UpRooted
- Deon Cecile
- Feb 4
- 5 min read
Updated: 6 days ago
A reflection on loss, love, and re-rooting
By Deon Cecile Dewar-Gray
“Some losses pull us out of the ground not to destroy us, but to show us how deeply we have lived.” ~ Deon Cecile
Driving back from Westmoreland, Jamaica, on November 15th, easing along broken roads after Hurricane Melissa, watching fallen trees scattered like punctuation marks across the land - periods, commas, exclamation points, and a whole lot of question marks - each one pausing the story of what once stood tall.
The word came to me, uninvited but undeniable:
Uprooted.
The storm had taken trees, roofs, certainty, and hope. Entire communities looked disoriented, as though the earth itself had shifted its memory. The hurricane came, and it uprooted, but little did I know that what I saw and subsequently felt was preparing me for another type of shift.
Uprootedness, as I am now beginning to understand it, is not only about what the wind takes.
Sometimes, it is about who life takes.
On January 15th, I lost my best friend.
And suddenly, the fallen trees on November 15th, and the word "Uprooted" made sense.
When Loss Is Not Loud, But Absolute
Death does not always arrive like a hurricane.
Sometimes it comes quietly -
with a phone call,
with softly spoken words,
a pause in the air,
a sentence that rearranges our future.
This is the kind of loss that does not tear roofs from homes, but it tears away at the strings of our heart and removes someone who knew us before we became who we are now. Someone who held our history and secrets without judgement. Someone whose presence was so constant we did not realize how rooted we were in each other until the ground gave way.
That, my friend, is a different kind of uprootedness.
In earlier blog articles and reflections, I wrote about loss as something cumulative - how it layers, reshapes, and stretches us. I wrote about how repeated losses introduced curiosities: Who am I now? Who am I becoming? What parts of me survive this?
Today, those questions are no longer theoretical.
They are lived!
The Land Knows This Feeling
Western Jamaica knows this feeling too.
Hurricane Melissa did not discriminate when she arrived in Jamaica on October 28, 2025. She was the girl who came to disrupt and wreak havoc. The likes of nothing Jamaicans had ever seen before, especially in the Western hemisphere. She uprooted mango trees that shaded and fed generations, tore through homes where laughter once settled easily into the walls, and displaced families, memories, and rituals.
And yet, what struck me most was not the destruction.
It was the people.
People sharing water when there was barely enough.
People clearing roads with hands that were already tired.
People laughing softly - not because things were fine, but because joy, even small joy, is a form of resistance.
Loss does not erase us.
It rearranges us.
Grief Is Not the Opposite of Joy
This is something we rarely say out loud.
Grief and joy are not enemies.
They coexist.
Every day, I grieve losing my best friend.
Yet I am also grateful; deeply, reverently grateful, that I had a friendship worth grieving.
That is the quiet truth of loss...
It only hurts because it mattered.
In some of my earlier writings, I also wrote about how losses shape us, how they leave behind hollows that eventually become spaces for empathy, wisdom, and softness. I believe that even more now.
What Being Uprooted Teaches Us
Loss, whether through nature or death, teaches us things we never volunteered to learn:
That permanence is an illusion, but connection is not
That love does not end; it changes form
That grief is not weakness; it is proof of depth
That becoming often begins where certainty ends.
My friend may no longer walk beside me, but she is woven into who I am and who I am becoming. In the way I listen. In the way I love. In the way I hold space for others when their ground shifts. In the kindness I share.
We rebuild differently after each loss that deeply affects us. Not to replace what was. But to honor it. ~ Deon Cecile
There's something about praise and worship gospel songs that open your emotions to a different kind of healing and freedom. I sincerely hope you enjoy this playlist as much I do, and that it soothes and heals the parts of you needing just that. One Love!
Re-rooting, Not Replacing
There is a temptation after loss to rush healing, to "move on," to restore normalcy.
But uprooted things don’t grow by pretending they were never pulled from the earth.
They grow by re-rooting.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
With care.
Today, I allow myself to feel without sinking.
To remember without collapsing.
To mourn without losing myself.
And I extend that same grace to everyone who is rebuilding from loss in countless forms.
The Ending We Don’t Expect, But Need
This is not a story about devastation.
It is a story about rebuilding, re-rooting, becoming, and hope.
It’s about how hurricanes and heartbreak both reveal the same truth:
What holds us is deeper than what breaks us.
I will carry my best friend forward - in laughter, in memory, in quiet moments where her voice still echoes (sometimes so loudly, I do a double-take).
Jamaica will carry her fallen trees forward - into new growth, new shade, new stories.
And if you are reading/listening to this while holding your own loss, know this:
You are not broken.
You are being re-rooted.
Sometimes being uprooted is not the end of our story. (As Jamaicans would say, “a mi fi tell yuh").
It is the moment the roots grow deeper - even when we can’t yet see them.
The land after a storm looks broken - but it is also fertile. ~ Deon Cecile
WHAT TO READ NEXT
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Welcome to Penned Inspiration - where we are "Writing Your Stories and Mine, One Letter at a Time."
Hi, I am Deon Cecile (Dewar-Gray), a Jamaican Writer, Blogger, and Aspiring Author. I have dedicated this corner of the digital world to celebrating Women Over 40, Wellness, Lifestyle, Organizing, Decluttering, and the Extraordinary in the Everyday. Here, wellness isn't about perfection – it's about progress. Lifestyle isn't about keeping up – it's about showing up authentically. Organizing and Decluttering isn't about throwing out everything or running to buy new storage containers - it's about maintaining the things that bring you peace and joy.
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From EMS (Facebook)
Oftentime we do not choose it and when it happens we feel rudderless and lost. The grief that comes with it is unbearable and without understanding. And no, we are not always standing Sis.
Thank you for sharing and for being so open. What you’ve written feels deeply touching—sad, yet reassuring—and I found it both helpful and inspiring.