Posted on

What Grief Feels Like To Me

I was driving last weekend and the Lord led me to this thought:

Grief is not a problem to be fixed, it is a process to be fostered.

I am in that process.

For me, it is a different type of grief than the death of a loved one, it is the grief of change in relationships. While there are details that make it harder than I expected, I was aware I was going to be grieving at this time of my life. My oldest is about to graduate, and I have home schooled her almost all of her life. There are specific things I am really concerned about for her, things that are for the most part out of my hands and in her’s and God’s. We are very close and she is going away to college in the fall. She won’t even be that far, but I know that I am going to lose a piece of myself not only as she goes, but as she grows. She is becoming whoever she is going to be. I am going to eventually have to get to know her again and what I have with her, and who she is, and who we are together, very well might be very different. The precious thing about this is knowing our attachment is so real…otherwise, my heart wouldn’t feel so happy and sad, excited and terrified, at the same time.

It’s important, in grief work, to understand that there is no going back to normal. I know that sounds really sad, and that sadness, that gravity of reality, is hard. But even that is important in the process. Thinking we can go back to normal should never be our goal; in fact, that would be quite insane, right? We would never actually get there, yet keep wondering why. It’s impossible and we have to eventually accept that. Time, hurt, bringing things to the surface, prayer, understanding people’s real feelings and choices (whether we like them or not), and the process of grief transform us, for the good or the bad, but we never actually get to go back. Instead, here’s the hope-filled part: As we allow grief its rightful time in our life, we catch glimpses and ideas and even dreams of what the next phase, the next “normal”, can look like. There is a life beyond this one, even here on earth. Phases and seasons…we can learn to love them.

God made us resilient. He really did. That is in each of us, by the grace of God. There are gifts I have found in grief…Here are a few:

-The gift of allowing myself to feel everything, without guilt or cheering myself up

-The gift of tears

-The gift of sleep (especially important in the early hours of traumatic events)

-The gift of unexpected silliness or laughter, which is never anything to feel guilty about

-The gift of time, how remembering events, words, and sensations becomes gradually less shocking, jarring, and stabbing (Depending on the severity of the trauma or loss, the longer this takes, but it does happen, by God’s grace.)

-The gift of truth to hold onto

-The gift of the closeness and comfort of God, and the knowledge that we don’t have to do anything but let Him be there with us

-The gift of friends, family, and community

-The gift of counseling

-The gift of acceptance

-The gift of faith

-The gift of slowing down

-The gift of just sitting and looking out the window and letting it all pass, as uncomfortable as the stillness might be

-The gift of knowing such a love in the first place

-The gift of knowing perfection was never needed, regrets can dissolve, there is grace

We don’t have to know it all. We don’t have to contain in ten steps how to grieve properly and get back on our feet again. We just don’t get control like we want. But there is good, there is God, in it all.

“Blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:21

Posted on

Seasons Change

I am thankful seasons change. We in Kentucky always say that if you don’t like the weather, wait a day, because it’ll change. I love that. I also love that in Kentucky, you get a “true” spring, summer, fall, and winter (even if you do feel all in one day sometimes!)

And I’m thankful the other kind of seasons change, too.

I remember when I lived 25 minutes from “town” and was homeschooling four daughters- the younger two who were learning English, the older two who would have liked to have been involved in more community than we could work out. I remember every half hour of the day being booked in a puzzle of a schedule so that I could meet with my “students” for big group, small group, and individual time. That was a sweet few years, but I am truly grateful the season changed.

Now my oldest two are 8th grade (public school, loving color guard and choir) and 12th grade (still home schooled but doing senior year at ECTC, our community college that offers dual credit classes for 1/3 of the price of college)! I spend a lot of time driving these young ladies out of town for activities (and even campus visits!), and our oldest can drive now, too! Game changer.

My youngest two are in elementary school and they are thriving with the extra reading teachers, the opportunities to run for leadership in clubs, and just enjoying friends and sweet teachers.

The season has changed.

I only work two days a week as a private music lessons instructor, which I LOVE. I am constantly training and encouraging my students of all ages to reach in and pull out their best voice, their best effort, and it is so rewarding to see them apply these tools I have spent my life gathering!

BUT…along with the theme of a new season…I am feeling like I get to go back to my original thought of what I would do with my life.

I got my Bachelor’s degree from Campbellsville University (Go, Tigers!) in 1999. It was in Christian Social Ministries with a minor in Music, specialization in Voice. I loved every minute! (Ok, not the Bio class. That professor was wacko!) I have certainly used everything I learned on a daily basis in relationships, parenting, church planting, and missions; but other than the music part of my degree, I have never had any kind of social work/ministry as my profession even though that was my major.

SO, I don’t know what it’s going to look like or how much time I will even have to dedicate to it, but I am studying, praying, and beginning to serve in a volunteer capacity in the social services realm as well as look into Marriage and Family Therapy school/training. It would be a long long road for as slow as I would need to go, but I would be finished Lord-willing by the time my youngest are in high school, and could increase my work hours (again, Lord-willing) as they all go off to college.

This is a season of –

no longer homeschooling

preparing my oldest for college in all the ways

being present with my kids, their activities, their friends

sleeping in some days, on a weekday!!!!

having some alone time daily

volunteering somewhere completely different than where my kids need me to serve

getting to learn something completely different than what my kids need me to learn

It is not a “relief”, because I loved what I was doing. But oh how the Lord knew how much I needed to get back to some of the things that make me me.

It’s sweet to let the Lord change the season. It’s sweet to know He will do it in His time.

Are you in a season you are afraid He will change too quickly?

Are you in a season you are afraid He won’t change soon enough?

We never know how long something will last, but we do know there will always be sorrow and joy intermixed. We do know there will always be change, as well.

Let us live with open hands.

God really does know what we need and no season is wasted if we walk with Him through it. It may seem the roundabout way but as we all know, life (and God’s plan), isn’t about the destination or He would streamline this process!

We are always telling youth and kids that God knows the plan for their lives. We are probably talking about that next ten years as they make the most important decisions of their lives! But we can trust that truth extends on and on into our 80’s and 90’s and beyond. God will never be done conforming us to the image of His Son, blessing us with His Fatherly care, using every inch of the beautiful creation He made us individually to be, and letting our lives be a reflection of Him to others in a million different places and ways.

Posted on

Amy Grant

An unexpected read showed up on the church library shelf: Mosaic, by Amy Grant. This is her autobiography she wrote when she was in her early 40’s, I believe. I picked it up, simultaneously feeling like a little part of my life that had been forgotten was awakened. Oh yeah! My first cassette tape!

Amy Grant was just a teenager when her youth pastor also became her producer, and I remember two of her songs so well from that first recording that I still often sing them–like 30 years later–in my quiet time or when my soul needs some soothing.

“There will never be another who has loved me like You// there will never be another who could hold me, mold me// There will never be another who could love me purely// Oh there will never be another who has loved me like You.”

“All I ever have to be is what You made me//Any more or less would be a step out of your plan//As you daily re-create me, help me always keep in mind//That I only have to do what I can find//And all I ever have to be is what You’ve made me.”

Such words of gentle strength as my personality was forming, as I was working hard already at that time to be my personal best in school, talents, and relationships. In Amy’s words, “Love Has a Hold On Me”, and it always has.

It has been really deeply moving to read this book now that I am also in my early 40’s. Although our lives don’t have a lot in common, I can tell she is a soul that just wants peace, closeness, family, grace. She loves the Lord so much, she loves the chance to use music to encourage, and goes out in nature sometimes where God touches her in extraordinary ways–these are three things we definitely have in common. There is no emotion too hard or too big for God to hear as we shout it into the cold air and just let Him have all that is too much for our hearts to carry.

I’m getting older. I have goals for how I want this second half of life to be. One of those goals is what her book whispers of: feeling free to feel, and resting, loving, being at peace, even during change.

Anyone else feel the need to take a really deep breath after that sentence? I do. I’m in a season of life where it feels hard to breathe. But part of that breathlessness is also excitement of what is ahead.

I like to think that someday I will write my own Mosaic book. Short stories that seem unrelated but that made my life, all our lives, what they are:

Surprising

Sad

Joyful

Disappointing

Scary

Messy

Beautiful

Our’s

God’s