July 6th, 2023

𝘐𝘵´𝘴 𝘰𝘬𝘢𝘺 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘮𝘺 𝘨𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘧.

I hurt for my sister. I hurt deeply for her. The night my nephew died, I would have done anything to relieve even a portion of the pain she was in…the same pain she is still in except without the numbness of shock to slightly soften the blow.

I could see the pain she and my brother-in-law were experiencing. It was written all over their posture, their faces, their words. I also felt pain. This was the kind of pain you feel when someone you love deeply is in terrible pain themselves, especially a visceral, messy, stabbing and tearing pain. But I couldn’t 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 HER pain.

I couldn’t fathom it. I still cannot. I cannot even imagine the density and magnitude of the pain of losing one of my children.

Only fifteen days after my nephew died, my husband took his last breath on earth. This was an entirely new level of pain for me. It is decidedly different than my sister’s pain but there is no war over grief. We don’t hold contests for whose grief is bigger or worse. They’re different. We also carry them differently.

Trying to imagine someone else’s pain is like trying to remember childbirth ten years later. You think about it and remember thinking it was the worst pain you’d ever experienced at the time but, looking back, it doesn’t feel now like it was physically ripping you apart. That’s why our population is what it is…we can forget the immensity of the pain and agree to go through it again.

Looking at someone’s pain through the looking glass of observation makes it difficult to understand them not “getting over it.” You may wonder when they will find “closure” and move on with their lives.

Closure is for bank accounts, not for love accounts. I don’t want to close him up, seal him away in some box that I put in the spare bedroom. His clothes are still in his dresser drawers. His stuff is still on his nightstand. He still has slippers in my living room. I’m sure eventually I will have to make adjustments to those things, to some degree, but not him, not his memory. No matter where I go from here, how I travel this grief journey, he will still be here, as much of him as I can hold onto.

Next Monday will be two months since Scott ascended into the waiting arms of Jesus. Each month feels like what a year used to feel like to me, time wise. Yet as far as grief is concerned, it feels like it all happened yesterday. It still feels raw and open and festering like a wound that hasn’t even had time to clot and stop bleeding.

You may look at me and think “It would be terrible to lose my spouse, my soulmate, the love of my life. Just awful.” But I guarantee you that, for you, it is like looking back at childbirth or a severe bone break or large kidney stone; you just can’t feel how bad it was once you’re past it.

Bones heal. Kidney stones may require surgery but eventually they either pass or are removed. Childbirth ends in a completion that usually brings joy that lasts for years to come; it comes with a future to look forward to.

I’m pretty sure that this kind of grief won’t be like that. I don’t think there will ever really be a commencement ceremony for finally being free of it. Not this side of Heaven.

I’ve experienced grief before. I loved my Granny dearly. That was a tough one. My step-dad who had been in my life since I was 18. My Uncle John. Our sweet Judah, my nephew. Each of these deaths caused heart-wrenching pain and I miss these people being in my life. And yet these all felt different than what I am experiencing now.

I guess what I’m trying to say today is that you probably cannot really comprehend or unravel how this pain would feel unless you, too, have lost someone who was, in one way or another, part of your every waking moment.

The one whose expression you see in your head when you go through or do something silly, dumb, outrageous, or frightening. The one you pick up the phone to call or text with big news or small. The one whose phrases you could predict in almost any situation. The one you reach for when you’re in need of comfort, strength, love, confidence, empowerment, or just a reminder that you matter. The one who was always there and you could trust in that…always.

And if you cannot imagine it, I’m grateful. I do not wish this tyrannical enemy armed with pain and fear and loss on anyone. It is a battle that feels as if it is to the death.

If you cannot imagine it, however, do not ask someone grieving to “pull it together.” Do not say “life has to go on.” Don’t suggest “moving on.”

For us, we KNOW that forward movement is a requirement of staying here. We KNOW we have to pick up the pieces. We KNOW we have to keep putting one foot in front of the other. We are all-too-aware that the world expects us to soldier on. But the thick sludge of torment that we are living in, like quicksand, with depths that occasionally come barely below our nostrils and other times feel as if it covers every hair on our head, it is exhausting to attempt extraction from it. It feels impossible. It feels impermeable for joy, relief, hope, enjoyment. It feels like every reminder that this person we loved will never, ever be here with us again to share any of life’s moments, is another heavy boot pushing down on the top of our head. It just hurts.

So, if you find yourself not being able to truly understand, it’s okay. But that doesn’t mean you cannot help.

Pray. And pray again. And pray once more. They can be short little prayers: God, give her hope. God, give him strength. God, pour comfort over her like a balm. God, show him your presence in tangible ways. Write down and send them a prayer in a text message or card or a Post-it. Give them words to pray when their own words won’t come.

Just don’t use any words that equate to “get over it,” even if they’re more gentle words that don’t sound as crass.

That person might still feel this way in a year…or longer. They’re playing the long game. It’s like being forced to begin and finish a game of Monopoly or Risk when you didn’t even have the energy for CandyLand or Chutes & Ladders. Except there are no games here. Pony up and decide to jump into battle with them while you have stronger defenses and even effective offensive moves that they don’t have right now. Plead the blood of Jesus over them.

Prayer is an offensive move. Use it.