Resilience Is Built Between the Storms

It’s built choice by choice, even in the face of devastating loss

“This will make me grow as a person. I don’t know how and I don’t know when. But, it will.”

As quickly as that crazy thought entered my mind, it was overwhelmed by inconsolable anguish, it was like every fuse in me blew at once.

I was on my hands and knees, staring at the floor in our living room, listening to myself repeat, “Oh God,” over and over again. I’d just found out that my oldest daughter, Chloe, had been killed in a horrific head-on collision.

My daughter. Dead. Every parent’s worst nightmare was happening to me. How was I going to get through this?

I had no idea. But, I knew I would find a way. This wasn’t my first rodeo. I’d already watched mental health issues slowly kill my wife.

Let’s rewind twenty-five years, before any of this happened. Back then, I thought of myself as strong. I was smart. I’d served in the military. I lifted weights, practiced martial arts, and believed I was the captain of my own destiny. I was capable of getting through anything.

I was so much more fragile than I’d ever imagined.

The truth is, I’d never really been tested. I grew up in a loving, two-parent home. We weren’t wealthy, but there was always a roof over our heads and food on the table. School came easily. And the older I get, the more I realize how rare, and how much of a gift, that kind of foundation really was.

Cindy and I married and had two wonderful daughters. Shortly after the birth of our second, everything fell apart. The demons of Cindy’s abusive childhood, combined with the trauma she experienced as a police officer, took over her, and our lives.

The next five years were a waking nightmare of homeless shelters, rehab, locked psychiatric wards, rage, lies, medication, crushing depression, violence and ultimately, suicide.

I did the best I could to keep her alive and to raise and protect our daughters. But it was so far beyond my ability to cope with that I turned to alcohol. It seemed to help, though in my heart I knew it was only making things worse.

After Cindy died, I spent the next five years drinking heavily and pretending I was fine. I remarried, moved to a new town and was progressing in my career. From the outside, it seemed like everything was on track. I’d made it through a terrible experience and come out the other side.

I was strong and resilient. Just like I’d always told myself.

Except I was stuck. I spent all day thinking about drinking. I planned how to hide it and lie about it. I organized our outings around booze so I wouldn’t have to suffer without it. I tore myself apart for not being able to quit.

All the while, I was avoiding facing the pain of Cindy’s death. I was stuck in a self-imposed purgatory. I was stagnant, living in the past, and trying anything to avoid what the present moment had to show me.

That wasn’t resilience. That was me refusing to face reality.

Resilience

Resilience is the difference between staying down and trying again. It’s what lets you take the next step when the last one nearly destroyed you. It’s growing in the face of change or uncertainty. It’s continuing forward with purpose, even when it feels impossible.

For me, the journey towards resilience began the moment I put down the bottle for the last time, on August 30, 2014. In time, I began to grieve Cindy’s death. I reframed how I looked at the past. I began to see the gifts in the experience, rather than just the darkness. I started to help people by sharing some of the lessons I was learning.

When Chloe died, on February 1, 2023, I knew I was a more resilient person than I had been when Cindy died. I had a much stronger band of brothers around me. I was much more aware of my emotional experience and had the vocabulary, and willingness, to talk about it. And I knew I needed to face this experience head-on, without trying to avoid it.

Resilience doesn’t mean you won’t experience pain. Quite the contrary. It means that you’ll square your shoulders, stiffen your spine and take it. Because it’s the only way forward. Sometimes, when the pain of a devastating loss feels like too much to bear, resilience can mean not making even things worse than they already are.

I’m navigating Chloe’s death much differently than I did with Cindy’s. I’m far from perfect and have taken a knee many times. There are times I’ve stayed down longer than others. But I’ve always gotten back up, and I always will. I owe it to myself, my family and to Chloe’s memory.

I am resilient.

Grief and Resilience

For most of us, losing someone or something we love dearly is the greatest adversity we’ll face in our lives. It’s an experience that can either break us or serve as a painful, but important, catalyst for growth.

In grief work, I sometimes describe capacity as “the space between what happens to you and how you’re able to respond.” The wider that space, the less likely you are to be shattered by a single blow, and the more likely you can navigate it with strength and humanity.

Resilience isn’t just one thing. It’s both capacity and practice.

Capacity is your baseline ability to bend without breaking when life hits hard. Practice is what you do to strengthen that capacity - like building habits, skills, and supports that let you recover and adapt.

I like to think of it as a bridge. Your capacity is the bridge itself - the span, the materials, how much weight it can hold. Some people start with stronger bridges because of upbringing, health, or support. Others have bridges that were built thinner or more fragile. Practice is the reinforcements and repairs you make over time, like learning to ask for help, regulate emotions, or show yourself compassion.

Grief is the flood that tests the bridge. It doesn’t matter how carefully you built it, the storm still comes. But the more you’ve reinforced it, the more likely it is to sway and hold instead of snapping. And even if it does break, practice is what allows you to rebuild something stronger than before.

Every one of us will experience the loss of someone or something we care about. It’s part of our shared humanity. So is the fact that we can all become more resilient.

I’ve learned a lot of lessons over the years. Most of them the hard way.

When the grief is crushing you like a tidal wave, it’s nearly impossible to shore up the bridge. That work is best done in the calmer stretches in between.

In other words, the best time to start learning the skills to become more resilient is before (or between) the challenges life throws at you. It’s never too late to become more resilient. But it’s infinitely harder once you’ve lost someone or something dear to you.

Chloe’s death showed me that resilience isn’t an abstract word, or a story you tell yourself. It’s the only thing standing between grief and being crushed by it.

And if I’ve learned anything, it’s this: it’s almost impossible to build the bridge in the middle of the flood.

In the days ahead, I’ll share the practices that help me keep standing. Because resilience isn’t theory.

It’s built choice by choice, even in the face of a devastating loss.

---

When grief hits, it feels like every fuse blows at once. The bridge you thought would hold suddenly sways, cracks, or even collapses.

Most men don’t realize this until it’s too late. We’re told to tough it out, but nobody teaches us how to carry grief without being crushed by it.

That’s why I created this free guide: 10 Hard Truths Every Man Needs to Hear About Grief.

If you’re a grieving man, or love a man who is , this guide will give you the raw truth you won’t hear anywhere else.