healing – Page 8 – thelifeididntchoose

Healing? Curing? Same Thing?

Healing and curing are not the same thing.

Healing is a process that takes as long as it takes and may never be complete this side of eternity. It’s a folding in of the hard parts of my story, an acknowledgement of the way I am changed because of the wounds I’ve received. It involves scar tissue and sore spots and ongoing pain.

To be cured is to be free of the effects of disease or injury.

And there is no cure for child loss.

I will never be free of the effects of burying a child this side of Heaven.

I did not understand the difference until it was my heart bearing an incurable wound.

The thing about healing, as opposed to curing, is that it is relational. It takes time. It is inefficient, like a meandering river. Rarely does healing follow a straight or well-lit path. Rarely does it conform to our expectations or resolve in a timely manner. Walking with someone through grief or through the process of reconciliation requires patience, presence, and a willingness to wander, to take the scenic route.

~Rachel Held Evans, Searching for Sunday

It really IS all about relationship.

Relationship first with the Living God through His Son, Jesus.

The ongoing life-giving ministry of His Spirit calls courage to me as I travel this Valley and sings hope to my heart when I cannot hear anything else.

He will not leave me in my distress.

He does not abandon me in my darkest hour.

But it is also about relationship with others.

Relationship with those willing to meander with me along this unlit and winding path. They are the ones who give me courage to carry on. They are the ones who lift me up when I am unable to lift myself and who lie down with me when even their best pep talk is not enough to get me off the floor.

They have listened to me tell and retell my story.

The first time I told it, I didn’t have a clue what to say or how to say it-what to leave in, what to leave out. How do you condense a life-sized earthquake to a novel, much less a few sentences?

But I find as I practice telling my story, it is healing.

Sometimes it’s as if I speak without my mind being engaged and listening, I have an “aha” moment-suddenly recognizing a new insight and another place that needs work or has received healing.

I’ve learned that there is no substitute for companionship on this journey.

My healing depends on the faithful Presence of my Shepherd

AND

the faithful presence of friends who refuse to leave even when it seems we are lost in the wilderness of grief together,

Repost: Silence Doesn’t Serve Anyone Well

One of the reasons I write is to share my grief experience with others.

I realized when tossed into the ocean of sorrow that of all the things I had heard about or read about, surviving child loss was never mentioned.

Read the rest here: Silence Doesn’t Serve Anyone Well

Subtle Disapproval

I mention that today is a hard day to someone who knows my story and the words fall with a loud “thud!” between us.

I don’t know whether to pick them up or not and she isn’t having anything to do with them.

So I move on to another topic. Clearly this one isn’t going anywhere.

There are lots of ways to send messages of disapproval. You can “just say NO” like kids are told to do in anti-drug and anti-bullying campaigns. You can rant and rave and argue and rail against someone or something in person and on social media.

Or you can just ignore someone when they spill what matters to them like an offering on the ground at your feet.

The opposite of love is not hate.

It’s indifference.

The opposite of support is not opposition.

It’s looking the other way.

Strangers line streets to cheer marathoners on-offering cups of water and words of affirmation.

“You can do it!” “Keep going!” “You are more than half-way there!” “Don’t give up!”

And yet many of us are running the race of our lives without a cheering section.

I get it–you are so very tired of the fact that I am so very tired. I have worn out the welcome mat to the door of your heart. It DOES get old when I bring the same baggage with me each time we talk.

Trust me, I’m working hard at unpacking it. I’m doing all I can to lighten my load and what I ask you to help me carry.

But it is a slow, slow process.

And every time I need help or encouragement and don’t get it, another brick is added to the suitcase.

You might think you are helping me learn to ignore the pain by ignoring my mention of it but I don’t have that luxury.

It’s my heart wound, not yours.

It’s my child buried, my child not here, my child gone from sight-how exactly should I ignore that? Which of your children could you put away for a lifetime and forget was ever here?

If you want to help me lighten the load,

let me unpack my pain by telling my story.

If you want me to finish the race strong,

cheer me on.

Yes, I AM a Cat Lady

I confess: I AM a cat lady.

Not the one with the dozens living in the house and stinking up the place but the one who relies on her furry pal to get her through hard days.

I raised Roosevelt from the day he was born.

His mom was a sickly outdoor cat that had never made it through a successful pregnancy and was not a candidate for being spayed because she wouldn’t have survived the anesthesia.

So the day I heard a tiny “mew” outside my window I hardly expected the sight I beheld. Here was mama kitty utterly amazed that she had birthed a baby, walking off the edge of the porch with a tiny black something still attached by the umbilical cord.

She could have cared less.

I grabbed scissors and a towel and rescued the little darling without much hope of his surviving.

But he did.

That was seven hospitalizations, two surgeries and one giant heartache ago.

He has become my comfort companion, my purring pal, the one who knows before I do that my RA is flaring, my heart breaking.

I am thankful for this oasis of comfort in a desert of hurt.

I am thankful that the God Who made me also made animals to bring healing in the midst of heartache. Oh, so thankful for a husband that puts up with my crazy “save everything that breathes” personality and doesn’t mind if a cat sneaks up the side of the bed in the middle of the night to get cozy in the covers..

When Dominic died, I remember sitting in my chair as the parade of sweet friends and family came over to cry with us. Roosevelt sat with me the entire time. His warm body reminded me that I was still here even when my limbs seemed to float away into the ether and my mind wasn’t entirely certain that what I saw or heard was real.

I have learned to count my blessings.

And while the majority of them walk on two legs, at least one has four.

Manifesto of the Brave & Brokenhearted~by Brene Brown

I am thankful for Brene Brown.

She has helped me put words to my feelings, helped me see a way forward when I felt there was none and helped me own my story even though it is hard.

I keep her quotes around to encourage my heart and remind me that I am brave.

This is one of my favorites:

Why Do We Turn Away?

The news goes out over Facebook, over phone lines, over prayer chains and everyone shows up.

Crowds in the kitchen, in the living room, spilling onto the lawn.

It’s what you do.

And it’s actually the easiest part. Lots of people, lots of talking, lots of activity keep the atmosphere focused on the deceased and the family. The conversation rarely dips to deeper waters or digs into harder ground: “Where was God?”; “Why him?”; “Why do ‘bad’ things happen to ‘good’ people?”

But eventually the busyness and noise gives way to stillness and silence.

That’s when the harder part starts.

The long hours of nightime darkness that invite questions that demand answers. The quiet hours of daylight that insist on playing a home movie of the years that went before. Forcing me to wrestle. Tossing me in the ring of trying to reconcile this tragedy with my worldview.

And many people turn away from the spectacle.

Even good, loving, Christ-following friends find it hard to stick around and watch.

Because it challenges their worldview too.

It makes them wonder if what they have always believed about God is true. It makes them fearful that if it could happen to my son and to me, it could happen to their child and to them. Ir raises questions, they’d rather not answer.

And they don’t have to answer them-YET-because their lives haven’t been turned upside down and inside out.

So they run.

They stop calling, they stop coming and they keep their distance in public spaces.

It hurts.

A lot.

It’s human nature to avoid pain. No one marches headlong into suffering. Empathy requres energy. Compassion demands opening your heart to the hurt hiding inside someone else’s.

I understand, truly I do.

If I could find a place where sorrow and longing couldn’t find me, I would stay there forever. But I can’t. I have to carry this load, I have to face the tough questions, I have to work hard to give my heart a chance.

It is so much easier when others come alongside. I feel so much stronger when others choose to call courage to my broken heart. I find great comfort in knowing that someone is willing to risk their own comfort to bear witness to my pain and struggle.

Please don’t lower your eyes and hide. Raise them and help heal.

I know it’s hard and you don’t have to, but please don’t turn away.

A Fine Line

“Can you?” ” Would you?” “We need you to… Help!”

You’d be surprised how soon people start expecting a bereaved parent to jump right back into the responsibilities and activities they shouldered or enjoyed before burying a child.

I know the rest of the world didn’t stop when mine did, but I was truly amazed that some people in my circle seemed unaware mine had stopped at all.

As I’ve written before here the funeral is not the end of grief’s journey, it’s quite near the beginning. It took a year for me to just convince my heart Dominic wasn’t coming back. It took longer to begin to understand how very different I am now and to embrace those changes.

I simply cannot do some things I once did.

And some of the things I can still do, I do differently or not as well. So I have to say, “no” more often than I used to-even when others don’t understand why.

But there’s a fine line between self-preservation and complete withdrawal.

I try to walk it each time someone asks me to take on a new responsibility, join a new project or agree to a new commitment.

I am honest about the fact that while I may say “yes” I might have to back out.

I’m also realistic about my new limitations-lower noise tolerance, greater anxiety when things change unexpectedly, inability to sustain small talk for more than a couple of minutes. So if the request means I am likely to hit my personal wall before I can meet expectations, I decline.

I’m also learning that I can use my grief as an excuse to get out of things I just don’t like.

And I don’t want to do that.

I can play the “child loss” card and push others away when it isn’t healthy. I can dig a hole and hide and then whine when no one comes to look down my pit to check on me.

So instead of rejecting every request out of hand, I respond-honestly-that I will think about it. And I do.

By slowly choosing thoughtful engagement I’m expanding my social circle again. I’m learning that if I push myself just a little bit, I get stronger and better able to handle the next thing.

I’m learning who this new “me” really is and what her limits are. I’m also learning that she has new strengths.

I’m still not as involved in anything as I once was. I don’t expect that I ever will be again. But I’m not a hermit.

It’s a balancing act-I’m slowly learning to walk this line.

Healing Comes In Its Own Time

I’ve lived with invisible chronic disease for a decade.

From the outside looking in, you’d hardly know that I am often in great pain. I make daily choices about what I will do and what I won’t do based on what I can do and what my body refuses to do.

I take medication. I do all the things I’m supposed to do to help my body heal.

But I cannot MAKE the healing happen.

No matter how hard I wish it were different, no matter how carefully I manage my treatment, healing comes (or doesn’t) in its own time.

I’m pretty sure that most people have experienced something similar if they’ve broken a bone or had a bad bout of bronchitis or pneumonia.

Other than following the advice of your doctor and taking your meds on time, resting and eating well, there’s not much you can do to force your body to get well.

A broken heart is just the same.

All I can do is place myself in the path of healing. I can feed my soul with truth and drink living water from God’s Word.

I can lean in and rest in the promise that Jesus will redeem and restore.

I can do the work that grief requires.

And working on healing takes energy, effort and time–lots and lots of TIME.

I cannot hurry the healing.

Please understand that as inconvenient, uncomfortable and disconcerting it may be for YOU, it is immeasureably more so for ME.

Please be patient with my heart.

I’m really trying.

What Does Healing Look Like?

band aid and heart

As I continue to walk this Valley, my heart asks the question, “What does healing look like?”

Fewer tears? Check.

More laughter? Check.

Better able to function? Check.

I’m definitely not as fragile as I was in the days and weeks and first months after Dominic left us.

I can do what life requires without falling apart (most of the time).

If you run into me out and about, I make small talk and answer questions about my family without breaking down.

So, from the outside looking in it seems the gaping wound of loss has healed pretty well.

But if I lift the lid of my heart ever so slightly, I’m amazed at how much it still hurts. I’m astonished by the depth of pain and sorrow just under the facade of OK.

I cannot claim to have reached some higher plane of healing or restoration yet. I’m not sure I will this side of heaven.

And the pain of loss has tainted the joy I feel in what remains.

Instead of brilliant technicolor, my life is now lived in sepia tones that warn what joy I have could be stolen at any moment.

The lesson I’ve had stamped with fire on my heart is this: Love is the only thing that matters in the end.

Love God.

Love people.

So the path to healing means I lean in and love Him and love the people He has given me with everything I’ve got.

Because love endures forever.

graphic-his-faithful-love-endures-forever

Yielded and Still

potter-clay

I can’t claim to be satisfied with this life I’m living.

I do not like this path I am forced to walk, this darkness that hides the light, this pain that burrows deep in my bones.

But I can say I’m learning not to fight it.

Sometimes I still pitch a fit.

Sometimes I still yell at the sky, “Where were You?” Sometimes I lie down in the floor and beg for relief. Sometimes I quietly rebel with only a single tear.

Most days though, I get up and give in.

I turn my face to the rising sun and choose to carry on. I submit my heart, again, to the One Who created it.

I don’t struggle.

I don’t fight the facts that greet me.

“I don’t think the way you think.
    The way you work isn’t the way I work.”
        God’s Decree.
“For as the sky soars high above earth,
    so the way I work surpasses the way you work,
    and the way I think is beyond the way you think.
Just as rain and snow descend from the skies
    and don’t go back until they’ve watered the earth,
Doing their work of making things grow and blossom,
    producing seed for farmers and food for the hungry,
So will the words that come out of my mouth
    not come back empty-handed.
They’ll do the work I sent them to do,
    they’ll complete the assignment I gave them.”

Isaiah 55:8-11 MSG

I am not God.

His thoughts are not my thoughts.

His ways are not my ways.

His plans are bigger than me, bigger than my hopes and dreams, bigger than anything I can imagine.

He has created me for His glory-not the other way around.

So I join with thousands who sing:

Have Thine own way, Lord,
Have Thine own way;
Thou art the Potter,
I am the clay.
Mould me and make me
After Thy will,
While I am waiting,
Yielded and still.

Have Thine own way, Lord,
Have Thine own way;
Wounded and weary,
Help me, I pray.
Power, all power,
Surely is Thine,
Touch me and heal me,
Savior divine.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: