The Bible says that “The Name of the LORD is a strong tower, the righteous run to it and are saved.” (Proverbs 18:10)
Clearly that does NOT mean that every person who calls on the Name of the LORD will be kept physically whole.
Many, many believers have suffered and died while the name of Christ is on their lips.
But I do believe that in a very real, very meaningful way, calling on the Name of the LORD has saved me.
Read the rest here: When I Don’t Know What to Pray: Praying the Names of God
I was reminded today how close fear sits to the door of my heart and to the door of the hearts of many bereaved parents.
Once again a mom shared an experience of not being able to get in touch with a surviving child and how that quickly spiraled downward to a frenzy of fear.
To some it may seem like an overreaction. But to those of us for whom the one thing you think won’t happen, HAS happened, it made perfect sense.
Read the rest here: If It Happened Once, It Could Happen Again
I’m participating in an online discussion group with others who are reading ATLAS OF THE HEART* by Brene Brown.
It’s a helpful exercise to map, name and explore emotions so that I can create more meaningful connections to myself and others.
I think I’ve been doing some version of this my whole life. Language matters. Being able to give any emotion-especially the deep pain and sorrow of child loss-matters.
Language is our portal to meaning-making, connection, healing, learning, and self-awareness….
Language shows us that naming an experience doesn’t give the experience more power, it gives us the power of understanding and meaning.
Brene Brown, ATLAS OF THE HEART, xxi
The morning Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, after I made the awful phone calls I reached for my journal.
I knew if I didn’t start spilling the grief onto paper my heart would explode with sorrow.
Since I learned to hold a pencil I’ve been writing.
It’s how I sort my thoughts, figure out my feelings and express my heart.
Read the rest here: Give Sorrow Words.
*Warning: ATLAS OF THE HEART contains language that may offend some folks. I just don’t want anyone to be surprised. ❤
Holidays are hard on bereaved parents’ hearts.
Even though our children are always on our minds, holidays act as megaphones, amplifying the missing, sorrow, grief and lost opportunity to build more memories.
So it’s particularly helpful when friends and family step up and step in, showing extra support on and around those extra hard days.
Here are seven ways you can bless a bereaved dad this Father’s Day:
Read the rest here: Seven Ways to Support a Bereaved Dad on Father’s Day
I’ve written often about how important friends are to our grief journey. They can encourage, provide practical help and simply by their presence remind a heart that darkness and despair is not all there is.
Men need friends who will step up and step in. They need masculine examples of sharing and caring.
They need grace and space to unlock the chest of emotions that they sometimes keep tucked away and hidden from their family because they think it’s their job to “be strong”.
So if you know a dad whose child has left for Heaven, reach out in the next couple of days before Father’s Day.
Read the rest here: Don’t Forget Dads!
I’ll be honest-I bristle more than a little bit when people suggest that bereaved fathers don’t feel grief as deeply as bereaved mothers.
They absolutely do.
The problem is that, as a group, bereaved fathers are less likely to make their feelings known, less likely to talk about the impact grief has on their lives and less likely to allow others into their private world of pain and sorrow.
For that reason, fathers are often overlooked grievers.
But they shouldn’t be.
Dads aren’t bystanders in the shattered world of child loss-they are participants as parents of a son or daughter whom they love just as much as any mother.
So just like Mother’s Day is hard for moms, Father’s Day is hard for them.
Read the rest here: Father’s Day for Bereaved Fathers
*I wanted to get this out early enough to help friends and family of a bereaved father understand a little better how they can encourage him as Father’s Day approaches.*
There is SO much pressure on grievers to pretend they are “OK” once the socially acceptable amount of time has passed since their loss.
And that is more than unfortunate because not only does it place an undue burden on broken hearts, it inhibits the very necessary work grief requires.
Sharing honestly and openly with safe people, giving voice to our feelings, letting the tears and words flow freely is the only way forward on this treacherous journey.
❤
It’s OK to not be OK.
If you are grieving, you are not responsible for making others feel better about YOUR pain.
You have suffered a great wound and you carry a heavy load.
You are allowed to express sorrow and longing. It’s what people do.
Read the rest here: You Don’t Have to Pretend
This is still the question that comes up most often in bereaved parent groups: ‘How do I DO this?’
No one is prepared for the devastation of child loss. There are no manuals issued as you walk away from your son or daughter’s earthly shell.
And what makes it worse is that because child loss is every parent’s worst nightmare, no one wants to talk about what happens after everyone else goes back to their lives and families are left alone with grief, isolation, devastation and desperate pain.
❤ Melanie
After the flurry of activity surrounding the funeral, our house was so, so quiet.
Even with the five of us still here, it felt empty.
Because Dominic was gone, gone, gone and he was not coming back.
And the silence pounded into my head and heart until it became a scream:
How do I DO this?
Read the rest here: How Do I DO This? The Question Every Bereaved Parent Longs to Ask
I first shared this several years ago and while it’s absolutely true that Kubler-Ross did not intend for her model to be applied to grieving parents it has been nonetheless.
And the damage that has been wrought in the name of interpreting the traumatic loss of out of order death through the lens of the “Stages of Grief” is undeniable and incalculable.
So, so many people have been judged or marginalized because the way they processed their loss didn’t follow a predetermined path. So, so many hearts have been hurt because they’ve been deemed “abnormal” or “pathological” or “maladaptive”.
I’m here to tell you that there are NO stages of grief-at least not the way they have entered common parlance or even common therapeutic practice.
Grief is a complex process that makes its own way through a person’s psyche. It’s unpredictable and untamable.
Grief after child loss is doubly so.
Don’t let anyone circumscribe your experience by outdated and disproved ideas about what you should or should not be feeling.
❤ Melanie
Ever since Elizabeth Kubler Ross published her best-sellling book, “On Death and Dying” both professionals and laypersons have embraced her explanation of the “five stages of grief”.
The model has been used as a faulty standard to measure grievers’ “progress” for decades.
Trouble is, she got it wrong.
And it is especially wrong for bereaved parents or anyone who suffers traumatic or sudden death.
Read the rest here: Stages of Grief ? Nope.
I think often about the things my children know that others don’t have to know.
The fact that life is precious, short and never guaranteed no matter how young or healthy you may be.
The reality that doing everything right or keeping your nose clean or staying “prayed up” doesn’t guarantee you’ll be spared from death, destruction or devastation.
It’s true that several generations ago folks grew up knowing all these things as a matter of course. But we’ve forgotten so much of this with antibiotics, life extending interventions, emergency medicine and abundant food, water and other resources.
I never interact with my earthbound kids without thinking about all the ways we are changed because death has invaded our home and our lives.
❤ Melanie
My youngest son worked hard to retrieve some precious digital photos from an old laptop.
Being very kind, he didn’t tell me that we might have lost them until he was certain he had figured out a way to get them back.
So he and I had a trip down memory lane the other evening.
It was a bumpy ride.
Read the rest here: Mind the Gap
thelifeididntchoose 