“Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.”
-2 Corinthians 1:4
Just moments ago, they arrived at home wishing that this day had never come. As they stare at the front door, a new feeling of dread washes over them. No one wants to open the front door. They both know once they walk into the house their lives will change forever. They stand there for what feels like an eternity, not one sound is made. Then her dad slowly opens the door, and they walk into the house. Life as they know it is about to change.
Memories come rushing into her mind. Memories of rushing her mom to the ER, seeing her hooked up to machines, not knowing what would take place. For one month she and the family live in the ICU watching their mom go from a laughing, joyful woman to a person they don’t even know. For a month she lives on edge never knowing what each day will bring. She goes to school and then to the hospital. This is her life now. She is only 16 years old; she is supposed to be having fun, like any other teenager. But she sits in waiting rooms waiting for the ICU to open so she can see her mom. She watches other people come and go. She sees more death in one month than she has in her entire lifetime. She watches families lose children, spouses, grandparents, parents, and friends. She prays that won’t be her story, that can’t be her story.
She is only 16 years old. She’s watched her older sister have fun with their mom during her teenage years. That is what she wanted: fun times with mom. She wants to finish high school, celebrate graduation, and go to college all with her mom. Life without a mom is not her plan, it cannot be her plan. They have plans to travel to NYC this summer, go shopping, see a show, and just spend time together. Oh, how can this be a part of her story? How can death be knocking at their door? But little did she know death was just days away.
She sits holding her mom’s hand listening to her heartbeat. Slowly her mom’s heartbeat comes to end. The feeling of being without a mom washes over her. Knowing that this will be the last time she sees her mom in person or holds her hand, she can no longer take the pain and she collapses.
She wakes up in her aunt’s arms remembering all that just took place. She doesn’t want to be near or talk to anyone. So, she just lies there waiting for her dad to come to get her. She knows what is about to take place, they will tell her that she no longer has a mom. That she will have to be the woman of the house. Since her sister has already left home, now it is up to the 16-year-old to keep things from falling apart.
How can this be her story? There were plans made, places to go, and things to do. She is only 16 and still in high school. Oh, how her mom would miss so much, not only in her life but in her sister’s life. Memories are going to be made and there will be no mom around to celebrate with. These are moments lost in time.
Now she and her dad stand inside the house for the first time without a mom or a wife. No mom to hold her, to love her, keep her safe or tell her that everything will be okay. Now there was no mom or wife in this house anymore. Their story is now being rewritten, a story they do not want.
GRIEF: deep sorrow, especially that’s caused by someone’s death.
Grief is like living two lives. One is where you pretend that everything is alright, and the other is where your heart silently screams in pain.
Grief can be a tricky situation. For while there are five stages of grief, not everyone will walk through them the same or even stay in each stage for the same amount of time. There are even ways you can deal with each stage. But have we ever thought of just being there for that person? The problem most people face when it comes to grief is they don’t know how to respond to someone else’s pain. It can make anyone uncomfortable to talk about someone else’s death or grief. This often leaves the person who is grieving left to deal with it on their own.
Someone who experiences the loss of a parent at a young age has a higher risk of experiencing many negative outcomes, including but not limited to, mental issues and/or lower self-esteem. The death of a mother is one of the hardest things most people will go through in life. But can you heal from the death of a mother?
You might be thinking you know how this story ends up. Dad gets remarried, the kid grows up with a new mother, and everything is okay. But that is not my story. There was a different story to be written; a story that I wish I had known how it would go. But if I did know then how it would go, my story would be different. Would it be better or worse? Only God knows the answer, and I would like to keep it that way.
May 8th, 2006, is a day that I will never forget. My life changed in a moment that day. I can still remember how to walk that line to her room, remember where every machine was placed and even the smell of the building. Worst of all, I still remember holding my mom’s hand and watching her take her last breath. I was only 16. No 16-year-old should have to watch their mother die.
Sixteen is a number that haunts me to my core. When I hear sixteen it triggers the memories and emotions of that horrible day. They come in like a wave crashing into me. I never allowed myself to feel those emotions then, so now I am paying the price. I lost my world, lost my identity as a teenager that day. I had to become a young adult. What I learned as a young teenager would shape me into the woman I am today. I not only learned how to care for a house, but also to pay bills, grocery shop, and cook.
I also learned how to close people off and not allow them to help me. I learned if I was going to make it then I would have to do it alone. If I could keep people away, they could not hurt me. I would not have to feel the pain and hurt that I did that night. The pain and hurt that I felt in that one moment was enough for a lifetime.
When I learned to keep people away, I could never truly allow God to come into my life. I would learn that if I could control everything then nothing could ever hurt me. And if someone tried to hurt me, I could push them aside and add the pain and hurt to my hidden box. For that box could keep all my emotions, never allowing me to feel them again. But little did I know that I was pushing God away, never allowing Him to carry my pain. I was only giving God a little of myself, trying to tell God what He could and could not have. Because I never truly trusted God.
I wasn’t ready to open that box and allow the hurt and pain to come out. However, keeping that box locked so tight was keeping me from the very breakthrough that God had for me. God was trying to reach down, to help me carry the pain. But I had pushed Him aside, I didn’t want to be hurt again. I was afraid that God would hurt me just as man had. Yet God is not like man. When we hurt, God hurts. God knows what grief feels like. John 11:35 tells us that Jesus wept. So surely God knew what grief was! He himself wept over Lazarus. Then why could I not hand over my pain to God?
Throughout the next 16 years, I would carry the weight of the world on my shoulders. I had taught myself that I didn’t need anyone and that I had to control every outcome in my life. Because if I could control it then I could control the emotions that came. But what I didn’t know was that pushing people away would cause me to turn into myself. I would become isolated from the very people that would help me. I pushed people so far away that no one knew anything was going on. I had learned over the years that if I just pretended everything was fine, then no one could hurt me, and life would just go on. What I was trying to do was the very thing that was killing me from the inside. But no one knew.
I isolated myself, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t around or didn’t do anything. If you were to ask my co-workers or people I went to church with, they would say I was just an introvert. Now let’s be real for a moment, I am an introvert (unless you have been around me for a while). However, being an introvert and being isolated are two very different things. Introverts are just shy, quiet people. Being isolated is staying home and staying away from people or events. Yes, I am an introvert but what I was doing was isolating myself from everyone. For you see, the pain I felt with losing my mom had caused me to never want to feel any type of emotion again. Now, that doesn’t mean I didn’t feel happy, sad, mad, or hurt. No, I still felt those things. However, I only felt what I wanted to feel. I tried to always feel happy because pain and hurt did not come from that. This led me to become a people pleaser.
A people pleaser is a person who has an emotional need to please others, often at the expense of his or her own needs or desires. If I could make everyone else happy, then my life would be happy and I wouldn’t have to feel disappointment, pain, or hurt. So, I made my choice at a young age that I would make sure everyone else was taken care of and happy. I no longer cared if I lived or died only if everyone else was happy. If I could do that, then I could hide all the other emotions inside a box, never to be felt again, keeping the pain a football field away from me.
But what good did that do for me in the last 16 years? Does that mean I didn’t have good times? No, there were some amazing moments in my life. But let’s look at what this choice of trying to please people cost me. I missed out on doing things I wanted to do, did things I didn’t want to do, gave up my dreams for others, always doing what the other person wanted to do, and just being a loner. Now, as I said, there were some great times in the last 16 years. But it cost me more than I could ever imagine. I never dreamed of hiding my emotions and keeping people away from me. Truthy I never realized what I was doing until years later, I mean years later. Try like 16 years later. But the emotions that I hid came out one day, coming out in a way I never thought would happen.
If you don’t allow yourself to grieve at the time of loss, that grief will eventually find a way to come out. It could be months, even years before it surfaces, but it will surface one way or other. And it will come out in ways you aren’t ready for.
When my box broke, all the moments that my mom had missed - from prom to college graduation to traveling to 7 different countries to moving to Indiana - came rushing out. All the pain that I hid in that box, along with the grief that I kept so tightly locked up, came out. She had missed my whole young adult life, and that made me angry. I hated that I could not share those moments with her, instead of watching other people share moments with their mom. Oh, how I wished I could have experienced those moments with her. How I wished I could hear her say she was proud of me. I still wonder to this day if she would be proud of the woman I have become. But only she and God know the answer to that.
Let’s go back to the story of Lazarus. Remember how Jesus wept for his friend? Yes, we know it was short-lived grief because Lazarus was raised back to life. But Jesus found it necessary to grieve. So, if Jesus grieved, what makes us think it is wrong to grieve? The scripture that tells us Jesus wept means more to me now than it ever did, because it gives me permission to cry. Because Jesus, too, shed tears for His loved ones. Jesus does not want us to hold in our pain and keep it locked up. No, Jesus wants us to cry and bring our pain to him. He wants to carry our pain and hold us in his arms. Just as Psalm 34:18 states “The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” When you feel you are alone in your grief, remember God is right there with open arms. But just as Jesus is right there with us He also wants to heal our broken hearts. Psalm 147:3 “He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.” Scripture tells us right there in Psalms! So I ask again: why do we think we can’t grieve or bring that grief to God? Because we are human. We think we have it all together. We feel the need to control everything. But when you allow yourself to grieve and allow God to take that pain, you can find peace in that moment.
This doesn’t mean your grief goes away. No, I believe that grief, especially the loss of a parent, never leaves you. That pain of missing them will always be there. It will get easier because you will learn to lean on God. But there will be moments in time when songs are heard, fragrances smelled, as well as events and accomplishments that will bring back the memory that your loved one is missing from the picture. But you will learn that it’s okay to cry, to miss them, and to feel all the emotions because you have learned that God is right there with you and He knows how you feel. So go ahead and cry those tears over your loved one, even yell if you must. But don’t hide the pain or the grief, because it won’t do anyone any good.
So as we celebrate Mother’s Day this year, if you’re blessed to still have your mom in your life, remember to hold her just a little closer and tell her you to love her. For you don’t know when the day will come that you won’t have her. A mother loves her child for who they are, forgives them for their mistakes, big or small, and they are there for their child whenever they need them no matter the age.
"Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted."
-Matthew 5:4
RIP
Linda Sampson Edmond
November 9, 1958 – May 8, 2006
Comments