Bartlett-Heritage Funeral Home & Cremation Center

12/25/2025

Forever loved, forever missed ❤️

12/24/2025

This Christmas, love keeps my heart connected to everyone I hold dear — here and in Heaven. 🤍🎄

12/22/2025

12/22/2025

The death of my child changed me
not gently,
not with warning,
but like fire ripping through the marrow
of who I used to be.
I no longer recognize the woman
in old photographs.
She smiled without guilt.
She slept without bargaining with God.
She believed tomorrow was promised.
Now I measure time
by before and after,
by breaths that hurt to take,
by memories that arrive uninvited
and refuse to leave.
Grief didn’t visit me
it moved in,
rearranged my insides,
and taught me how loud silence can scream.
I am not broken.
I am altered.
Ash and bone and love
still trying to stand in the same body.
I flinch at laughter,
envy ordinary problems,
and carry a name in my chest
that the world no longer speaks.
The death of my child changed me
but listen closely
every step I take now
is powered by a love
that survived the impossible.
I am different.
I am scarred.
I am grieving.
And I am still a mother.

Written by; Marlena L Bowdery
Many Phases And Faces Of A Mother's Grief
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12/06/2025

💔🥺💫🌹

11/24/2025

There’s a kind of exhaustion that holidays bring when you’re grieving...
a quiet ache that makes the thought of being around people feel overwhelming....even when those people love you.

Part of you wants to stay home, wrap yourself in silence, and protect the pieces of your heart that still feel too fragile to expose.

And another part of you feels guilty for needing space…
guilty that you don’t have the energy to pretend you’re okay…
guilty that the world expects you to show up like nothing changed.

It’s a tug-of-war nobody sees:
🖤 wanting to avoid the empty chair and the memories that hit too hard
🖤 wanting to be included, but not knowing if you can handle it
🖤 wanting comfort, but dreading the weight of conversations and eyes watching your grief

If you choose to stay home, it’s okay. If you show up and leave early....it’s okay. If you smile and then cry in the bathroom...it’s okay. If this year looks different, it’s okay.

Protecting your heart is not selfish. It’s survival.

And the people who truly love you will understand.

🕯️ Be gentle with yourself this Thanksgiving. Your grief is real. Your heart matters.

🖤

11/20/2025

Thanksgiving is only a week away…
and for many of us, the closer it gets,
the heavier everything begins to feel.

Everyone is talking about plans, food, family, and gratitude...
but nobody sees the quiet heartbreak
behind the people who are just trying to survive the holidays
without the person they miss more than anything.

There will be an empty chair this year.
A space that used to be filled with laughter,
stories, and a voice we would give anything to hear again.

And while the world expects us to be thankful,
they don’t understand how complicated it is
to carry grief and gratitude in the same heart.

We’re trying.
We’re doing our best to hold it together,
to smile when it hurts,
to show up even when our heart feels broken.

But the truth is…
this season is hard.
And missing someone you love
doesn’t get easier just because a holiday is coming.

So if your heart is aching too...
you’re not alone.
We’ll get through this together, one breath, one day at a time.
🕯️💔

11/05/2025

My heart holds her close always 💙🥺

11/01/2025

“I Didn’t Feel It Break”

I didn’t feel it break
not the way people think.
It wasn’t one big shatter.
It was slow.
Cruel.
A ripping from the inside out.

I was still breathing when it happened,
still standing,
still moving,
but something inside me
was screaming so loud
the world went quiet.

My heart didn’t just crack
it splattered.
It burst under the weight of a name
I still whisper every night.
His name.
My child.

I tried to hold it together,
press the pieces to my chest
so I wouldn’t lose another part of him.
But it cut me
over and over again.
And the blood isn’t blood anymore
it’s memory,
it’s pain that never clots.

They say time heals,
but time only reminds me
how long it’s been
since I heard his voice.
Healing?
No.
I just got better at pretending.

People look at me
and see a mother surviving
but I’m not surviving.
I’m haunted.
I walk around holding a heart
that’s no longer mine,
just the remains
of what love looks like
after it dies.

And every shard that falls
still bleeds his name.
Every piece still screams,
“I miss you.”

Written by: Marlena L Bowdery
Many Phases And Faces Of A Mother's Grief

11/01/2025

09/28/2025

This looks about right