Messy Grief

Yesterday morning at the traffic light, I turned to the car beside me. A woman was wearing a watch that looked identical to one my Mom used to wear. I then observed how her jacket was the same style and color as what Mom used to wear. The glasses were also similar, as was her hair and her face... she looked just like her. I had to pull myself out of staring. My heart raced. I turned my eyes away. The light turned green. It took all my might to press the gas pedal and leave her behind. All I could do was cry.

I asked the Lord why I took notice of this woman. Perhaps to replace the images I carry in my mind of Mom’s final days. Or maybe to remember how she would have been now, had she not been ravaged by Alzheimer’s Disease. Perhaps just to be reminded that she is healed now – far better than she could’ve ever been here on earth. Or maybe just to expose my feeble heart that sometimes just needs to cry again. To continue to grieve even when it feels like I’ve done so much grieving.

The other week a friend and I took the kids to a playground. It was a fun place – lots to see and do, lots to chat about. She just asked how I was doing. I started talking and within three minutes I was bawling. When I give words to my feelings and memories, I can’t help but cry.

I don’t want to think about certain elements of this whole situation. I thought for sure I’d want to go visit my Mom’s roommate again, but I don’t. I don’t want to go back down those halls; I don’t want to be in the room where I saw her dying body for the last time. I don’t want to smell the food cooking because it will remind me of all the times we sat next to each other. And it will remind me of when she could still walk and talk and it’s just all too painful.

Each week when I drive to visit my Dad at his house, I feel like I’m driving to go see her and I wish I could but I can’t. She’s not there.

I was trying to envision the other day what life would be like if Mom was here and healthy. Would she be working? How often would she come to visit us? Would we go shopping together? Would she love to do certain activities with A? The truth is – I feel her absence so profoundly.

I don’t like to idolize my Mom. She was not perfect. She made mistakes. We didn’t always get along. But, I loved her dearly and I miss her. I never knew quite what it would feel like to NEVER see her earthly frame again. I miss her presence. I miss walking into a room and looking for her face. I miss touching her skin. And knowing that she could still hear me. Just being near her.

Now that she’s gone, I remember more of who she once was. I’m able to see past what the disease made her. As we go through the things left behind in my parents’ house, my memories are restored. But, it’s as if this immeasurable gap remains between the Mom I grew up with and the person who left us. It’s been so long. I don’t know how to bridge the two worlds together. I feel the gap all the more since she’s gone.

When I was a child, I always wanted to be with my Mom. I missed her everywhere I went. I found a journal the other day from when I worked at a summer camp. I wrote of how much I missed home. I was weepy every Sunday evening I went back to college. I feel as if I’m experiencing the greatest separation that could ever exist and everything within me hates it. I hate it. I want nothing to do with this. I want to put up a fight. But nothing I do, nothing I feel can restore what’s been broken. And nothing can bring her back.

I’m left with painful images of dying, death. I’m left with that last day when I wanted to go back and see her and didn’t. I’m left with the night I knew death was near and I climbed into my bed. I’m left with our phone being downstairs the morning she died, never hearing it ring. Packing a picnic lunch to go see her to realize my Dad had called to tell me she had died. I’m left with every detail of pain, every feeling of loss. Every last look into her eyes. Every last feel of her feeble hands.

There is nothing right about death. I can’t say this enough.

Yet in this great loss and separation, Christ comes to lift me from such darkness. “But you, O Lord, are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.” (Psalm 3:3) And, He reminds me that I was once separated from Him, but no longer am.

Christ came to bring me near, to restore what had been broken, to usher me into fellowship with Himself. Un-ending fellowship and relationship. And, He assures and promises me (and He always keeps His promises) that He will never leave or abandon me (Hebrews 13:6). He will never be overcome by something bigger than Himself. He will always be the sovereign, powerful conqueror. I don’t have to fear Him going away.

Luke 15:31 Jesus says, “’Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.’” It’s Sonship. It’s family. It’s a tie that is not broken. I’m His child. And, as His child, I want to be meek and humble like Christ is (Matthew 11:29), who submitted Himself to the will of God, knowing it would entail great suffering. I want to be fully surrendered to the work He wants to do in my life. And, right now, presently, this is the work He’s about. And, I can trust His hand and His presence will be with me the entire way through this journey.

Sinclair B Ferguson says meekness is “… the humble strength that belongs to the man who has learned to submit to difficulties, knowing that in everything God is working for good.” He then goes on to say,

“We have seen that mercy is God stooping down to man in his weakness and inability, to bring him healing and restoration. He is the Good Samaritan, binding wounds, carrying burdens, and providing for the man who was attacked by robbers (Luke 10:33-35). This is what God does for us in Christ Jesus.”

This morning it hurt to wake. I cried out for Him to carry this burden. And He did. He is continually lifting my head and my heart! And He will never stop doing this. He is redeeming and restoring everything the robbers’ stole. And it’s all been accomplished through His everlasting work on the cross. His saving work is finished, but His ministry to my heart continues. And I will always be thankful for this!

I am not alone.

“Though the fig tree should not blossom,
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
(Habakkuk 3:16-18)