Comment by mindslight

This tracks for me, at least for the death of a parent. "It" meaning the specific thing never gets better, it just kind of fades into a less acute dull lament. But "It" meaning your whole life overall can certainly get "better". You can find new things to care about. But that's "new normal" and the old normal is just gone. Something that used to be.

As for the article's metaphor I thought they were going with another obvious direction - a broken glass is just suddenly, irreversibly gone.

I wish the author had laid out a timeline, because it feels like this was written early on in their grieving process, and I think the whole appeal of the stages model is that your perspective/understanding will change as time moves on.