Grief

In many ways, this blog post is long overdue, but I have learned about the incredible blessing of timing in the past year.  It has been a long year in many ways, every day has held its own unique challenges and the unyielding force of unsolicited change has not always been gentle.  Truthfully, it has been an ongoing war between the good days and the bad days.  Every morning holds a conscious choice to press on, to move forward, but to never forget. 

My dad went home to Jesus one year ago today.  Honestly it still doesn’t feel real to type that out.  For the longest time I thought that if I could avoid accepting that it had happened, I would never have to deal with the unbearable pain that accompanied such a substantial loss.  However, choosing to face it and to fight those fathomless depths of grief has shown me a lot about myself, and even more about my God.  The purpose of this blog post is to take some time today to remember the man my dad was, and to publicly acknowledge the depth of the loss I, and so many others, experienced when he passed. 

I spent weeks, even months, hoarding quotes about grief.  I reveled in the beauty of those words that so aptly described the pain.  However, even as I characterized my grief through the borrowed words of others, and the wordless emotions I felt on my own, I began to truly understand grief and the grieving process for myself.  Grieving process, this is a phrase we use often, especially towards those who have experienced great loss.  I had never really considered what that phrase meant until I experienced it in my own life. This is what I have learned:

• Grief is picking up the phone to call someone who won’t be able to answer, and feeling the depth of that loss all over again. 
• Grief is seeing that beloved person everywhere and in everything.
• Grief is being forced to leave a store or stop on the freeway because a song comes on the radio and those emotions that are so carefully controlled spill over unbidden and without warning.
• Grief is needing a hug, a pep talk, a life lesson, a helping hand, a shoulder to cry on, or a smile from that one single person who could make anything in life ok again, but not being able to have it.  
• Grief is listening to a voicemail over and over again so you don’t forget how their voice sounds. 
• Grieving can steal your energy and mire you in a quicksand of despondency before you realize what is happening.
• Grief sucks. 

In spite of all these things I learned, from the poetic to the hysterical and the absolute melancholy, one stands out about the rest.  Grief is a journey; it is not a place to make your life.  For those moments of grief I have experienced or fought against in the last year have been equaled or exceeded by moments of pure joy at the hands of memory.  There is a process to grief, but there is also a time for that nonlinear path to come to an end.   I was incredibly blessed by the presence of my dad for most of 24 years, and I will never stop wishing that we could have had more time together.  However, they were an amazing 24 years.  He taught me measurable skills like refereeing, driving, how to make some ultimate “dad” meals like bean casserole and macaroni with ketchup.  Even more importantly he instilled in me less tangible gifts: a love for reading, Cougar pride, and an abiding love for the Lord.  There will never come a day when I don’t miss my dad, but I will not trade our beautiful memories for the anesthetizing clutches of grief any longer. 

Please, please don’t misunderstand me.  I think grief is an essential part of loss, and it is something everyone experiences and deals with individually.  I could remain in the stages of sadness and grief for some time yet, and it would be ok because of the depth of my bereavement, but I am choosing to embrace this life with the optimism and persevering spirit of the strongest man I have ever known. 

Thank you to every person who has come alongside me through this last year.  Your prayers, texts, phone calls, hugs, stories, and memories are all stored in my heart. 

I’ve also included a couple of my favorite quotes that I found this last year.  They helped me to feel a little less alone and express some of what I have not been able to say.  Hopefully they can serve the same purpose for others in times of need.

“God saw you getting tired and a cure was not to be. So He put his arms around you and whispered, “Come to Me”. –Author Unknown

“Grief never ends…but it changes. It’s a passage, not a place to stay.  Grief is not a sign of weakness, nor a lack of faith…it is the price of love.” –Author Unknown

“Grieving, like being blind, is a strange business, you have to learn how to do it.  We seek company in mourning, but after the early bursts of tears, after the praises have been spoken, and the good days remembered, and the lament cried, and the grave closed, there is no company in grief.  It is a burden borne alone.” –Ursula K. Le Guin