Camaraderie
“Heather, now I completely understand why you have had seasons of struggling being at church. What I am experiencing is different to you but I totally get it now. I know I sympathized with you, but now I completely understand.”
“Kinda suffocating, right?”
“Yes… It is strange how grief makes it so difficult to be around lots of people you love.”
“Yeah, it is like you don’t have the energy to smile but you also don’t have the energy to share what is going on.”
I sat on our front porch with one of my dearest friends. The morning sunshine blanketed us in warmth as she shared her heart. She has always been a soft spot to land, always one for a large capacity for compassion, but her understanding of grief had just taken a lifetime step forward. Tragedy tearing time in its unexpected, unplanned, unaccounted way. Our suffering was not the same, our circumstances are completely different, but our hearts deeply connected that morning as we drank our coffee, shared our stories and cried together.
At its most vicious, Grief partners with Shame to convince me that I am alone, that no one understands, that I will always be sad and always be angry. At it’s best, Grief partners with Grace to foster deep compassion, builds strong bridges of understanding despite circumstances and creates authentic community.
When we face difficulty, tragedy, suffering and hardship it is normal to feel alone, isolated, insecure, angry, ashamed, and guilty. Any of these, or a combination of these emotions can weigh us down, no matter how hard we fight. Left to ourselves and our own strength we can easily become discouraged, down cast, demotivated, depressed. Facing grief alone is like attempting to swim in a raging ocean. The waves pound down upon you, the current pulls you under, all you can see is the impossibility of the situation. I have swam in these waters, I have slept at the bottom of this ocean. I have felt dead and lost and overcome.
If you can relate in any way, I encourage you to find one or two close friends who you can share openly, honesty, and fully with. I would urge you to start writing letters of lament and worship to Jesus. Pour out all of your anger and sadness to the one who has endured the most anger and the deepest sadness-Jesus fully and completely understands the pain we face.
I was stuck for awhile because I wanted someone in my life who understood fully. This is impossible. Even my sweet husband, who has walked every step of the way of this special needs journey, can not relate 100% because he thinks and feels and processes and relates and problem solves and grieves differently to me. That is not wrong, it is totally normal.
The only one who can relate because he understands everything is God. He understand me. He understands you. He grieves with us.
Once while having a moment pining for someone who could fully understand I felt God whisper to my heart, “Heather, I understand what it is like to be a parent of a child who is living in a body that is limited. I understand.”
That stopped me in my tracks. God was graciously relating to me on a parent level. Jesus had known all the freedom of heaven before coming to this earth and being bound by human form and earthly limitations. In the same way Finley is limited to her body ailed by cerebral palsy. God understands. From that day on the desire for full understanding was diminished, not fully gone but it did not hold power over me anymore.
Hebrews 4:15-16 reminds us that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Jesus fully and completely understands. He longs for us to lay bare before him all that we are.
We do not have to walk through the exact same sufferings to find camaraderie and community in the midst of difficulties. Stories that gave me words to articulate the deep pain in my heart early is one of a woman who struggled over a decade with infertility, and another is the story of a woman whose husband was having an affair. Completely different struggles to my own, yet over and over again I have been encouraged and lifted up by their dedication to authenticity and deep dependence upon God. Suffering is worldwide and suffering itself as the basic themes of isolation, despair, loneliness, anger, insecurity misunderstanding, fear, guilt and shame. This is the common ground that offers a gracious opportunity to connect and comfort and point one another to Jesus, the one who hem us in, the one who goes behind and before, the one who collects every tear, the one who is always praying for us, the one who promises that we will have trouble but that he has overcome ALL trouble, the one who brings life from death and dancing out of mourning. Jesus understands. He is in our corner. He is cheering us on, running alongside of us and carrying us when we are unable to take another step. He wipes away every tear, is intimate with every fear, and draws us close whispering, “I’ve got you, my dear.”
Chrisann Goad
Two of the most beautiful women I know. Thank you, Heather, for sharing your heart and giving all of us a bit more language to speak of our own griefs. I love you.
heathersweetman
Love you so much!