The God Who Fills the Gaps

February 24, 2026

Last night, grief found me.

Not loud.
Not dramatic.
Just sudden.

It rose up from somewhere deep — the kind of place you don’t visit on purpose.

I was grieving my eldest brother, Kou.

Growing up, he was larger than life to me. Him and Cindy felt grown, established, important. They had a house. They had babies. They had rhythm. I was just the little sister tagging along, wide-eyed and watching.

I played with my nephews who were only a few years younger than me — which always felt funny. I was an aunt, but I was still a child. Cindy was creative. She made childhood feel expansive. She would invent games, turn ordinary afternoons into something magical. I remember spending days at a time at their house — sleeping over, running barefoot, eating together.

My California childhood is threaded with memories of them.

Then at nine years old, I left.

Minnesota was cold in every sense of the word.

I still remember the Greyhound buses back to California during middle school — sometimes even during the school year. The long rides. The smell of the seats. The strange mix of excitement and homesickness. Tou — just 19 months older than me — and I would travel to Sacramento and stay for a month or so to help babysit.

Children helping raise children.

Eventually, those trips stopped.
And when the trips stopped, something else stopped too.

Connection doesn’t usually snap.
It thins.

In college, Cindy and I had a rare phone call. Rare because by then, there was already distance. Old drama between my parents — especially my mom — and them had created tension. And even when adults say it’s “between them,” it rarely stays there. It spills. It stains.

On that call, I was excited. I had been watching one of the newer nephews in the family and I was gushing. Bragging. Just happy to be an aunt again. It was innocent to me. Pure joy.

I later learned she took it as an insult to her and her sons.

Something that small.

After my mom’s burial, I learned she had carried that moment as fuel. Held onto it. Let it justify distance. Let it feed resentment.

And I sat with that realization thinking — how many years were shaped by something I never meant?

Still, I hoped.

I always believed it wasn’t too late.

Not too late for Kou to be my big brother again.
Not too late for me to know my nephews as an adult.
Not too late for Cindy and I to meet again, not as daughters under tension, but as women.

But after the funeral, after everyone returned to their normal lives, certain things transpired. Quiet confirmations. Subtle but undeniable.

And I realized — it was never going to happen the way I hoped.

There’s a particular kind of grief reserved for relationships that are still alive but no longer reachable.

That’s the grief that found me last night.

This month, I was in New York City at the AREAA Leadership Summit. And I saw Tom T.

I had met him once before at EXPCON in Miami in October 2024. At the time, I just registered success. Accomplishment. Influence.

But at the Summit, he shared part of his story.

He’s the sixth of eight children. Five boys. Three girls. And the youngest two are a brother and sister.

Like me.

Something in me softened immediately.

It wasn’t admiration.
It was recognition.

When I learned he volunteered to mentor for AREAA’s EDGE program, I asked him to be my big brother. I didn’t overthink it. I just asked.

He kind of said yes. Told Fugie and me to call him. And we did.

Our first video call felt easy. Natural. Safe. He put us on his calendar again this week. I’ve been looking forward to it. Replaying what we shared. How open I was. I don’t open up like that quickly.

But with him, I did.

And that’s why last night hit so hard.

As I was talking to Fugie, I realized my spirit wasn’t just excited about gaining a mentor.

It was mourning what I never fully had.

When my mom passed, many things passed with her. The pain she carried for decades. The tension she held in her body. The ache in her heart that softened only near the end.

The summer before she died, seven of her children, the usual crew, were in Minnesota visiting. And Kou showed up out of the blue.

Unplanned.

I don’t believe in coincidences.

That day felt like God’s mercy to my parents, to my mother.

At the Summit, I showed Tom our last family photo. I pointed to each of us in birth order. I could see that summer in my mind — the sunlight, the feeling that something sacred was happening even if we didn’t fully understand it.

God gave my mom closure.

And last night, through tears, I felt Him beginning to give me mine.

Family is not about blood.

It’s about who God assigns to steward your heart in certain seasons.

I don’t know what God will do with this connection with Tom. I don’t know how long it will last. I don’t know if he will become a lifelong big brother or simply a chapter in my healing.

But I know this:

There are no coincidences.

And as much as I longed for my eldest brother to step into that space in my life, I am first and always a little sister to Christ.

He sees the gaps.
He feels the ache.
He knows the specific weight a sister carries.

And He is not careless with the details of my heart.

Last night I cried for what was.

But I also felt hope for what God is restoring — not the same way, not the same people, but with the same tenderness I’ve been longing for all along.

Love,

Yer