We’ll experience grief in this life. There’s no getting around it. Death and loss are part of it. Moving through grief is a privilege because grief is born of love. And love never dies.
It’s not something I could ever prepare for. Even when I knew it was inevitable. Losing people I love and count on is devastating—no matter the circumstances.
After a long illness, the loss is almost a relief, but the pain is still sharp. Unexpected losses carry with them the shock as well as the grief. Losing someone too soon or in the prime of life carries its own weight. What more could they have become had they lived?
Moving through grief is a journey.
Grief begins with a last breath and doesn’t end. In the beginning, it’s a tidal wave of emotions. We navigate the new reality before us with broken hearts and shaky breaths. Nothing feels right. Not even our own skin.
Getting through the first weeks is the hardest. But, it’s also when we receive the most comfort. Friends and family usually surround us. People drop in with food and warm hugs. We spend our time going through memories and planning the funeral, celebration of life, or memorial.
The loss hasn’t fully sunk in and likely won’t for a while. We take each day as it comes, trying to stay busy and grounded. Though inside, it often feels like we’re barely hanging on.
Eventually, we’ll look back on those first days and months and wonder how we made it through.
The middle is the hardest part of the journey.
After everyone has gone home our grieving truly begins. It’s in the quiet that we feel it most. It finally starts to sink in. Our new reality rests heavily on our shoulders.
Absence is the most difficult part of grief. Knowing we’ll never see our loved one or friend again or hear their voice. Not in this life anyway.
The last time we hugged them, said “I love you,” heard them laugh, is the last time we ever will. It’s hard to accept that. That’s why the middle of our grief journey is so hard. Our minds understand the loss, but our hearts don’t want to let go. All the love is still there. We carry all the “what ifs,” agonize over the “if only I had known,” and cling to the “I wish I hads.”
Grief changes us.
For a while, we feel so out of place, so untethered. It hits us in waves. We reach for the pain because it reminds us of them. We live in the memories, trying to be strong, trying to carry on. But it all feels so outside us. Separate from the constant ache we carry on the inside.
The middle of our grief journey lasts as long as it lasts. There’s no timeline for it. We simply move through it, feel all of it, experience every sharp pain, every biting sob, and every single memory. We have to. It’s the only way we’ll make it to acceptance and peace.
Grief has been my greatest teacher.
Every loss has been different, but every grief journey I’ve taken has led me to the same place. More importantly, to the same truth: Moving through grief is a privilege, because grief is pain borne for love, and love never dies.
Scripture tells us that Jesus prepared His followers for His death. He told them He would leave them, but that He would see them again, “So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you,” John 16:22.
Christ’s death and resurrection are our assurance too. Our assurance that we will be reunited with the Father and Son, but also with our loved ones who have gone before us. Christ’s sacrifice ensures us that death cannot separate us from love and that joy awaits us on the other side.
Grief is part of life.
Moving through grief is one of the hardest things we’re called to do. Grief changes us, but it also strengthens us if we allow it. It strengthens our faith and increases our gratitude. For, if we did not love, we would not grieve. So that if given the chance to love all over again, even knowing the loss would come, we’d choose to. That’s the privilege of moving through grief. We bear the loss because we keep the love, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things,” 1 Corinthians 13:7.
And love never dies.
JN Fenwick (© 2024)
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