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Mum 'paralysed with grief' as she faces milestone alone

By Nikolina Koevska Kharoufeh |

Returning to work after maternity leave can be a difficult time for any mum - but for a mum whose husband died four weeks after her baby's birth the milestone is an overwhelming one.

Julie Thomason is mum to two-year-old Kinsey and six-month-old Charlie lost her incredible husband Charles in an accident when Charlie was just four-weeks-old. The US mum thanked her co-workers with a recent Instagram video, captioning it: "Thank you to my coworkers who respected my request of 'no sad hugs' today."

The clip shows the mum lightheartedly making fun of her anxiety about returning to the office. Julie is putting on a fake smile to try to fool her coworkers into thinking that she is doing okay. The accompanying song repeats the lines: "Everything's fine. Everything's good. Nothing's wrong, I'm feeling great."

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Julie and her late husband Charles with their son.
Julie says she is trying to be "cool and chill" about the return though is finding it hard. (Instagram)

In preparation to her return to work Julie asked her coworkers to not make a big deal of the occasion and try not to give her too many "sad hugs" that day, a request they all upheld. "Instead I was greeted with coffees and cookies and colorful sticky notes," the mum explained.

Julie lost her husband Charles and the father of her two children in October 2021 just four weeks after she gave birth to her second child and son Charlie. He was in a car accident and never returned home from a work trip.

"They say you don't realise what you have until it's gone but that's not true for me. I knew exactly what I had. One in a million. And I tried my best to tell him daily," the devastated mum wrote on Instagram when she shared the tragic news.

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Julie and her husband late Charles with their two kids.
Julie and her late husband Charles welcomed their second child Charlie into the world in October 2021. (Instagram)

Since her loss, the mum has been raising her two kids as a single parent and sharing her journey with over 50,000 followers on Instagram who credit her for being the 'bravest woman in the world'.

"We are a team. We may be a smaller team than we were planning on being. We may have lost our strongest player. But we're going to keep competing and we're going to keep winning and no matter what we're not going to quit because that's not what Daddy taught us," the mum wrote on her page.

Followers took to her page to wish the mum a positive return to work, encouraging her to embrace the new adventure and ask for help when she needs.

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"You are such an inspiration. Your grit and determination to seize joy in the hardest season anyone could imagine is incredible," one person commented on her video.

Another said, "Sending positive light and love your way... You got this, its okay not to be okay."

It's been five months since Julie lost Charles and she says she still feels "paralised" by the grief. "So very thankful for friends and family that comes racing to help me on these days. It truly takes a village," she wrote on her page.

She regularly thanks her online community for following her journey and those who reach out that are in a similar situation, "Thank you, truly. For all your kind words."

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