This episode closes out a month of conversations dedicated to love, loss, and remembrance. Recorded nine years after the death of my husband, Mark, this final March reflection is not about closure or moving on. It is about what endured. What relocated. What stayed. In this conversation, I speak to both Mark and you, the listener, exploring the idea of continuing bonds and the quiet ways love endures long after loss. I share how grief has changed shape over time, how connection can persist without denial, and how meaning can be made not by letting go, but by carrying love forward. This episode offers gentle permission to remember, to speak love aloud, and to honor the relationships that continue to shape us even in their absence. March is ending. Love is not. I am sharing my experience of loving the same man for 32 years, a mother to two adult children, a retired military officer, a breast cancer survivor, and my connections with others.   Anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts should reach out to a suicide hotline or local emergency number in their country: Psychology Today Suicide Hotlines and Prevention Resources Around the World. — Watch the episode here   Listen to the podcast here   Love That Stayed Before we begin this episode, I want to name where we are in this month. This is the final episode in a series I’ve dedicated to my late husband, Mark Fornwald. During the month of March 11th, 2017, he left this world. Throughout March 2026, I’ve chosen to honor him in my grief and my love out loud one conversation at a time. If you’re joining me now, you have missed anything you need. The conversations weren’t meant to be consumed in order or completed like a program. They were meant to be entered gently wherever you found them. This episode isn’t about wrapping up anything or offering conclusions. It’s about gathering what remains and what stayed would endure and what continues to live on after my loss. As with other conversations, some of what I’ll say is spoken directly to Mark, some is spoken to you and some simply exists in the space between love and memory. Mark, as we close out March 2026, I want to talk with you again. Not to say goodbye but to acknowledge what has never left. Mark, years later, you’re still here. You are still what matters. Do you know how love changes shape? I would have never thought of that years ago when my girlfriend Kim gave Mark and I that statuette. It just seemed like love would last forever. I never thought about our love changing. The flag is my flag from leaving the United States military and the little statuette of praying. Enduring Love & Continuing Bonds With Mark My love for Mark has changed because I don’t get to touch him. I don’t get to embrace him when I say I love him and what that looks like, but it still exists. I still love him now. That will never change. I haven’t been able to build on top of that love. We’ve not had new experiences that make me feel like I love him in a different way or more than I did before because that interaction that personal connection that I have with you is stopped the moment you start breathing but I love you. I think about how I love you when I see our children. I think about how I love you now when different things happen that we may have spoken about doing and I’ve been able to do them. It has reshaped because the direct intimacy doesn’t exist with you anymore, Mark, but it still exists. Do you know where you show up now in my life? My last name is still Fornwald. I cannot consider my last name being anything else but your last name. That connection is important for our family and our children to know that they have a parent in this world with the same last name. I did get remarried like you suggested and gave me permission to, but I’m glad that the reality of loving you is still something that shows up every day in my life. When I moved to Virginia, I was talking to you on the drive here saying, “I’m moving,” as we said that we would, when I made it to the place where I was living and I took a bath. I had a glass of wine and I said to you out loud, “I did it babe. I made it here. I made this trip and I relocated.” When there are things in my life that are happening when I go on a trip and used to text you when I come home that I’ve made it there safely. The thought is there. I may not be texting you because you’re no longer in this world but mentally, I am checking in with you and telling you that I made it safely. Do you know you were never erased? Some people thought that once you stop breathing that some way or another, I would forget about you. It’s not possible. I spent 32 years of my life with you and that was from like the age of eighteen straight up into just about hitting 50. I cannot talk about anything about who I am as a person without mentioning you to some extent. There is no way possible that you could be erased from my life. You are ever present and ever real. The part that was the most difficult for me is trying to come to terms with that. Other people may get uncomfortable, because I’m talking about you. You’re no longer here, but my life and who I am has been shaped every way possible because of who I am with you. People got a buckle up because I’m going to talk about you. I’m going to mention you in my