Grief Pt. 2
Loneliness
by Nancy Andreson (The Widow’s Mite, Might)
Easter Sunday will mark exactly 200 days since Don stepped into eternity. I am still an infant in learning about grief. Every persons journey will be unique and individual. My hope is to share some words that might encourage a few others in their experience of loss.
I heard someone recently say, “Grief is simply loss, loss, loss.” It is a pretty perfect description of how I feel. Loss multiplied, a wall you run into repeatedly – in every area of life.
The biggest loss for me is simply the man who shared my thoughts and passions. The one who I was in community with. What a great and wonderful thing God had in mind when he made two people become one!
Don and I talked about this as we did pre-marriage or marriage counseling. Our question was; How do you become one? How do you get to know this other precious person so intimately? The answer is of course, though talking and listening! Each partner has to do both. Mutual talking, mutual listening, mutual responding. The other becomes a white board on which we process our life, thoughts, joys, sorrows and decisions. In healthy relationships, we value the other persons opinions and insights. They become a mirror against which who we are is reflected, adjusted and takes definition. Some discussions are deep, and you’re discovering things you didn’t know about yourself.
So much of life is simply a sharing of experiences. Its mundane life about what happened over a cup of coffee with a friend, a trip to the store, a field of flowers you saw, a comment overheard, a thought you had had when driving. They are things (rightly so) others would find boring. Yet your partner hears our awe, disbelief, humor, joys, sadness, insult, etc. and enjoys it all, well at least most of it. In healthy relationships, our story is engaging, because it is being shared by someone you have become one with. Someone you love.
Death or loss steals this precious asset of love. Without it life is itself mundane and boring. One wonders at times if it is worth living.
Now, when I experience life, I come home to a new partner, silence. This happens on so many levels. Silence going to bed at night, driving home from church on a Sunday, taking a drive around the lake.
It is very pronounced when eating. What was always a social occasion now is a backdrop for loss. It’s changed my appetites. I mostly don’t care what I eat when I am by myself. . Cooking no longer interest me. I watch T.V. so the silence isn’t deafening. Now that the days are longer and warmer I can watch the sun set on my porch when I eat. It even better than T.V. it has it’s own language but like T.V., it doesn’t talk back.
For the first 6+ weeks Don was gone, every morning upon waking I would be shocked that Don wasn’t laying next to me. It was a most startling and tormenting moment of overwhelming loneliness. I was fearful it would never go away.
One morning I awoke from a dream in which I was repeatedly, both listening to others and singing with them a worship song. When I awoke I began praying every line of that song aloud.
“Holy Forever”
A thousand generations falling down in worship to sing the song of ages to the Lamb.
And all who’ve gone before us and all who will believe
Will sing the song of ages to the Lamb.
Your name is the highest,
Your name is the greatest
Your name stands above them all
All thrones and dominions
All powers and positions
Your name stands above them all
And the angels cry, Holy
All creation cries, holy
You are lifted high. holy
Holy forever.
If you’ve been forgiven and if you’ve been redeemed
Sing the song forever to the Lamb
If you walk in freedom and if you bear His name
Sing the song forever to the Lamb
We’ll sing the song forever and amen.
And the angels cry holy
All creation cries holy
You are lifted high, holy
Holy forever.
Your name is the highest
Your name is the greatest
You name stands above them all.
All thrones and dominion
All powers and positions Your name stands about them all…
From that day on the oppression that I awoke to every morning left. It has never returned. God had delivered me.
Death doesn’t separate us from an eternal song of praise sung to the one who is worthy of exaltation and worship. Whether living or dead, angelic or human, we all sing it together. Our center is God himself not another person.
The battle of loss is ongoing, yet I have found worship an amazing gift to break the power of loneliness that accompanies it’s presence. It gives me perspective.
GRIEF Part One
Tears
You keep track of all my sorrows, you have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book. Psalm 56:8
I am at the very beginning of a process, one I am not an expert at. I have heard it said you never get over loss, it is simply that with time, it’s woven into the greater tapestry of your life. I think that is the truth. I will never get over Don! I will always treasure him, value his impact, wisdom and love. I will always carry those things with me. I am not sure my story will be helpful to many. It’s “my” story of “my” journey. A journey I’ve only begun. Some might think it foolish to even share it for so much more is to come.
If there is anything I know for certain, it’s that everyone processes loss differently. Perhaps the best book I have read (I’ve read numerous) is titled Seven Choices – Finding Daylight After Loss Has Shattered Your World, by Elisabeth Neeld.
I am a retired pastor. Part of my job included counseling. I read this book several years ago, because I was looking for resources as I counseled others through the loss of loved ones, divorce, loss of employment, health issues and heartbreak. Unexpectedly, it turned out to be a best friend as I processed my own losses over a division in our church and a loss of a dear daughter-in-love through divorce.
The book is unique in that it includes the author’s own story of the unexpected death of her husband in the prime of their lives. It includes excerpts from others who share their experiences of loss. It has input from doctors and psychologists about how each step of grief affects the physical body and mind. Together it gives a fuller picture of the magnitude of expressions and experiences of loss. At each stage of loss there is a choice a person is presented with that helps them move forward.
It is not a book you read in one sitting. There is so much to this journey. It’s not a book you might find helpful at the very beginning of loss. The book, like any loss, is something you slowly wrap your mind around. Sometimes it is best read, then put down then picked up again after you’ve traveled a little distance. Everyone is different.
My conviction is that everyone should read this book preemptively at some point in life. Although it is not a Christian book, and I’d disagree with some of it’s premises, it is invaluable work in understanding loss, your own and others you care about. As I said, I was sad when I finished it. I felt I’d lost a friend.
This particular journey of my loss (I’ve had a few) began with my husband being diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. He had two operations, one had nothing to do with the cancer. Those were followed in rapid succession with aggressive chemotherapy, then high dose radiation. Although the cancer was gone, he never recovered from the chemotherapy and radiation. He was in a constant state of extreme fatigue, yet sleep eluded him. The operation that had nothing to do with the cancer, was a fusion in his spine. Some type of nerve damage resulted so his mobility was greatly decreased and he lived with constant pain. A year later the cancer returned. This resulted in an ongoing downward spiral of life, resulting in his death a few years later.
This isn’t about his grief, rather mine, but his grief was shared by me. We both lost life as we knew it. He was amazing. Always grateful for every little thing I or anyone else did. Always grateful to God for the life he’d had. He was never a complainer and never felt sorry for himself.
He was able to work part time. He preached some of his best messages during this season. We were able to do some classes together. We even taught a few classes in Spain. I gave up my job to care for him. And we transitioned to my doing most everything. I in no way resented this. It was honestly an honor. It was part of a vow of love at our marriage. “For better or worse, whether richer and poorer, in sickness and in health, I honor you for as long as we both shall live.” In the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We both meant it. We both followed through in all of our various challenges as a couple over the many years we shared. He was an easy and delightful person to serve. It was a different investment of the love we shared.
We relocated permanently to New Hampshire where we had a second home.
My life became very small and centered on what Don needed. I often said if I wrote another book I would title it: “Life on a Leash – Lessons Learned in Relinquishing Control.” When you are on a short leash you are fine if you accept your new perimeter, rather than fight against it. You work on gratitude in the small things. That was a choice both of us had to make, and it was a joint loss. Good lessons were learned. At the end of his life, Don told our grandchildren, “You learn things in weakness you will never learn in strength.”
In September of 2024 Don died. We had been out to dinner to celebrate our 56th Anniversary on Aug. 31. One month later he was gone. I treasure the picture of our last date. Our lives forever changed. His for the better, mine for the “unknown”.
I live in the mountains, and many days we are in the clouds. On those days you sometimes cannot see across the street to where other homes sit. You know the houses and trees and mountain are there but what you see is fog. My trust is firm that they haven’t gone anywhere, that they will eventually emerge. It’s a good picture explaining how I feel when I try to imagine my future.
One of the things I first learned after Don died, was that there are different types of tears. I am going to try to define them because I found it helpful for my own heart. I called the first “The Sledge Hammer.” It comes from nowhere. Unexpected and overwhelming. You are convulsed in emotion and sometimes almost unable to catch a breath. My first was when I put Don’s khaki trousers in the washing machine and realized he would never wear them again. In addition I realized that the color, a staple of my husbands style, would disappear from my life and what was now MY closet.
The next Sledge Hammer, was when I unloaded his briefcase and removed his glasses stored in their nice black case. This man I loved, who read 4 books at a time, would never again sit in the rocking chair across from me or in a beach chair on vacation, immersed in the joy of words and ideas. I was undone.
These burst of emotion are so intense they take you to your knees. In my experience, they were at the front end of my loss. In a stage where reality is breaking through your rather numb mind, putting you in touch with a new reality you cannot yet somehow understand or believe.
Thankfully, I have not experienced them in recent months.
Then there are “mists” of emotion. They come from inside of you. They are softer, and bubble up from memories of what was, longings for what can’t be re-captured. They don’t reduce you to your knees, but you better not try and drive your car when they come. You can’t see the road. Pull off and let them pass. Be honest with God about how much you miss what was lost, how you’re not sure how to go on. For me, worship music will often provoke these mists because they make my heart tender, and center me on a bigger truth. They too are un-beckoned. I had one recently when I stopped in to see our accountant about our taxes. I was fine, introducing myself and said I had a couple of questions. He said; “Oh you’re Don’s wife, Nancy.” I said, “yes”, then I said, “Don died.” As I spoke those words, I was filled with emotion and tears began rolling down my face. It was the contact of my reality before a stranger. The same happened as I sat in the dentist’s office, and she asked when I began having a problem with my teeth hurting. Here was a perfect stranger calling me to testify about my great loss. A mist, not a sledge hammer, but an un-beckoned mist of sadness that I couldn’t control. I have found people are understanding and kind as you wait for the emotion to dissipate.
Emotion also comes as “rain forest.” This isn’t the drenching rain of a rain forest but rather the result of being in the clouds. It’s just a constant dripping rain. It’s a longer event. Not as intense, doesn’t pass as quickly, but just a need to cry and get rid of some of the emotion of loss. It might be at the telling of a story or expressing of a desire. This happened the other day when driving in the car with my daughter. I do not even recall what we were talking about but it made me cry and cry and cry. Not hysterical crying, just crying at the loss that can’t be regained.
I am sure there are other types of tears. Tears of anger, regret, or frustration. I simply have not processed those emotions through tears.
I think it’s good for me to cry when it knocks on my door. I always feel badly for those who happen to be there, particularly when they are strangers. I apologize and let them know sometimes emotions come un-beckoned. I don’t feel ashamed but simply let is pass through me. Whatever tears appear, I feel like I’d be foolish to push it away. It is a normal, healthy processing of grief.
Jesus grieved as he looked over the city of Jerusalem. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones God’s messengers. How often I have wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn’t let me.” Matt. 23:37.
Jesus is grieving a deep loss. The loss of an entire city of people he loved and desired to raise and protect. He is well acquainted with the loss of a dream, a relationship, a purpose, of what is familiar.
He wept when his friend Lazarus died. John 11:35. He wept even knowing Lazarus’s future was secure in heaven. Tears, regret, and longing are a most appropriate response to loss. God doesn’t hold them against us. He made tears. He weeps with us and instructs us to weep with one another. “…weep with those who weep.” Rom. 12:15.
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