08/10/2014

   As I mentioned previously, for me the first step to surviving was the realization that I needed to allow the people around me to just love me. Many of the people closest to us felt an almost overwhelming need to do something, anything, for us in an attempt to somehow help us through this ordeal. However, often what these well-meaning people needed for themselves was not what was particularly helpful to me. Still, I slowly began to realize that we were surrounded by the love, concern, and prayers of many people, some of which we did not even directly know.
   It also began to be apparent that even with all this support around us, in many ways, my journey through grief was going to be a lonely one. While grief demands to be dealt with, it is not on a set timeline. While many people are familiar with the various stages of grief (i.e. denial, anger, bargaining,
acceptance, etc.) such stages are extremely fluid. They do not conform to a neatly set pattern or timeline. What I was experiencing or feeling at a particular moment was not what my wife or children were experiencing. What I felt I needed at a certain moment in time did not often conform to their needs. In short, everyone's journey through grief is highly personal. It ebbs and flows from day to day and often from moment to moment. This aspect of grief makes it very difficult to stay on an even keel.
Many times I would feel like I was making good progress one day, only to feel like I had taken 10 steps backward the next.
   I often became frustrated with myself because I too often felt like I had to keep dealing with the same things over and over again. Why didn't I get the message the first time? Why did I have to go through the same things again and again? Grief is like that. Make no mistake: grief must be dealt with. You can try to run away or hide from it, but it will track you down. It will slowly and methodically follow you like a stalker or a spy pursuing their quarry. Its presence will not always be overtly apparent, but you will always know it is there, lurking in the shadows, waiting patiently to strike until you least expect it, usually when you are the most vulnerable. Again, it is this relentlessly uncertain characteristic of grief that consistently serves to confound and confuse us in our journey. Yes, grief demands our attention. How we respond to that demand can make a world of difference in our journey.