GRIEF UNVEILED…

The other day I watched a heartbreaking clip on the news about the Refugee Camp in France. What struck me was the sheer volume of widows and fatherless children in comparison to families and young men living there. These women are in a completely foreign land, some having come from wealth, and lovely homes, having once felt what it was like to be a complete family unit. A charity had stepped in to teach these ladies how to sew., thus enabling them to sell their projects to first world nations giving them an income. Instantly I felt an affinity with these ladies as they shared their stories of starting again, and trying to find a life without their men to provide for them and their children. All they wanted was security and opportunity. People could easily watch this and feel pity, and yet remain detached from it all. For me, my heart identified with their pain, their longing to once again feel secure and hoping for opportunity to feel whole again. I instantly felt thankful for what we have, and the opportunities offered here, for the people around us that love and support us.

Saying that though the following day was a truly horrendous day for me. It started with a memory that popped up on Facebook of when James had spoilt me to a Spa Day. I remember that day so well, and how wonderful it felt. I hadn’t felt that way in a very long time, in fact I couldn’t remember what it felt like to feel that happy, I spent part of that moment trying to remember, but frustratingly I couldn’t. Instantaneously like a hungry animal, thankfulness was swallowed up by the pain. Nothing ever prepares you for what it feels like to lose your best friend and soul mate. If only life came with a manual for trouble shooting trials. It’s been over a year since I lost my husband, and still I experience waves of grief that take my breath away. The thing I miss the most is having him there to chat to, he was the one person who truly understood me and connected with me in the deepest way possible. Every day I wake up and wish he were lying next to me and that it was all just a bad dream. Every day I am reminded that I will never see his beautiful, rugged face again, or feel his rough hands in mine, or his big broad shouldered hug that would swallow me up. But most of all I miss him by my side, chatting for hours in a coffee shop sharing hearts and trying to fix the world together.

We had dreamed of the life we would live post cancer, excited that finally we were going to be released into all God had for us. After all we had walked such a tough journey with the treatment, and yet had remained so resolute in our belief in God the Father, we had to the greater part remained unwavering in our faith that he would be miraculously healed. We were going to change the world with the message of love and faith that people needed to hear, a beacon of hope in trial and pain. It was a good dream!

I’ve never spoken of those last few days, because they were too painful, for some reason now I feel the need to bring it into the light. They are indelibly marked in my brain and often come back with force when I least expect it. It had dawned on me that the miracle we were desperate for may not happen, but I wasn’t giving up without a fight. I would trust God even until His last breath, just as I had promised. Agonisingly I had to hear him gasp for breath for two days, knowing he was fighting to stay. With the lack of sleep, constantly praying God would just heal him, the moment arrived. We could hear a change in his breathing and demeanor when I was talking about how I would struggle without him, we realised he could hear us. So we jumped up and began to speak words of affirmation and sing over him, immediately he calmed down. I had seen enough of him suffering, and I knew he was fighting to stay for us. I knew at that moment deep in my spirit I had to make the choice to give him the release to go. I drew as close to him as I could and told him that he could go to be with Jesus, that Chloe and I would be okay, but that he needs to ask Jesus if he can come back. It was then that he took his last breath. Immediately I wanted to take it all back and scream ‘STAY!’

Seeing him lying there lifeless, it hit me like a dagger right into my heart, he was gone. Eighteen months of fighting, and there he lay, and with him part of my heart lay dead too. I tried for almost an hour to bring him back to life quoting every scripture that I could possibly think of that promised life, but he was gone forever. So I lay on the bed with him, no more wires or machines in the way, and put his arm around me just to feel what it was like to be hugged by him one last time. It took every ounce of willpower to walk away and leave him there. I was supposed to leave that hospital with him, healed and free, instead I was leaving him there lifeless and alone in the care of strangers. I knew he was in a better place, but I desperately wanted that place to be by our side.

Call me crazy, but in the days between him dying and his cremation, I kept reminding God that it wasn’t too late. The intense faith we had walked in for two years was still coursing through every fibre of my being. He could still send him back. I knew once the cremation came then I would have to let go forever. Going to pick up his ashes was not how I wanted him back, I wanted him alive and healthy being able to embrace him with joy, instead I walked away with him in a canister just a pile of ashes, along with the ashes of our hopes and dreams.

WHY GOD? This proceeded from my mouth for many days. Why had He chosen not to use us, to leave Chloe fatherless and me a widow, alone and heart broken? In my mind it made no sense at all. Still to this day those questions often come and go, either they will fade or come back with vengeance when we are trying to move forward and nothing is making any sense.

I’m sitting here with tears streaming down my face after another wave of grief has hit me hard, totally unexpected and unpredictable. I needed to put on paper what it really feels like in the moment when it hits. We live in a society where emotion and the harsh reality of struggle and pain makes us very uncomfortable. Yet we live in a world where tragedy is taking place all around us, we may try to escape it, avoid it but it’s real. The Bible says that, “creation groans as with the pains of childbirth for the sons of God to be revealed.” We only have to stop and truly open our eyes to see that people are crying for hope, for truth, for Jesus. I used to believe that as a Christian comfort was a right that Jesus should never remove, and that success was a true indication of a mature Godly life. This sense of entitlement had impacted the way I had responded to suffering. If I had enough faith it would never happen to me. Using this as a protective covering to manipulate God into only giving me what I thought a Christian should have. When I’d struggle I used faith as a formula to remove it, after all wasn’t that what being a strong Christian was all about? Yet I only have to read the word to realise that for most of my life I had failed to see that the Bible never promises this kind of life, but rather that there will be trials, and that in my flesh I am weak, yet in Him to take hope as He has overcome the world, and that in my weakness He is made strong. The wheat must grow amongst the tares until the final days.

It goes against everything in your flesh and the world we live in which promises things that will make our life happier, more comfortable, successful, and settled. Like smoke and mirrors they rarely deliver. I had unknowingly surrounded myself with these things because they made me feel safe. I chose to ignore the bad things happening around me. Until the day my bubble burst, and I had to wake up and take notice. Our fake securities are like flowers, they may look beautiful even bring a sense of joy, but one day they perish. All of those things I held my security in superficially were stripped away, all that remained is what I held inside. Revealing your true self is scary! Not talking about emotion, being humble and showing weakness is in itself like a disease, it festers. A wound needs to be cleaned before it can heal, not just plastered over. Uncovering it and cleaning it out is the only way to recovery. Fake recover serves no one. That’s a whole different subject I’m passionate about, so I’ll leave it there.

This real world, made me very uncomfortable before James was diagnosed. Entering that environment was a massive awakening. We were thrust into a world of extreme suffering and the harsh reality of cancer. A sea of faces walking unimaginable agony not just for themselves but families and loved ones. I remember days of sitting in waiting rooms hoping for good news, looking out at people who were walking a similar journey and either seeing joy and hope or devastation and depression. Their faces marked with the struggle and fight of treatment that had sucked vitality and life from their worn out bodies. This was the ‘valley of the shadow of death.’ I thought I’d known it before, but here in this place, in these wards, I knew I had entered it for the first time in my life, and yes it made me very uncomfortable. However, as time went by that valley became our reality, and we learned to make the most of it, even find a second family within it. Right in the midst of all of this is where we saw God lay a table for us to feast on and find strength, in the presence of our enemy. Sometimes you need to know and experience true darkness to appreciate true light. A supernatural grace sustained us through some of the worst experiences of our lives. I could see a favour and supernatural peace over James’ life as he walked through experiences that would make the toughest warrior crumble to dust.

It is not until it is all over that you look back and realise what you have walked through. I had to write it all down when I went through grief counselling, and it made my hairs stand on end. I had a counsellor that had fought in the war in Afghanistan. He had counselled serviceman, then families and policemen for over 20 years, and after reading our experiences, he told me it was the first time he had ever cried. Hearing that was like water to my soul, knowing it was okay to feel this level of pain. When he asked me how I had walked it, all I could say was that our faith in God had sustained us, and that you realise whilst you’re in it how far you are willing to go for someone you love.

When the busyness of sorting life out after someone dies had somewhat settled, I realised that the supernatural grace had lifted, replaced by the true nature of the raw pain. I believe it was because I had to face it in order to truly grieve well? The band aid had to be lifted to get rid of the pain lying within that had affected my life for all these years. Believe me there were moments when I choose to run from it, ignore it, but left for too long it builds up and then explodes inside me. So deep down I know now that the only way to truly heal is to dive into the pain. At that place where you feel your heart might literally stop working is where you meet a whole new revelation of Christ that you could never reach without it. You are faced with the revelation that without Him you cannot survive. Here is where He becomes ‘El Shaddai’ the God who is more than enough, because He is the only one who can meet you there. Here we come face to face with our inability to carry a single thing on our own, because His strong hand upon our life becomes the life source we cannot live without. As we humble ourselves and accept our weakness, dependance and hopes in Him, here He truly hears and here He truly heals.

You can study Psychology and be an expert in all matters of the heart, but unless you experience grief for yourself it cannot be explained in diagrams or textbooks or even follow a patterns on paper. It is like being by the sea (the water being the grief); sometimes it is around your ankles like you are paddling in it getting your feet wet, you know it’s there but it’s ok. Sometimes it’s waist level, and it makes you feel like you’re really struggling to manoevre but still you can just about manage, and then other times it hits you like a tsunami knocking you senseless, taking your breath away leaving you feeling like you may never recover.

Grief has many faces too. You don’t only grieve the loss of a loved one, you grieve the loss of a life you once had, your identity, your dreams and plans for the future, security, and even the loss of friendships. It was like being transported into a foreign world which was unrecognisable, with no more crutches that made you feel secure. No choice given, but having to make your way into a new life with only what you hold true inside. Everything feels very foreign and uncomfortable. Your emotions roll around in a whirlpool making no sense at all. It’s lonely there, because no one will ever be able to understand your walk unless they physically take your place. Inside you’re screaming for the old life that you took for granted, just for one moment of knowing the security of walking hand in hand with your soul mate again, but that was taken leaving the gaping hole left in your chest where part of your heart has been ripped out. So you try your utmost just to take one day at a time with God by your side, hoping eventually you will find your way into this new world and eventually feel at home with it. On top of that you have a little girl who is walking her own journey of pain and emotion, and you have to take her hand and try navigate not only your own emotions but hers too. That’s when I knew each day I had to give this precious child over to God to hold her heart in His hands, to be all she needed, because I was clueless as to where to begin.

I used to work with my husband, for over 13 years we worked together. I gave up any dreams of what I wanted to pursue to support him in the business. I never felt robbed or regret, because we were building something together. It enabled me to be at home and be with our daughter, take off holidays and ferry Chloe to clubs and friends. However now that he is gone, I am left jobless and to a great extent feel I have lost not only my husband but my way of life, identity, security and direction. It feels uncomfortable, very scary, and at times impossible. Yet I have a little girl to look after and protect and provide for. It’s like starting from scratch. Who am I? What am I good at? What should I do? What is my purpose and calling in life? We had always had a plan. We had always had vision, goals and dreams, but those dreams all died when he died, because they involved all of us.

I’m 45 in June, no one dreams of starting over at 45! I’m tired, exhausted and life has knocked the wind out of me to say the least. I’ve battled with CFS, multiple house moves, one being a failed immigration, we had fought bankruptcy losing our entire property portfolio and our own home, as well as various other emotional issues from our past. Life hasn’t always been kind. To add insult to injury, we lost two good friends and my dad in the same year as James died. Understandably I suffered severe anxiety for a few months, all leading up to this point in my life where I now have to start again.

I look out and all I see are mountains and hurdles to overcome. So what do I do? Well, to be honest and real, some days It’s just too much and I melt. Other days I just step out trust God and take one day at a time, hoping that somehow a door will just crack open and offer hope. Every day I wake with a prayer in my heart for breakthrough, wisdom and direction in faith. Other days I make resolutions and get stuck in and study and buckle down to make myself more employable, apply for jobs and keep hoping. Up to now just met with silence. No responses, no direct word from God but….’just trust me.’ How I would love to just pick up a phone have a chat audibly with God and ask him what to do. Instead I feel His constant urge to just seek His face, know His love, and let that be my driving force. Revelation forming in my heart is this; that as I seek Him just for who He is, I sleep better, I feel better, and deep down have an assurance that He will add all these things unto me. So why oh why do I not stick to that….because my flesh is uncomfortable and desperate at times, and I just want to make it happen.

This I believe is the hard road of faith, the one less travelled…it’s one step in front of the other, somedays doubting and then asking forgiveness and starting again afresh the next day, other days more positive and resolute, and then somedays where you just want to not care anymore, so you try distract yourself with anything that will just stop you thinking about it. It’s certainly no casual walk in the park on a sunny day! More like wrestling in the ring with a cage fighter, glad to make it through another day in one piece!

So most writings have a great ending that makes all the tragedy or story of struggle worthwhile. But what happens when it doesn’t have the fairytale ending? When grief doesn’t ever go away, you just learn to live with it, like a limp. Who knows what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was? Yet it remained, and only gave him more opportunity to boast of Christ’s ability to show His strength through it. Now I truly identify with David, Jacob, Moses, and the disciples, each given a promise but having to walk through unimaginable struggle to see it come to pass, some never seeing it but remaining faithful nonetheless.

So let’s be gentle with our broken, to those who are still walking a journey of healing, not using our theology as a tool to try fix or avoid the pain but as a balm to heal and carry people to the feet of Jesus the only true source of healing. Let’s draw into the world of those hurting, and be a warm comforting blanket that remains until the warmth of His love permeates their broken soul. Let’s not assume or patronise that the person isn’t doing everything within them to be as close to Jesus as they can. It’s not about making us feel better to be able to offer a solution. More often than not they are closer to God in those times than you and I are as it’s their only means of survival. Rather let’s be in awe of a good God who has enabled this soul to still be holding the faith despite the seemingly endless pain. See a soul that will one day be able to carry others because they like an experienced Captain have weathered the storms and know how to navigate to a safe harbour because they’ve been there.

I am slowly beginning to see my widowhood not as a mar or burden to my identity, but rather as an opportunity (that I didn’t choose but that has been entrusted to me.) Perhaps one day I may even identify it as God’s calling to walk a road less travelled by, to meet those souls who too have entered that foreign world we choose to ignore.