Episode Introduction

Welcome to the Grief Witnessed podcast, where raw stories of loss and healing are honored without judgment or quick fixes. In this deeply personal episode, I join host Shay Martin to share my journey living and cooking through grief following the sudden loss of my husband, Zach. Grief is often portrayed as a linear process, but as many of us know, it’s anything but simple. Through candid conversation, I open up about the shock of Zach’s diagnosis, the challenges of navigating aggressive lymphoma, and how the everyday act of cooking became a lifeline amid the chaos of widowhood.

This episode is for anyone who has experienced relational trauma, loss, or the disorienting silence that follows the death of a loved one. Together, Shay and I explore how grief reshapes not only our hearts but our routines, our bodies, and our connection to the world around us. You’ll hear about the power of presence, the importance of community, and the unexpected ways that grief can lead us back to life. Whether you’re grieving now or supporting someone who is, this conversation offers compassion, realness, and hope.

Key Takeaways

• Grief does not pause the world around us, and learning to live with grief means navigating the disconnect between personal loss and everyday life continuing.
• Relational trauma after loss is complex, and healing requires more than fixing—it requires witnessing, presence, and gentle self-compassion.
• Cooking and creating meals can serve as a grounding, healing practice to reconnect us with our bodies and nurture ourselves through grief.
• The experience of losing a spouse suddenly brings intense challenges, including isolation and the need to rely on community and support networks.
• Medical trauma intertwined with grief complicates the mourning process, making honesty and transparency in relationships essential.
• Intentional love and care within relationships can leave lasting imprints that continue to guide us through grief.
• Grief is not a problem to be fixed but a lived experience to be witnessed and honored at every stage.

Notable Quotes

“I just remember thinking like, what? Like, my life was just completely changed that like that just happened. Zach just died. And there’s people like going to lunch or like on their bike ride. And I just couldn’t fathom that the whole world didn’t stop for everyone when my world did.”

“Cooking became this way for me to feel connected to life again, to nourish my body and soul when everything else felt so fragile and uncertain.”

“Even in the darkest moments, Zach was such a fighter and so positive. That intentionality with how he loved me is something I carry with me every day.”

“Grief isn’t about ‘getting over it.’ It’s about learning to hold the pain alongside the moments of joy and new life.”

“I almost wanted the world to stop with mine. Totally get it. And yeah, that didn’t happen.”

Topics Covered

• Grief and Loss: The emotional landscape following the sudden death of a spouse, including shock, disbelief, and the ongoing adjustments to life without Zach.
• Relational Trauma: How the experience of losing a deeply loved partner impacts one’s sense of safety, trust, and connection.
• Widowhood: The unique challenges and isolation that come with becoming a young widow, including navigating grief within a community of peers.
• Cooking as Healing: Using the act of cooking and nourishing the body as a therapeutic practice to ground oneself during grief.
• Medical Journey and Trauma: Zach’s diagnosis with Burkitt lymphoma, the rapid decline in health, hospitalizations, and how this intertwined with emotional grief.
• Intentional Love and Memory: The lasting impact of Zach’s intentionality and love, and how these memories provide comfort and guidance.
• Community and Support: The importance of connection with friends, family, and fellow widows in processing grief and finding hope.

Full Transcript

Shay Martin: Then after that, it’s like, you just go home. Like, I went from thinking I was going to live here for 12 weeks to, OK, your husband died. Now you just go home. So we had to go back up to our room. And like, I see his phone like any normal person would. Like he was just living like there’s evidence on his phone that he was like just here and his clothes. And we just like take it home. And I’m like, I guess I’m going to go to my parents’ house. Like, I don’t know, just no one can prepare you for that. And I always remember walking out of the hospital and it was late May and it was the most beautiful, clear blue skies. Sun was shining day. And like I saw people biking by and in their cars and walking by. And I just remember thinking like, what? Like, my life was just completely changed that like that just happened. Zach just died. And there’s people like going to lunch or like on their bike ride. And I just couldn’t I couldn’t fathom that the whole world didn’t stop for everyone when my world did. And that’s a feeling I’ve felt a lot like since just it’s weird that we don’t all not that I would wish this on anyone, but I almost wanted the world to stop with mine.

Annie Wright: Totally get it. And yeah, that didn’t happen.

Shay Martin: Hey, everybody, it’s me, Shay. Welcome back to Grief Witnessed, where we remember, where we tell the stories and where grief is allowed to exist without fixing it. All right, everybody. Welcome. I’m here with my friend Annie.

Annie Wright: Hi, Annie.

Shay Martin: Annie is also a widowed content creator like myself. Yes. And she’s in Utah, where I am. So she’s also in the Young Hot Widows of Utah group.

Annie Wright: Yes.

Shay Martin: When was the first time you met? Was it the Halloween?

Annie Wright: It was Halloween.

Shay Martin: Yeah.

Annie Wright: Yeah. I think you reached out to me first, which.

Shay Martin: Yes.

Annie Wright: Yeah. We went to like a Halloween thing. And tell everybody what you dressed up as.

Shay Martin: I dressed up as a widow, like a Victorian widow with a black veil over my head. And yeah, that’s how I felt.

Annie Wright: Amazing.

Shay Martin: So, yeah, it was amazing. And we ended up filming a reel, I think, that night as well. What was the reel again?

Annie Wright: It was we’re widows. Of course, we.

Shay Martin: Oh, yes.

Annie Wright: We’re widows. Of course we. Whatever.

Shay Martin: Yeah. Yeah. So I love, love Annie. And I’m excited. And I don’t know if excited is the right word, but I look forward to hearing more of your story and letting everyone here witness your story with me.

Annie Wright: Thank you. Thanks for having me here.

Shay Martin: Tell us about Zach. Tell me about your love story with Zach.

Annie Wright: So, OK, so Zach and I, let’s see, to set this scene. This was my the summer before my last semester of college. And I had always gone home. I went to Utah State, but my parents lived like an hour away from Utah State. So I would go home and live with them during the summers. And this summer, me and a friend were like, we don’t want to just work an odd job this summer. Like, let’s go do something more fun. What we thought would be fun. So we had the grand idea to go do summer sales, which is very Utah.

Shay Martin: Yes.

Annie Wright: So we went out to California and we didn’t know my friend Lily knew like one of the girls there. We didn’t know anyone else. And so the first day we go to our first meeting and there’s just a ton of guys and girls. Like it was a huge group. So I don’t particularly remember seeing Zach that day. But then after that, we everyone just started hanging out with each other. It was so much fun. We were in Orange County. So every weekend we were selling solar.

Shay Martin: Oh, selling solar.

Annie Wright: Which I will say that job was not for me. I would never do sales again, but it was worth it just for obviously I met my husband, but it was so fun. Like we would go and surf on the weekends and go to the beach as much as we could. But pretty quickly, I could tell like Zach and I were flirting with each other a little bit more. And like there was something there.

Shay Martin: How could you tell?

Annie Wright: Well, I don’t know. He was he was just really flirty. He OK, he was really tall, too, which I always appreciated. And like he stuck out and I thought he was really cute from the beginning. And then there was a weekend where my best friend, she had to go back to Utah. And the two of us were like this. So when she was gone, I was like, oh, like it’s not going to be as fun hanging out with the group. And I remember Zach texted me. He’s like. There’s a group of us going camping, he’s like, you need to come, like, please come, I’ll drive you down. So I went and drove down with him and like two other guys. It was the four of us. And it was actually such a fun car ride. Zach had bought an old 4Runner out in California. He’s a big car guy. And so we were driving this old 4Runner. We had to have the windows down because there was no AC, so it was loud. And all the boys were just acting dumb. And I remember they had like Red Bulls and they were like, I don’t know, making trumpets out of them. I was like, what am I doing right now? But, and Zach was trying to like have a nice conversation with me, but it was so loud. And anyway, as the night went on, everyone like started going to sleep and him and I just stuck around the campfire and just talked for a long time. And I remember I could tell that like he wanted me to sleep in his 4Runner with him slash kiss him.

Shay Martin: Yes.

Annie Wright: I don’t know if I should be exposing this to the world, but he was like not making the first move. And I’m very much like, I wanted him to make the first move. But I remember it got to the point where I didn’t really have anywhere else to sleep. There were some girls, but I wasn’t as close with them. And I was just like, hey, are you sleeping in your 4Runner? And I remember right away, he was like, yeah, do you want to sleep in mine? It’s like, sure. And so anyway, we ended up just having a really long conversation in there as well that was just really deep. And I don’t know, I just feel like I got to know him more that night. And then we did end up kissing.

Shay Martin: Just a conversation or?

Annie Wright: It wasn’t just a conversation, but I did appreciate that he, I don’t know, he was respectful and it was a good night. And then after that, that was like mid June and June 30th, he, sorry, after that, he took me on a couple of real dates. And then June 30th comes, he’s like, let’s go to Newport. And we actually got Taco Bell because I had lost my purse and it was at the Taco Bell in Newport. So we picked up Taco Bell and then we went and sat on like one of the lifeguard stands and we talked for a while. And then he said, Annie, be my girlfriend. He didn’t ask, like he said, just be my girlfriend. And I regret this because I made him nervous and it was dumb, but I was like, can we talk about this for a second? Cause I was not expecting that. I honestly thought that it was going to be kind of like a summer fling, just a fun thing. Like that’s the vibes that he was giving off. So him asking me to be his girlfriend was so shocking. And I was like, okay, I’m about to go back to college. He was going to stay and do sales through the fall. I was like, we’re going to be doing long distance in like a month. Like, I just want to talk more about this. And I remember he told me, he’s like, Annie, I just want to let you know, like the reason I’m asking you and the reason I would date anyone is because I genuinely really liked them and I see it going somewhere. And if I ever feel like it’s not going that way, I’m going to straight up tell you and I’ll be honest. And I had just kind of gotten over like a weird situations of things. So that just like straightforwardness was so, I respected it so much and it just made me feel good about moving forward. And so he kind of convinced me that day to be his girlfriend.

Shay Martin: Yeah.

Annie Wright: And then we, I went back to school like a month later and we did long distance. We literally just FaceTimed and called all day. So he stayed in California. I went back to do my last semester at Utah State, which it was the worst semester because all of my roommates had graduated, most of my friends. And I was like, I’m not going to go to parties to like meet guys, like I have a boyfriend. So I pretty much just stayed, went to class, stayed in my dorm and then I would go home on the weekends. But yeah, we just FaceTimed like crazy and just were always on the phone with each other. He was knocking the doors. So like in between every door he’d call me and yeah, it was fun. That was also good for our relationship because it just showed us how much we missed each other and that like, it wasn’t just like the chemistry. It was like, we actually had this deep connection and we enjoyed talking to each other. So yeah, so then, so we met May of 2022, started dating end of June and then we got married or I guess he proposed the following March. So almost a year.

Shay Martin: Okay.

Annie Wright: Yeah. And then we got married in September of 2023. So yeah, a little over a year, which is pretty good by Utah standards.

Shay Martin: By Utah standards? Wow, okay.

Annie Wright: Tell me about the first time he told you he loved you or you told him, I don’t know who said it first.

Shay Martin: He definitely said it first.

Annie Wright: Okay, he definitely said it first. So this was, it’s kind of a funny story just because he, obviously he moved really quick in the beginning, like we met end of May and then a month later asked me to be his girlfriend. And I was like, neither of us had ever told anyone that we loved each other. And I remember thinking, oh my gosh, he might say that soon and like, I’m not ready. Like if he says it, I’m not gonna be able to say it back. And then time kept passing. I went back to school and then he moved back in like November after the fall and he still hadn’t said it. So this was June to November and I was like, oh man, like at this point I had started to maybe feel like I wanted to say it. I was like, I really, I love this man.

Shay Martin: So you were feeling it?

Annie Wright: Yeah, I was feeling it. In the beginning he had said like, I’m gonna be straightforward with you, like let you know how I feel. So I was like, okay, like why isn’t he saying this? It came all the way to December and I remember thinking like, I didn’t want to push him into something he didn’t want to say. But I also like wanted to know how he was feeling and I almost was about to say like, hey, like can we talk about where this is going? Like I just want to know where you’re feeling. And we had gone to like a family Christmas party and then that night he like, we drove up to a pretty lookout to watch the sunset and I remember he kissed me and then he whispered it in my ear. He’s like, I love you and it was sweet. And then I said it back and yeah, it was really sweet. And then I told him, I was like, I, I was, I was questioning how he felt about me. I’ve been waiting. But yeah, but I, the more I got to know Zach, truly he is such an intentional person. I, I speak like, um, like he’s here still. Um, yeah. Spirit. But just very intentional with everything