So, I'm going to be honest up front. This one is raw and honest, may be a little long, and there will probably be some language. We're all adults here, but I just wanted to give a little head's up on that.
October 17 this year, I will begin my 28th year in pastoral ministry. For over 27 1/2 years I have walked with people through times of beautiful celebration and also unspeakable grief. I have officiated more funerals than any one person should, and I have witnessed just about every way someone can grieve the loss of a loved one. In seminary, they don't teach us much about how to walk with the grieving, practicum aside. It's just something we pick up along the way, or learn by doing it wrong.
Having just experienced the loss of our beautiful daughter, let me just say this in the beginning. Everything we are taught about grief is Grade A bullshit.
Some folks say there are five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. In two weeks, I've already gone through all five, but it's not this nice, neat little journey like folks may think. It's a whirlwind of emotions. Sometimes they line up to hit you one at a time, sometimes they are sucker punching you from every direction. What's worse, is that you may think you've made it through, only to find the cycle starts over again, and again, and again.
So, what I'd like to do for a few minutes is just talk about my experience so far.
We have two daughters, the apples of our eyes, Jen and Hannah. I was 26 when Jen was born and had always thought I wanted a son until I laid eyes on that perfect baby girl for the first time. Then all thoughts of raising a son disappeared. I was a girl dad now. There's just something about the relationship between a girl and her daddy, and if you are a woman who didn't have a good relationship with your father, my heart breaks for you. Hannah came along 4 years later. Folks kept asking us if we were going to keep trying for a boy and I'd just tell them, "We have two, healthy, beautiful daughters. I'm done. We could have 15 girls before we had a son."
We never made a secret of the fact that Jen had epilepsy. She had her first seizure at 12 years old on the way to school. Recently, we'd gotten the Grand Mals mostly under control, but she would still have Absence seizures. Over the last 18 years we were terrified that someday, epilepsy would take her from us. It did.
We were coming home from vacation two weeks ago and were still about 4 hours from home when we started to get suspicious that something wasn't right. Jen hadn't answered a text in a little while. Then she wasn't answering a phone call. That wasn't like her. She might not text right back, but if her momma called and she didn't answer right then, she would always call back in a few minutes. This time she didn't. Three hours from home and we asked Steph's sister in law to just run by and check on her. A few minutes later, "Her light's on but she's not answering the door. Where's your spare key?"
You know those gut feelings they talk about? Yeah. In my gut, I already knew. I just hoped I was wrong. Two and a half hours from home we get confirmation that Jen was gone. She'd had a Grand Mal, first one in almost a year, laid down in the kitchen floor, and stopped breathing. It was like she just laid down to take a nap. And she was gone. Just like that.
Of course, our first thought, somewhere north of Mt. Vernon, Illinois was that "This can't be happening." Stage one, denial. This is something that happens to other people, not your own family. We were in an instant daze, and were still two and a half hours from home. Then the begging started and the steps got out of order. Anger was supposed to be next, but instead it was "Please God, let them find a pulse. Let them bring her back." It didn't happen. During this seizure her jaw locked and even had someone gotten there in time, the coroner said there was nothing that could have been done. Let me stop right here and ask that no one comment with, "Well, they could have done this..." Jen was gone. The warmth and color had already left her earthly form. She was gone.
I thought the rest of that drive home that night was the longest two and half hours of my life, but damn, was I wrong. It may have been up to that point, but in the days since, time has simultaneously gone by at light speed and stopped at the same time. It's the weirdest feeling. I find myself thinking, "How can it have been two weeks already," and "Oh my God, it's only been two weeks." We get up in the morning and plan out our day, but in the back of our minds our main thought is to just make it to bedtime so we can sleep and either dream of her and happier days, or be absent from consciousness for a few glorious hours so that we can get a little break.
This week we were talking to a friend of ours who lost a baby, and it hit me, "Thank God I'm already an old man. Thank God I'm on the downhill side of life and only have a limited number of years to carry this." The weight of losing a child early in life and having to deal with this pain, this emptiness, this broken promise of what could have been for 40, 50, 60 years is an unbearable load to carry. But, this is our new reality, like it is for so many other members of this gut wrenching club, and we will never be "us" again. We will only be some form of "us" that exists after our own hearts stopped beating when theirs did. That's what I don't think folk understand. There is no going back to normal. There will be smiles and laughs, and we may momentarily step outside of our grief, but there is now only before and after. Nothing will ever be the same.
Folks have been wonderful through this, though. I mean, seriously, wonderful. The crowd for her visitation was so big that the funeral director had to call in help. Our baby packed the funeral chapel at 11:00 on a Wednesday morning. Who even does that? The calls, the visits, the food...we have no words to express our gratitude for the way we have been loved these last two weeks.
Now, let's get into why I got up at 4:00 on a Sunday morning when I didn't have to be at church, fixed my coffee, and sat down at my laptop.
The way we've been taught to handle grief is bullshit, and it doesn't matter which side of the pain you find yourself. We tell folks, "You need to be strong for..." I'll be damned. No, you don't. The most comfort I found at Jen's visitation was from folks who just held onto me, didn't say a word, and just let me melt. Grown men, friends I've had for years and some I just met recently, hugging me, patting the back of my head, and just letting me cry. "Being strong" be damned. You don't have to be strong when part of your reason for existing in this world has been ripped from you. Let it out. Let it all out. Screw anyone who doesn't like it. This isn't about them. This is about you finding the strength to somehow take your next breath. By damn, you do whatever you need to do to keep existing, to make it one more hour, one more afternoon, one more day. If you need to cry, cry. If you need to scream, scream. If you need to rage, rage. And that brings me to the next point.
Rage.
Sweet Jesus.
I have raged twice in the last two weeks. Steph and Hannah have not yet, and that does concern me a little because I know it's in there, and it will eventually find a way out. You think you know anger by the time you hit my age, but this is different. This is something you never knew even existed. This is not anger like someone pulled out in front of you, you had to hit the brakes, and the deviled eggs hit the floorboard. This is gut wrenching, primordial. This rage comes from places within you that you weren't even aware of. It's raw, and it's terrifying. I didn't know that I could possibly ever get that angry, but there it was, and for a moment, I was powerless to stop it. I thank God that no one was in front of me during those moments. I seriously do. For just a few minutes you are not yourself, and you don't even recognize who you've become.
It consumes you, the rage does, but just momentarily. I've never been demon possessed, if that's a thing, but this has to be close to what that's like. It takes over your body and your mind. It is screaming from every pore and trapped inside you at the same time. It is a flood of emotion, and I realized after it was over, that this rage, this experience I just had, was really love. But not just love. It was love, it was hope, it was disappointment, and it was anger for what was and what would never be now, all rolled up together. Her wedding? I'll never get to do Jen's wedding. Grandkids? She'll never walk in and tell us that she's pregnant. Our old age? She won't be there. All of that has to come out. Hell's bells, let it.
I'd say go off by yourself and let the rage out, but that's not how it works. It chooses the time and place, not us. It decides when it appears; and the trigger... a phone call, a package, a TV show. Who knows? The bitch of it is, rage isn't going to tell you it's coming. It just shows up, and there you are, trying to not throw something expensive, punch a hole in the wall, or hurt someone. When it comes, your goal is to survive until it passes, and it will. Just give it the few minutes it needs. Let it take control for a bit. It's terrifying, but it's a release that I'm convinced we need. For me, I couldn't have stopped it if I wanted to. But after, there was this calm. I can't describe it. All of that in me that needed to just scream finally got to do so, and then I could just breathe.
I will say that there have been beautiful moments, too, though. The pain is a constant presence. The depression is real. The sadness ebbs and flows. But then, out of nowhere, you get a memory, and you smile, or God forbid, laugh. It's the weirdest thing. How can we possibly laugh after experiencing this kind of loss? But there it is, and like the rage, you can't stop it. I'm slowly learning to cherish those moments.
You know, in nearly every funeral service I have officiated, that's one of the things I have always said, "Cherish those memories." But it's different on this side of things. All of those things I've told people in their grief; what was I even thinking? Of course they're going to cherish the memories. Dammit, James, you don't have to tell them that. I get it now. I thought I had all the right words to help a family walk through this experience. Boy, was I wrong. Dang near delusional, even. There are no words. There is nothing that makes this easier. I've heard some stupid stuff said to grieving family members over the years, and I decided that I wanted to be proactive before we got to Jen's visitation. I wasn't sure how I'd respond if something stupid was said.
"God needed another angel."
"God needed another flower for his garden."
"God knows what he's doing."
"God was protecting her from something worse later."
"It's all part of God's perfect plan."
"God needed her more than we did."
"She's in a better place."
"Just hold onto your faith."
Bullshit..
A grieving mother doesn't need to hear that God knew what he was doing by taking her baby. A grieving father doesn't need to hear that God planned for him to lose his daughter. A grieving sister doesn't need to hear that her sister is in a better place. Grieving grandparents or aunts and uncles, or cousins don't need to hear any of that, so don't say it. I'm not asking politely. I'm demanding that these things not be said to someone who is grieving a loss in their family. For one thing, it's just ineffective. The ministry of presence is so much more powerful than any cliche'. For another thing, it's horrible theology. I'm not going to get into that here, but human nature is to find someone to blame, and saying these types of things gets us into what we call theodicy, or justice of God. This is not the time for that. Hold them and let them cry. You don't have to say anything.
Everything we've ever been taught about how to walk with the grieving, at least in this part of the country, is just plain wrong. It doesn't help. Sometimes, it even adds to the pain.
What I didn't realize is just how exhausting this really is. I am so tired. All three of us are. The visits are wonderful, for a while. At some point you want everyone to leave. But then you're terrified for them to leave because the house is so damned quiet now. But you just want to stretch out and watch TV and not talk. But you need to talk. But you want to be alone. But you don't want to be alone. It's all just so screwed up. You don't know what you want, or what you need. In the first few days, it's absolutely overwhelming, but you know that in a couple weeks, the world will still be turning, folks go back to work, the texts, phone calls, and visits get fewer and farther between. Then, there you are, just trying to get through one more day. Y'all, this just sucks.
So, here are a few observations from this side of grief.
Don't try to find the right words. There are none. So many people said that to us and they were exactly right. "I have no words." And that's ok, just hug us for a minute.
Visit us. Please come by sometime. Just shoot us a text and see if we're up for company. Maybe we've had a good day and it's an absolute "Yes!" Maybe it's been a rough day and we just can't do it right now. A quick text will let you know how we're doing.
Call us. Ok, call Steph. I don't love talking on the phone, but she does. Text me, call her. Ask us how today has been, but be ready for the honest answer. I've learned that saying, "I'm ok," when someone asks how I'm doing is a lie. Instead, I've started being honest. "Honestly? I'm not worth a damn today, but I'm making it best I can."
This one is big, and it's already happened once. Don't dodge us in the stores. If you see us out, apparently we're having a decent day, so stop us and ask how we're doing. Again, though, be ready for honesty. We may need to talk and share some stories. We may need a hug, and to get our coffee and bread, and get the hell out of the store. It's a crap shoot, but please don't turn the other way if you see us out.
Food. Oh Lord, the food. It has been a life saver, and we are so thankful for it. One thing we've realized though, two people don't eat as much as three or four. Smaller portions or frozen meals are absolutely perfect. We are so thankful for everyone who has brought meals. You have no idea how much it helps. I love to cook. My kitchen is my happy place. Was my happy place. I've cooked once since Jen passed, and I don't know that I'll ever cook another meal in my kitchen without stepping over her body lying in the floor. Not having to these past two weeks has been so wonderful.
Basically, just set aside any preconceived notion of what you think people need at a time like this and just ask them. Our son in law, God love him, asked me what I needed the weekend Jen passed. I said, "Son, I don't even know. The yard needs to be mowed?" He got my lawnmower out and mowed the yard. He's such a good kid. Sometimes we need things. Sometimes we need you. Sometimes we need space. Sometimes we need conversation. Sometimes we need silence. We don't even know what we need from one minute to the next, so please don't be afraid to ask.
Ok. I've been sitting here for two hours now, and gone through one pot of coffee already, so I'm going to stop.
One last thing. Just love on us a little. Regardless of what we may think we need at any given time, that is one thing we absolutely do need. Just love on us a little. Grief takes everything out of you, and sometimes a hug is all you need to start recharging your battery.
Thank you all so much for the way you've carried us through these last two weeks. We could not have made it this far without you. We love you all so much.
