There isn’t one right way to navigate grief. There isn’t one right way to talk about grief. I think we often avoid it because it can be painful and tender, and it feels heavy. Whether you’ve lost someone you love or not, we’ve all experienced the pain of loss and grief. And the one right thing to do when grief shows up is to grieve.
Losing My Mom
I lost my mom when I was 19 years old. She was just 44. When we found out my mom had stage 4 colon cancer, I didn’t even know what that meant. I was a Senior in High School with my sites set on dating and college and becoming a teacher. I was a good kid, but I was 17, so I was in a season of slamming doors and rolling my eyes at my mom.
It was a real sobering summer after I graduated from High School. Rather than working at a summer camp, I stayed home and took regular walks around the neighborhood with my mom. We got to talk about heaven and healing. We got to navigate the effects of chemo and radiation. We got to talk and pray about the boy I was dating and my dreams of becoming a school teacher.
In the fall my mom encouraged me to go to college, and after two years of driving home twice a month to help care for her, she became very weak, and she took her last breath on January 3rd, 1990.
My boyfriend had just been at my house the day before to talk with my parents about wanting to marry me, and my mom had whispered with labored breath, “NO.” We all just froze. And then a smile broke out on her face.
I went back to college a month later, and Todd officially asked me to marry him; I called my dad to celebrate. My sister, Lori, helped me plan my wedding, pick out the dress, and choose the cake; Todd and I got married 8 months later. My dad is a pastor, and he officiated our wedding; he cried through a lot of the ceremony.
One of the most joyful days of my life was also one of the saddest days of my life.
The tension between grief and gratitude is real.
A Beautifully Sad Story
There’s this beautifully sad story in the Bible about Jesus navigating grief. It’s found in the Gospel of John, Chapter 11. Jesus is out traveling with His disciples, and He gets the news that his dear friend, Lazarus (Mary & Martha’s brother), is dying. And by the time Jesus and His disciples get there, he’s already gone. Buried in a tomb.
Now if you’ve read this story, you already know that Jesus ends up bringing his friend, Lazarus, back to life. Jesus has the crazy power to be able to do that kind of thing! He can actually do something to FIX this situation.
But before Jesus does anything to FIX IT, He FEELS IT.
In John 11:35, the shortest verse in the Bible, we read, “Jesus wept.” He felt the pain and the loss that Mary and Martha were experiencing. He felt the suffering that his friend had endured leading up to his death. He faced His own pain and sadness at the gravesite of his dear friend, and He wept.
Feeling all the Feelings
Have you ever stopped to consider that Jesus has emotions? He was sad. He was grieved to the point of tears.
Jesus was angry when the temple was overtaken by scammers trying to overcharge people for the temple sacrifice. He was angry enough to flip some tables!
Jesus was deeply distressed and troubled, overwhelmed with sorrow as He was facing His own death on the cross.
Jesus got frustrated with the Pharisees and with His own disciples.
Jesus felt empathy for the sick and joy for the healed!
Jesus felt the feelings of friendship, the emotions of being a son and a brother, and the weariness of being a human.
In her new book, Untangle Your Emotions, Jennie Allen writes about how we tend to measure our emotions as good or bad. But she argues that all emotions are good because our emotions are how we connect with God and with other people.
We connect with God through love and and joy and peace! There is no one who better understands love than Jesus. He is the very best listener; His eyes never glaze over when we repeat a story. He is nurturing and caring and attentive. He gets it. He gets you.
You are never too much for Him!
Becoming a Mom
I became a mom when I was 28 years old. Ruby was our first child, named after my mom, in a way. My mom’s name is Julie, but in the tangle of my grieving emotions I wasn’t sure about naming our little baby girl “Julie.” So we decided on Ruby because on my mom’s headstone is this quote from the book of Proverbs: “She is more valuable than rubies.”
Having a child of my own was healing in some ways and hard in other ways. I’ve never longed to have my mom there more than when I had Ruby. Becoming a mom without my mom was painful.
Ruby was a joy and a handful as a little girl. She was so much fun! She was verbal and on the move, and she always wanted to be in charge – a natural born leader! When we had Cole a few years later, Ruby was delighted to have someone she could boss around!
If you’re a parent, you have probably realized that no one can push your buttons like a toddler can! And when my toddlers pushed my buttons, it pushed out all the grief that I had stuffed down deep inside. But my grief didn’t leak out in the form of tears; it came out in the form of intense anger!
As a young mom I had anger issues. I found myself screaming at my kids over the smallest things. I could see Ruby’s face go numb as I was loudly lecturing her about cleaning up her toys or as I tried to calmly ask Cole not to whine but to USE…HIS…WORDS!!!
I read a great book at the time written just for moms with anger issues called, She’s Gonna Blow by Julie Ann Barnhill. What I learned is that the issue buried under all of my anger was unprocessed grief. I didn’t know what to do with my grief.
- How do I show everyone that I am trusting God and moving on with my life?
- How do I process my grief without getting stuck in the pit of sadness?
There are no easy answers to these questions, and there’s not one right way to process grief. But they say that if you don’t deal with your grief, it will deal with you.
Navigating Mother’s Day & Grief
My grief tends to show up around Mother’s Day. Sometimes it feels like a stomach ache or lower back pain or like a dark, heavy cloud. It can feel like dread – dreading what I may feel like on Mother’s Day or dreading the tension of trying to meet the expectations of others.
I don’t always get this right, but one thing I’ve learned is to communicate with my family:
- Communicate about how you are feeling
- Communicate about what you think you might need as Mother’s Day approaches
- Communicate that you’re not sure what you’ll need
- Remember that they can’t read your mind, but they do want to celebrate you and care for you.
We can also remember that Jesus gets it. He understands our mix of emotions around Mother’s Day and grieving. He is there to listen, to offer space to feel safe, and to feel it with you.
Jesus says in Matthew 5:4 in the Message: “You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.”
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