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Erika Kirk explained why simply getting “through the next 15 minutes” has been a critical step in getting through the first year since the tragic assassination of her husband Charlie Kirk.
Kirk, who took over leadership of Turning Point USA (TPUSA) following the fatal shooting of her 31-year-old husband at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10, 2025, penned a New York Times guest essay headlined, “What I’ve learned about grief,” that was published on Monday.
Kirk said the first 24 hours after her husband was assassinated felt “like a fever dream,” and she told Second Lady Usha Vance that she didn’t know how she would move forward. The wife of Vice President JD Vance then offered words that are now “seared into” Kirk’s heart.
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Erika Kirk penned a New York Times guest essay about grief as the one-year anniversary of the tragic assassination of her husband approaches. (Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images)
“You know when you’re on an airplane with your kids, and you’re going to land in 15 minutes, but the kids are going crazy, screaming, throwing things, and then the plane lands, and the kids relax, and everything is fine again? That’s how it will be. Just get through the next 15 minutes,” Vance told Kirk, according to Kirk’s guest essay.
Kirk explained that things like seeing his toothbrush and towel in their shared bathroom were tough, but she constantly thought of Vance’s advice.
“I stood in the doorway of our bedroom. I turned on the light and walked toward his side of the bed. I stared at his pillow and wondered how long a person’s scent can last in sheets. I stood there in silence, replaying all of the completely ordinary mornings we woke up there together. I wasn’t ready to be there, so I turned off the light and crawled into bed with my 3-year-old daughter. Just get through the next 15 minutes,” Kirk wrote.
“For months, I avoided my bedroom. I told myself it was OK to confront the pain gradually and to sit with each memory as it came to me,” she continued. “The first Saturday without a love note from him passed. His 32nd birthday. My birthday. Thanksgiving. When I put the Christmas tree together wrong, it made me realize that being a widow means old traditions will need to make room for new ones. The wave crashes on me again and again. Every time, just get through the next 15 minutes.”
The CEO of the conservative nonprofit listed other family milestones that her beloved late husband had missed, and she eventually realized their young daughter was also “surviving her own little crashing waves.”
Erika Kirk speaks during the memorial service for her husband, political activist Charlie Kirk at State Farm Stadium on Sept. 21, 2025, in Glendale, Arizona. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
“Grief is strange. Time continues even when every part of you wants it to pause or, better yet, rewind. But the people we love who have passed on would not want us to spend the rest of our lives trying to rewind. At first, I needed to survive the next 15 minutes. Over time, I’ve realized that Charlie would want me to live them,” Kirk wrote.
“Occasionally, I’m asked whether I’m angry at God. I say no. My husband was one of one. I was blessed to be his wife, and I understood his assignment here on Earth, which he more than fulfilled. He wanted people who felt lost to know the everlasting hope he found through faith and the sense of meaning and purpose that can fill the deeper longings we so often try to satisfy elsewhere,” she added. “To the world, he was Charlie Kirk. But to me, he was the love of my life. To our children, he was the center of their world.”
Kirk believes that it’s easy to struggle to understand God’s plan after losing a loved one and faith is truly tested when “bad things happen.”
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Charlie Kirk was assassinated Sept. 10 during an outdoor event at Utah Valley University. (Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images)
“True faith means accepting that we won’t get every answer and finding peace in that,” Kirk wrote. “I have seen extraordinary good born out of something unimaginably evil. I have watched people return to faith in droves, reconcile with their families and forgive old wounds because of Charlie. I know my husband is in heaven, but I ache for him to be here. Still, I can stand and say without a shadow of a doubt that God is good.”
She wrote that the wave still comes, but it is different a year later and she even welcomes it, as “a moment the grief makes Charlie feel impossibly close.” Kirk believes grief is universal,” doesn’t care whom you voted for” and never truly goes away.
“I am learning that grieving Charlie and living life at the same time are part of the rhythm of grief. I can miss him with every part of me and still laugh with our children. I can have a broken heart and still experience joy,” Kirk wrote.
“If you are living through grief, I won’t tell you what to feel or that tomorrow will be better than today. I will tell you what a dear friend told me: Just get through the next 15 minutes,” she continued. “One day, maybe when you least expect it, you’ll start to see that those 15 minutes hold more than just grief. The grief is there, always, but so is the beautiful gift of life.”
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President Donald Trump greets Erika Kirk, widow of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, during a public memorial at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, on September 21. (Patrick T. Fallon/Getty Images)
Psychotherapist and author Jonathan Alpert told Digital that the second lady provided strong advice.
“One of the hardest parts of grief is that your mind races ahead, filling you with anxiety. How am I going to do this for the next year? How am I going to raise my kids without this person? What are holidays going to look like? How do I build a life I never expected to be living? Suddenly you’re trying to solve the rest of your life at the worst possible moment.
Sometimes you really do need to shrink the window and just get through the next 15 minutes,” Alpert said.
“Resilience isn’t pretending you’re fine. It’s being able to hurt and still live your life,” he added. “Erika’s piece shows that those two things can exist at the same time.”
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TPUSA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Charlie Kirk founded TPUSA to promote conservatism on college campuses nationwide. He was speaking before more than 2,000 people at a TPUSA event in Orem, Utah, when he was assassinated, leaving behind Erika and their two children.
Digital’s Michael Sinkewicz contributed to this report.
