I recently
asked a dear loved one who has been struggling with Covid, how they were
feeling. Their reply was, “it comes in waves”.
I was relieved to hear that they were not constantly feeling awful, but
as I lingered on their words, it occurred to me how grief can be like that.
When I
think back on the memory of my earliest loss, it seems like ages ago. Sitting at a hospital back in 1972 with
nine-year-old legs dangling and swinging from the hard waiting room chairs. I
was unaware of what words truly awaited me.
A child’s heart is a mansion of hopes, full with the unknowing of what
can be lost. With all that we had gone through during the last few years with
my mother suffering with mental illness and physical pain, I still was not
expecting the news that would come my way.
I have
written about that day and the loss of my Mom many times, but the memory of it
has been relived in my heart and mind over and over again. Like that description of illness, it ebbs and
flows as waves do. It comes to me in the
face of mothers, and the cries of children in their arms. Sometimes it is in
the silence of what is, and other times it is in the loud clamor of what will
never be. It can overtake me like an
ocean, or merely sprinkle like a christening, but either way, it envelopes and
then gradually lets go, drifting away like a ship at sea.
It has
been almost 50 years since the day I lost her, and though time has a way of
easing the ache, I have learned that grief is not something we ever completely
lay down like paddles of a canoe. When we
lose someone, we love in this world, they still hold a special place within our
heart that no one else can fill, and in our day to day life, many things can
serve as a reminder of what we miss so deeply.
In those moments, I can once again be the child in a waiting room with
news too hard to hold all at once. Yes,
grief comes in waves whether it is yesterday or decades ago, and like that
child so many years ago, my heart has learned this lesson over and over again.
I
dedicate this to all those mourning in this world, and to Amber Whitworth, my
beautiful daughter who not only has endured great loss, but leads the grief
ministry at her church.
