My Joy Is Public, My Grief Is Sacred

My mother died a few weeks ago.

And apart from one story on my socials sharing the news of her passing, and a blog post (or 3🤭), I have not spoken about it on social media. In fact, for the mourning period, I have not been active online.

Not because I am in denial.

Not because I am trying to be strong. (Only tables are meant to be strong, I am NOT).

Not because I loved her any less.

But because my grief feels too sacred for social media.

Ever noticed how the internet has trained us to perform grief publicly?

Someone dies, and within hours, there is:

• a black-and-white picture

• crying emojis

• angel emojis

• “rest in peace”

• paragraphs poured straight from the heart

• Instagram stories

• tribute videos

• sympathy comments

and then… likes.

Hundreds and hundreds of likes.

And I know that for some people, public grief is healing. I genuinely do understand that. Some people feel held by their community in that way, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

But for me? I could not do it. (What I really wanted to write here was “give me zero Shem”🤣 but that’s maybe too niche a reference).

Something about reducing the biggest loss of my life into content that people consume in seven seconds and “like” before scrolling to a makeup tutorial or a recipe video felt unbearable to me.

My grief refuses to flatten itself into something consumable.

I do not want the internet comforting me with heart emojis.

I do not want people I have not spoken to in six years typing “stay strong dear.”

I do not want my mother’s death to become engagement.

Maybe that sounds harsh, but grief has made me deeply protective over certain things.

And one of those things is privacy in mourning.

The truth is, I actually love being visible on social media. I love beauty. I love documenting my life (in fact, before you continue reading, go follow my Instagram: @tubainnairobi). I love sharing joy. I love a good caption and aesthetically pleasing photos and soft lighting and beautiful experiences and playful bragging like my mum did. (My Nairobi friends are tired of hearing me say “I’m better than you” 🤣🤣🤣)

But joy and grief do not feel the same to me.

Joy feels expansive.

Grief feels holy.

Joy feels light enough to share.

Grief feels like something to protect.

And maybe that is the real tension of modern life. Those of us that choose to, now live in a world where every emotion is expected to become content. Every milestone, every heartbreak, every breakdown, every triumph. Everything is documented, uploaded, processed publicly, and consumed quickly.

But some things, at least for me, lose meaning the moment they become performance.

My mother was too important to me to become an Instagram aesthetic or a series of WhatsApp statuses that people respond to with “likes”.

Ironically, she would probably completely understand this. I remember wanting to take her to Baluba Game Resort for a weekend away after my dad died, and she declined, saying she did not want to run into people and casually have to say, “I lost my husband.” So we just stayed home, and I get it!

My mum loved presentation. She loved beauty, image, elegance, and being “put together.” She would have absolutely hated being publicly perceived at her weakest and most vulnerable.

I remember looking at her on her deathbed when she literally looked like death personified, a few days before she finally passed, and laughing with my two of my sisters at how she would have haaaaated people seeing her like that if she were conscious. Poor girl.

Oh well! In Zambia, we mourn and tensha (my foreign readers, please ask your friendly neighbourhood Zambian to translate this word for you) publicly.

This was a woman who wore wigs and nice dresses in the house. A woman who loved a red lip and a good fascinator. A woman who believed deeply in presenting yourself well.

And maybe that is why, even in death, we celebrated her beautifully.

We wore white and gold at her burial service because that is what she requested years ago.

We served good food.

We looked beautiful.

We honoured her loudly and properly.

Not because we were pretending not to grieve, but because beauty was part of her language.

And maybe this trip to the coast, I randomly woke up and decided to do is part of that too. I simply wanted to bask in the beauty that is the Indian Ocean. Except when I stepped into that water, I broke down, and it was extremely comforting.

Although my mum is gone forever, my life still feels so deeply connected to hers.

She understood expansiveness long before I did. She studied abroad (like me!) before I ever left Zambia (because I wasn’t born yet🤣). She travelled internationally for work (like I do!). She loved books, beauty, movement, and ambitious living, just like me. A real soft-life girly, that one, complete with a man that didn’t play about her.

Later, life asked different things of her. Marriage. Motherhood. Duty. Responsibility.

But years later, especially when I moved back home during Covid, and I’d debrief her on my latest side quests, she would look at me and proudly say, “I love your life. Nda kumbwa mwandi” (Ask your friendly neighbourhood Lamba-speaking person to translate).

When I started going to the gym circa 2023, my dad proudly declared, “Tuba, you are amazing!” 🤣 For context, he was born in the 40s, so single women going to the gym was probably like seeing a flying car to him.

I truly believe I am NOT my mother’s wildest dream, but rather her continued one.

It’s with this frame that I vehemently reject being reduced to pity.

I do not want to become “that poor divorced girl (although that’s a good thing you should congratulate me on) whose sister, dad, and mum died all within a year and 9 months.”

Yes, those deaths happened.

Yes, they changed me.

Yes, I cry.

Yes, sometimes the grief knocks the wind out of me.

Yes, I’m tired of faux deep conversations every day every day (the repetition there is a Zambianism I love using 😄).

“No, but how are you REALLY?”

“Are you SURE you’re okay?”

Woiyeeeee! (One of my favourite Kenyanisms🤣) Obviously, I’m not okay, but I don’t want to talk about it daily.

Also, one thing I have unexpectedly enjoyed throughout this grieving process is watching people squirm with awkwardness when they ask me “how are you?” and I answer honestly, saying “I’m not okay.”

Reactions have ranged from nervous, awkward laughter (imagine laughing at an orphan that’s not okay 🤣 people with parents are so funny🤣), to full-on panic on my behalf, to my personal favourite: “Why are you not okay?”

Sorry for not following the expected script, but my mother died a few weeks ago😭🤣 (See above point about grief being flattened).

It was the same when I shaved off all my hair in January 2026 as part of my mourning process for my Dad, who passed in July 2024, and people would say, “Where’s all that thick, long hair of yours? Why would you cut your hair? You look different.”

To which I’d answer in a deadpan way: “My dad died.” 🤣🤣

Actually, I’m sorry for that, but I genuinely could not resist watching the look of horror and cringe wash over people’s faces🤭🤣. Sometimes I’d redeem them afterwards and say, “Oh no, it was two years ago.”

Grief also reveals how strangely people behave around loss. Some people become extraordinarily tender. Others become oddly clinical, awkward or even unintentionally cruel. I once had to endure being told, “I knew your mum wouldn’t make it.” 🤦🏾‍♀️😭🤣 Guys!! Being a new orphan?? 0/10! Do not recommend.

Also, contrary to what people seem to think, grieving people are (usually) not having some dramatic mental breakdown. In my case, I am just sad because my mother died. Those are two very different things.

I think somewhere along the way, we forgot that grief is not automatically pathology. Sometimes you are not spiralling or struggling mentally (shout out to the pro-mental health and therapy movement, though). Sometimes your life has simply been shaken by loss, and your response is sadness, exhaustion, late replies, being a little absent-minded, crying in the shower, needing rest, writing long blog posts such as this one, and bursting into tears when you hear certain songs. I cannot listen to Jax’s Like My Father and Sakala Brothers Kalebalika and many many many other songs without ugly crying and heaving like my parents have just died all over again.

That is not dysfunction to me. That is grief.

Also, shoutout to all the self-help books, dating advice books, therapy language, manifestation content, and emotional awareness work I consumed in my early twenties. People laugh at that stuff (TBH I do too now, imagine reading The Secret in 2026🤣), but honestly, reading such taught me how to enjoy my own company, relish in spending time alone, embrace my full range of emotions and observe my own mind without collapsing into it.

But my life is still very beautiful.

I still laugh (very) loudly, even at the deaths in my family and the circumstances surrounding them.

I still default to wearing my smile 24/7.

I still swim in the ocean when I have the chance.

I still love my ice cream, grapes and watermelon.

I still dance alone around my apartment.

I still bake my signature Malva pudding and banana bread.

I still have deep friendships.

I still do my best at a job I absolutely love.

I still go to my dance classes four times a week.

I still go to my Pilates classes three times a week.

I still have deep, unending joy.

I still have peace that passes understanding.

I still have beauty.

I still love writing (can you tell??🤭)

I still randomly break out in song and sing loudly.

I still enjoy loud, off-key car karaoke in Nairobi traffic.

I still love French.

I still love books deeply, even when grief has shortened my attention span (temporarily, I hope).

I still enjoy washing my hair, wearing a face mask, putting on the gown I inherited from my mum (which was actually a gift from me to her) and sitting in silence in my beautiful apartment.

I still love brunches and clubbing and going to see live plays and musicals all in one weekend.

I still love dinners with my married friends downstairs, whose quiet, structured family life I aspire to, and dinners with my upstairs neighbour, whose expansive, cultured life I also aspire to.

I am still fully alive.

And I think that is what I want my social media to reflect once I am back.

Not denial.

Not performance.

Not “look at me thriving.”

Just… life continuing.

And to quote the character of Hilary Banks, played by the brilliant Coco Jones in Bel-Air Season 4 Episode 6 (minute marker 06:30): “Grief doesn’t have to disappear to make room for joy. They can exist side by side.”

Just because I’m predisposed to be happy and laughing does not mean, “the grief will hit me one day because it appears I’m too happy for someone who has endured such loss.”

No!

It hits me every day. That heavy, deep-seated grief.

But so does joy!!!

Oh, the joy of waking up to a brand new day with sunlight pouring into my bedroom because yes, I sleep with the curtains open, teeheehee.

The joy of stepping onto my balcony to greet the day?

The joy of finishing a whole punnet of grapes in one sitting?

The joy of sleeping in until 1 p.m. on Sundays and waking up to absolute quiet?

The joy of Fridays and relishing in the fact that I have the whole weekend to do anything I want?

The joy of seeing a certain name pop up on my screen and knowing it means hours of laughing, philosophising, being bored, and gossiping together on the phone, multiple times a day?

The joy of hearing the tiny voice of my bestie’s 5-year-old calling me “Tuva,” as well as my nieces and nephews on the phone and calling them by the specific nicknames I gave them?

The joy of receiving packages of stuff I ordered online?

The joy of putting together a look for a girls’ hangout and it working well?

The joy of my twice-daily skincare, haircare and fragrance rituals?

The joy of anticipating a new romantic love when the opportunity presents itself? 🤭

The joy of knowing that I have friends, colleagues, neighbours, and community that put together thousands of US Dollars | Kenyan Shillings | South African Rands and of course Zambian Kwacha (have I mentioned my people are better than yours😌) to send to me when they heard that I’ve lost my mum?

THAT joy?

It exists alongside the grief of knowing I will never, ever everrrrr see my parents’ faces again, hear their voices again, or wake up to my Dad playing guitar while my mum sings to me on my birthday.

I will never laugh with my parents again.

I will never dance with them again or enjoy our weekend ritual of pizza-and-Coke Fridays, Saturday dinners out, and pies from Pie City on Sundays.

I will never again see my mum’s joy at bringing out the Christmas tree and decorating it.

I will never see “Dad” or “My Mummy” pop up as a call on my screen.

I will never again get to watch an Arsenal game with my Dad. I cried bitterly the night it was clear that they would be the champions, because I will never see him celebrating his beloved team finally winning the European League again after 22 years.

I will never again sulk at my mum and wait for her to “come and beg me,” only for her to completely ignore me until I eventually gave up and started talking first.

I will never experience my Dad knocking off from work, having bought me Appy Apple and a Shawarma from After-Ten (which has the best shawarma in Africa🤭)

Should I ever fall ill while visiting Zambia, I will never again get diagnosed by my Dad at his medical laboratory and treated from home by my mum using her nursing knowledge.

Now lab tests are sterile and impersonal, and I don’t get to call the person drawing my blood “Dad.”

In spite of all this grief, I can still share sunlight, the ocean, my own rendition of Justin Bieber’s Hallelujah, and myself floating in my beloved Indian Ocean as a balm for my grieving soul. I’m grieving, but I’m still full of joy.

However, some conversations about my mother belong only to me, my family, and those people who understand that they don’t have to treat me with kiddie gloves.

I appreciate my darling Kenyan brother Dennis, AKA my Dennisito, who takes almost every chance to call me an orphan 🤣🤦🏾‍♀️ (a bougie one, but an orphan nonetheless), and who still recognises when it’s time to be serious because he knows I have been crying all night.

I can’t count how many times he has started our calls with “Wewe ka orphan unafanya nini?” 🤣🤣🤣 Or if I’m wearing something he deems indecent (which is like anything short of a burka), he goes, “Mbona una va hivi? Naona hauna mama wewe”🤣 (Ask your friendly neighbourhood East African or Lubumbashian to translate for you).

My siblings and I joke about that all the time!

One time, a few days after the funeral, we were craving Kapenta (ask your friendly neighbourhood Southern African to translate), and someone cooked it for us.

I video called my bestie Chila telling her “Look at what your orphaned friend is eating, now that her mother is dead” and we laughed and laughed.

She came over later that day and ate the same Kapenta, and I laughed at her for trying to copy me, the orphan, when she is only a half-orphan who still has a very healthy, alive mother.

Obviously, we have to be very, very, very, very close for me to joke like this, and I must be the one to introduce this type of vibe, because if just anyone said this to me without prior approval, I would kick them with my legs that are strong from almost a decade of Pilates🤣.

Anyway, all this yapping is to say:

My joy is public.

My grief is sacred.

But those two things coexist within me, and I embrace them with gusto.

And I do not owe the internet or anyone my deepest pain for it to be real.

If you’ve read to this point, I hereby release you from treating me like I’m perpetually fragile.

I am grieving, yes. But I am also still very much me. Please just be normal with me again 🤣 it’s the kindest thing you can do for me.

I’ll take a “Hey, sorry about your mum” and I’ll give a quick but sincere “thank you,” and we MOVE ON!

And if you’ve already said “sorry about your mum,” then that’s it! You’ve paid your dues! No more grief talk! (Yay!)

That said, I also think grief is one of those seasons where small acts of thoughtfulness matter more than usual. “Being normal” and “being thoughtful” is a TOUGH balancing act, and I can never fault anyone for slipping up once in a while.

On a more serious note, if you’re genuinely worried about me, please trust and rest assured that should I ever truly need help navigating this, I would seek it out professionally or explicitly ask, because I have no problem asking for and receiving help.

And to be clear, this does not mean I have not deeply appreciated the people who showed up for me beautifully during this time.

The friends who visited my mum in hospital EVERY DAY or as often as they could, one of whom even brought her a book because I mentioned that my mum loved reading.

The friends who prayed with and for my mum and us. Those that did so privately, those that assured us they were praying and lighting candles, those that sent WhatsApp voice notes with prayers, asked what her favourite Bible verse was, and gently sought clarity on her illness so they could pray for her specifically.

The ones that sat with me in silence. No advice, no platitudes, no urging me to take care of myself, just sitting.

The ones that cried with me.

The ones that did not tell me to stop crying, “be strong,” say “it is well,” or “you should celebrate her life instead of mourning.” (I remember one of my sisters cussing someone out for saying that to her the day mum died 🤣🤣)

The ones that gave their time, money, phone calls, texts, handwritten notes, effort, food, gifts, flowers, car rides to and from the airport and basically everywhere and most of all, those who gave their presence; physically and virtually.

The ones that sent funny TikToks and reels to bring some laughter in my life because they know I like silly things.

The ones that gave me space from my work and life obligations to breathe and just be, gently reminding me, “If you are not up to it, you don’t have to do it,” or “let me take that task off your plate” once I returned to work.

The ones who left their comfortable homes to sleep with us at the funeral home.

The ones who refused to let “professional relationship” be the limit of how they showed up for me. The massage therapists who gave my mum and I our monthly massages came to her funeral 😭 and my nail-tech-turned-friend in Kenya came to visit me with a gorgeous bouquet once I returned.

The ones that invited me to breakfasts, brunches, dinners, lunches, sleepovers and afternoon teas and gave me a much-needed respite.

The ones that noticed my silence online and gently checked in on me, because they know that not posting my dance videos is unlike me.

The ones that gave me warm, genuine hugs that felt like a healing balm.

The ones that brought/sent food to my doorstep upon my return. I especially remember these pancakes that one of my friends made and brought for me, staying long enough so she could ensure I ate some. Another friend back in Zambia took time off her busy workday at her big-girl banking job to bring me some Nando's, which we ate together on the floor.

The ones that gave me a journal so I can write letters to my mum. (This blog actually started in that journal.)

The ones that stayed silent in the immediate aftermath, then later wrote heartfelt messages or simply came to visit me when they felt enough time had passed.

The ones that organized a make-your-own-sushi at home night to welcome me back home to Nairobi after the funeral (okay that was only one girl and she might be my most “extra” friend🤣.)

THAT is the kind of care I will remember forever.

PS: This is not professional advice on how to handle your grieving friends, but after 3 close funerals in under 2 years, I fear I may now be an expert, so look out for my overpriced masterclass coming soon 🤣. Having written all this, I’m feeling generous, so here is a little preview from the course material: trust that people going through bereavement, illness, visible hardship, hair loss, or major body changes are usually already aware of what is happening to them. They know they are grieving. They know they are sad. They know they look different. They know they have gained or lost weight.

Trust that they will instinctively begin figuring out how to navigate what they are experiencing. Before you say something about their experience, ask yourself whether it really needs to be said out loud and whether it will add value. Your well-meaning curiosity and advice are not always necessary, and people do not always want to repeatedly narrate an already obvious pain for public consumption and emotional extraction.

On that note, fellow orphans, half, bougie or otherwise, come tell me in the comments: did you grieve publicly or did you also disappear from the internet like me and come back with a 10,000-word essay explaining your grief? 🤣

If you are struggling with mental health, my niece founded a lovely and important initiative called Happyish, where she and her team offer mental health support and create safe and nurturing spaces where people can explore their emotions and develop coping strategies. Even if you don’t need her services, please check it out anyway and support her. She’s a cool kid!

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