of the solution?” That question became action.
He created the Stillpoint Warriors Movement — a community-based qigong and movement practice dedicated to supporting veterans and first responders through community-funded care and free treatment opportunities. The movement combines qigong, meditation, functional movement, traditional club and mace training to create something deeper than exercise alone. It creates community. Presence. Regulation. Strength. Connection.
Because healing does not always happen through words alone. Sometimes healing begins through movement, nervous system safety, shared purpose, and knowing someone still cares enough to show up. He also started a community based, donation funded acupuncture program that helps veterans in his private practice as a way to give back and be of service.
And maybe that is part of what Memorial Day is truly asking from us — not perfection, not performance, but participation. Not just gratitude spoken aloud once a year, but a willingness to ask:
How can I contribute?
How can I serve?
How can I help carry what others have carried alone for far too long?
What Memorial Day Quietly Asks of Us
Maybe Memorial Day was never supposed to be comfortable. Maybe it was meant to interrupt us for a moment. To ask us to slow down long enough to remember the people behind the uniforms, the families behind the grief, and the invisible battles many veterans continue carrying long after the world has moved on.
Not every wound is visible. Not every war ends when someone returns home. And not every act of remembrance needs to be loud to matter. Sometimes remembrance looks like silence. Sometimes it looks like listening more carefully. Sometimes it looks like finally being willing to acknowledge the emotional and human cost of freedom instead of covering it with celebration and distraction.
As we gather with family and friends this Memorial Day weekend, perhaps the invitation is not to remove joy altogether, but simply not to lose sight of what this day was created to hold. Before the food. Before the sales. Before the noise. Pause. Reflect. Remember those who never made it back home, and those who did return, with parts of them that never fully came back home either.