“Grief is like the ocean; it comes
on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is
overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim.” - Vicki Harrison
A psychologist friend once told me, "It's not normal the amount of grief and loss you have experienced already for the amount of years you have lived." From babies to young mommas to grandparents to teenagers. From disease to natural causes to accidents to suicide. I have been near to it all and know that I probably haven't even faced the hardest ones for me yet. As I tend to do with life, I have taken it all in, absorbed and learned. Following are some lessons my heart has been through and the stories that accompany them.
Lesson #1: This is really hard.
The first experience I had with
losing someone very close to me, was my friend Shawn. He was one of the most
kind, beautiful spirits I had ever met and such a good friend. When he was only
20, engaged to be married, he died from Leukemia. I was also 20 and struck to
the core with questions. Not only did I learn how painful losing someone can
be, I learned that in those valleys is where God will come near and wrap his
arms around us.
Lesson #2: It's always with you.
Just before Shawn was diagnosed, I
had taken my first mission trip to Romania. The children that we worked with
the most would change all of our lives forever. They were HIV+ at a time when
people were still uneducated about the disease and so they were taken from
their families and put in an institution to die. This was the first time I had
ever been so close to suffering, close enough to touch it and hold it. A boy on
his death bed asked me for water and going against the rules of the 'hospital',
I gave it to him. I will never forget that moment. He died the next day and
many of the children I played with and held in my arms died in the months and
years that followed. Their faces visited me in my sleep. I put their pictures
on my walls and vowed to honor their memory with a life of service to children
abandoned and neglected. I carry them close to my heart, always.
Lesson #3: It's impossible to make sense of it.
My cousin who was almost 30 and
raising two sons ages 11 and 13, was killed in an accident while riding her
bike after work one day. She lived in Milwaukee, I was living in St. Louis. My response to
it was to do the only thing I knew how to do, help. I left my job and moved in
with her kids. I packed up her life. Up until that point, it was the hardest
thing I had ever done and I did it alone. Walking her children through the
first stages of losing her, helped to lift me out of my own sorrow. It took me over a month to get beyond the shock and not feel like I was just watching her kids while she was on vacation.
Lesson #4: Remembering helps.
When my grandma passed away it was a
different experience for me. This was someone who I cherished and was extremely
close to, but she was 93 and it was the normal progression of life. Doesn't
make it easier, but I think you are a little more settled with it. After she
was gone, the littlest things would remind me of her and make me cry, like
eating eggs. I decided to surround myself with things she liked and things that
were hers so that I could remember her often. There's a lot of healing in that.
Taking everything away, hiding the pictures, avoiding the memories just puts
off the inevitable and makes it that much harder to face the pain of it. To this
day, I keep one of her quilts on my bed even though it matches nothing in my room. Everyday it reminds me of her and makes me smile.
Lesson #5: If you're not intentional, it will swallow you whole.
One of my closest friends who I had
known for 20 years fought cancer when we were in our early 30's and it
eventually took her life. This came after what seemed like a barrage of disease
and death very close to me. This one sat on my chest and forced me to fight for
survival. For years I felt the empty space that Pam had filled in my life. It
was the most pain I had felt in losing someone. I got depressed. Through her
death, I have learned that grieving is a journey, not a segment of time or an
event. I remember standing at her grave site exactly one year after she passed
and feeling the raw emotion all over again. The grass hadn't grown over her
grave yet and it seemed like a picture of what was happening in my heart, it
was still so fresh. There was no way to put a time limit on feeling this, but I
had to find a way to move forward at the same time.
Lesson #6: Let yourself feel it, all of it.
When I returned from a year living
in Zambia, I had a heavy heart and was going through something emotionally that
I couldn't explain. What God ended up showing me in that year was that I had a pile
up of losses and grief that I hadn't allowed myself to feel. I had focused my
energy on taking care of everyone else and had unintentionally avoided letting
myself really feel it. It's like building a dam to hold back the water. It's
better to just let it wash over you as it comes.
Lesson #7: Run and let them inspire you.
After my friend Andrea, age 30, died
suddenly from breast cancer leaving a husband and one year old son, I ran my
2nd marathon. She had encouraged me to run the first one and supported me
through it. I ran this one for her and raised money for her son and for
research. Two weeks before the race, I had an injury to my hip and a little
joint in there that had come out of place. A therapist put it back in place and
said that if I wanted to run the marathon, I should not run anymore until then.
So with the injury and the loss of two weeks of training, I ran this race. At
mile 8 of 26, that little joint came out of place again. Every time I passed a
medic station, I considered quitting, but I couldn't quit on Andrea. God met me
throughout the race with people who didn't know me who encouraged me and I
finished it. This increased my faith to believe that they are all watching me, cheering me on and they are all with me in every step I take in this life.
Lesson #8: We need each other.
People can be awkward at times of
loss, not know what to say or say unhelpful things, but surrounding ourselves
with the right people is imperative to healing and moving forward. Every person grieves differently and I've learned to allow for that. I have seen families torn apart by loss. I think it's because everything comes to the surface, so raw, like walking around without skin on your body. We need space and we need nearness at the same time.
Lesson #9: He walks with us.
A few years ago, I experienced one of the deepest losses I have ever had to walk through. It was the loss of my ability to have natural children. I found that God was in the valley of loss, walking with me, giving me strength and comfort. I have a tatoo that is a lotus flower rising out of flames that symbolizes what God did through that trial. It stands for strength and beauty rising out of adversity.
Lesson #10: If you are willing, it will make you stronger.
Tragedy can crush us and it can be the thing that propels us forward. I look back on all of the pain, suffering, loss and see how it has all shaped the person I am today. Some of it nearly took the breath right out of me, but I survived.
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