I was just talking to someone Tuesday about how grief is a little like always walking along a cliff. It is always there just waiting for you to tumble into the abyss. It doesn't take much when you are already on the edge, to just fall in. You try to distance yourself but the truth is, I think we will walk by the edge always when we have lost a child. You can find a way to be steadier, you can find a way to walk stronger but the cliff is always there and if you aren't careful....in you will go. Then it is time to claw your way out, pray your way out, thank your way out and if that doesn't work you start calling for help. Yep, grief is a weird thing.
I fell in yesterday, right into the dark pit. Gary is scheduled for open heart surgery July 27th, this is a great thing. Except it isn't. Someone will be missing. Justin came last time Gary was in the hospital as soon as he heard. He prayed for Gary, he sat with us and he made us laugh. This time he won't be there and on top of a few other things, that pushed me right over into that place, the grief place.
So today I am trying to reframe things. Thinking about how thankful I am that God sends people into my life to show his love, that I am surronded by loving friends, that I have a wonderful family, that this surgery is a good thing, that life is not all bad......it just isn't. Sometimes it may feel like it but it is not. In the middle of all of this (I won't bore you with all the messy details) God is still good. I can find joy in my mess, hope is actually right on the horizon if I will put my eyes on Him.
My husbands heart is too big, its a funny problem really. His heart is too big and mine sometimes shrinks to a hard little stone out of fear. I am learning to not shrink back, to fight for love. To feel more, to love more along this journey. Love is something we have to fight for. I am fighting for more and more of it, to fill my heart to overflow so that it pushes out any and all fear and doubt. That's what love does, it drives out fear.
So yes, I had a bad day yesterday. It was also a good day. Someone brought me a gift, a reminder that God is smack dab in the middle of the bad day. The day helped me to process through why I felt so sad and I didn't stay there. I woke up and started a new day, a good day.
I woke up this morning remembering that God swallowed death. I have always loved that verse. death is temporary, so small that it can be swallowed up like a little cookie by our BIG GOD. One day all this will be unimportant but in the meantime, let's all live well. Let's love at every opportunity, speak love and give love. That is how we stay out of the pit, how we win even over death.
I am in progress, growing daily but not perfected. Thanks for the grace and understanding.
Love you people,
Debbie
18 There is no fear in love: but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath punishment; and he that feareth is not made perfect in love.
1 John 4:18 (ASV)
8 He hath swallowed up death for ever; and the Lord Jehovah will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the reproach of his people will he take away from off all the earth: for Jehovah hath spoken it.
Isaiah 25:8 (ASV)
54 But when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?
1 Cor 15:54-55 (ASV)
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