(NewsNation) — Monday marked one year since four University of Idaho students were stabbed to death inside their off-campus rental home.

When I first started thinking about Monday and what it meant for the people involved, I wondered what one year passing really meant.

So many people were calling it the one year “anniversary” of the Idaho killings, which I get. Technically, it is an anniversary, but that word just doesn’t sound right when we are talking about such an awful tragedy.

Honestly, I wasn’t crazy about making the day into a big deal. I guess I just wondered if the significance of the one-year mark was something manufactured by the media. For the families, I thought they grieve every day, and today is probably like all the other days they have had to endure for the past year. But then I spoke to them, and I realized today actually is different, and it is harder than the other days.

Kaylee Goncalves’ parents described it to me, and once they did, it all made sense. Now that it has been one year, they explained, it means they have had every holiday without Kaylee. Her birthday passed, her parents’ and siblings’ birthdays she loved celebrating passed.

Something about a full year going by is much, much harder, they said. Time passing can help heal pain, but in other ways it can make things worse, like for Kaylee’s baby sister. She is realizing that one day she is going to be older than her big sister. That’s something I never thought about, but for Kaylee’s baby sister, it’s something she dreads.

Ethan Chapin’s family says they spent the day taking some time to pause and remember all the good Ethan brought into the world. Ethan was a triplet, and when I talked to Ethan’s mom last, she was telling me how when you are the mom of a triplet, you spend your entire life counting to three.

From the time Ethan and his siblings were little, she would always count to three to make sure they were all accounted for. In the grocery store. At the park. It was always one, two, three. She can’t really fathom only counting to two now.

Maddie Mogen’s father, Ben Mogen, calls Maddie his “little angel.” In an interview with Spokane’s KREM,
Ben says, “Having her in my life got me through a lot of dark moments. I wouldn’t be here without her.”

Xana Kernodle‘s cousin, Sheldon Kernodle, tweeted Monday, “I will continue to do whatever I can to honor your name and keep your spirit alive. We must never forget.”

Ethan, Xana, Kaylee and Maddie’s families are living the hell of all of this every day but trying to find ways to make the world a better place in their honor. A year after their deaths, we remember the victims but also think of the families who never imagined they would be in this position, grieving with the world watching but showing incredible strength that I think we can all admire.