Grief Reappearing

The Thomas M. Ellis book, This Thing Called Grief, states:’ Grief is a crazy-making complicated process. Grief is not about clear, predictable stages or steps. Rather, it is a natural process of dynamic changes that will ebb and flow as they may.’

I have experienced the crazy-making complicated process recently in a new way. Attending my Grandpa’s memorial was a great time of family renewal and remembering. I came home and ‘got on with my life’ stuffing the feelings of sadness. It wasn’t long though before God used my husband to prod me about my disconnectedness. I was living the reality that yes in fact; new grief does bring up old grief. Almost unknowingly I had started erecting walls to contain my pain. The loss of Grandpa had brought to the surface my feelings of grief about my mom.

I love that God loves me so much that even when I don’t consciously invite Him into my pain, He gives me opportunity to work through it. In these couple weeks since I have returned from the memorial, these are a few of the examples that He was in the middle of to allow me to feel and heal.

I attended a movie that allowed me to cry for the last half of it, steady! My daughter and her friend and I sat, without Kleenex, and shed tears of cleansing. (It wasn’t really pretty, but when is crying pretty?)

The day that my husband questioned me about what was going on I had been reading a book by Anne Lamott.She had written something that had struck a nerve with me and I had decided not to finish the book. Well that day as I gathered the books to return to the library I picked up her book, OK, just one more chapter. That chapter happened to be the story about her mother and how it was hard but she was a little relieved when her mother died. Their relationship was difficult and crazy at times, but now she was at the place where she just missed her. I knew what I was reading was precisely where God wanted me to be for that moment.

I took my son to the library and I returned with 3 books, one called Complaint Free World, the other Unattended Sorrow and lastly This Thing Called Grief. Hmmm, I wonder if I should pay more attention to what my heart is telling me. It seriously didn’t connect with me until later - I was not picking these books up just to be more prepared to help others in their grief. They were especially for my own heart at this time.

I realized when my husband cornered me with his love that it was grief that I was feeling. I don’t know what to do with it when it comes bursting through the covers of life. I tend to have very finite thinking sometimes. When I get to a certain place, I feel that I should be ‘done’ with something, rather than allowing my life to be a journey. My grief over Mom took me by surprise and in acknowledging it; God was able to heal another piece of my heart. I now feel I just miss her. I don’t dwell on the fact that the last times were difficult as she struggled in her mental illness, the fact that she ended her own life. I just miss having my Mom around, someone that always made me feel special and loved.

Another gift I was given was a visit from my sister and her boys. We are just re-establishing our relationship since her crazy making years of drug addiction. She has been clean for over a year now. Praise God! One day I may share some of that story. We had many conversations about Mom and her last times, shared our guilt and our grief and discovered the completely different ways we coped. I was reminded of how personally unique our journeys are with grief, even when we grieve the same person.

A line that stood out for me in the movie I cried through said that ‘love is fragile and we are not always the best caretakers’. As I walked through this part of my journey of grieving, I have seen that I have not always been the best caretaker of my heart. God tells us to guard our hearts for they are the wellspring of life. Although I took some deliberate steps to walk through my fresh loss, sadness still lingers. I needed to give myself permission to feel these things, to let God work it out for His good.

Stephen Levine says in his book Unattended Sorrow,’ Unresolved grief is like a low-grade fever. It flows in peaks and valleys. Sometimes it spikes into almost overwhelmingly afflictive emotions; at other times it lies almost dormant, nearly comatose, just beneath the surface, until a shadow crosses the heart and releases it.’

I am grateful for the shadow that released it, and the new opportunity to resolve it. I will trust my God to heal it and to not be afraid of it.

Do you have any unattended sorrow? Ask God to give you the courage to walk through the valley of the shadow of death. You will then fear no evil because He is with you.