Too Much Quiet

Last night, our family slept in four different houses.

Nothing bad happened. No drama. Just real life—coparenting schedules, work travel, and responsibility pulling us in different directions. Adam going to Haines for work, coparent time happening, and me at home on-call all weekend. And still, saying it out loud feels heavier than I expect.

There’s a quiet ache that comes with nights like that. It doesn’t hit you all at once. It just shows up slowly and sits with you.

When I got home, I tried to stay busy. Picked up a little. Folded some laundry. Moved around. Diesel ran behind me like he always does when I came home, then stopped. He looked back at the door, waiting for the little footsteps that usually follow me inside. Even he was confused.

The house was calm. Almost peaceful. But also… too quiet.

No two little boys whispering down the hall at bedtime. No random cough or whispered question. And when I climbed into bed, there was no comfortable warmth beside me. No one breathing next to me. Just a space of unwrinkled covers.

Coparenting has a way of humbling you. It teaches you how to hold gratitude and sadness at the same time. How you can do the right thing and still feel the weight of it. How missing people doesn’t mean something is wrong—it just means you love them.

Some nights, the quiet feels earned. Other nights, it feels lonely. Both can be true.

I reminded myself that this ache is really just love with nowhere to go in that moment. That in a few days it will sound different. That the voices, the mess, the warmth will all come back.

So I let the silence be what it is. I don’t try to rush past it or fill every second. Because pushing through doesn’t mean ignoring the hurt. It just means carrying it and keeping on anyway.

If you’ve ever stood in a house that felt a too big, too still, or too quiet—know you’re not alone in that. It’s strange. It’s humbling. And it’s part of loving deeply.

The quiet ache is real.

And so is all the blessed love behind it.