Here's What the Casserole People Won't Tell You
It's always, always hard for me to open up and write about these things. It is much easier to pretend my life is 100% together and losing my mom didn't affect my life in this way.
But it has, and it has shaped who I am.
First, this is one of the heaviest things I've ever posted. I encourage you to read it from the perspective that I wrote this blog to myself, what I wish I would've known when my mom passed away several years ago. These thoughts and opinions do not apply to every person or every situation, at all.
But, my prayer today is that if you're reading this, and you've recently had someone you love pass away, you are comforted. You are more aware. You know you're not alone.
First, this is one of the heaviest things I've ever posted. I encourage you to read it from the perspective that I wrote this blog to myself, what I wish I would've known when my mom passed away several years ago. These thoughts and opinions do not apply to every person or every situation, at all.
But, my prayer today is that if you're reading this, and you've recently had someone you love pass away, you are comforted. You are more aware. You know you're not alone.
And if you haven't, I hope you will feel more prepared to walk alongside someone who is dealing with it.
Disclaimer: While I joke about the people with the casseroles, and while many of them just brought a casserole, there were several who did much, much more, who walked with me through all of these things, and they are priceless friends and mentors. They are part of the reason I can sit here and type this. So to them, thank you.
Also, this is long.
Disclaimer: While I joke about the people with the casseroles, and while many of them just brought a casserole, there were several who did much, much more, who walked with me through all of these things, and they are priceless friends and mentors. They are part of the reason I can sit here and type this. So to them, thank you.
Also, this is long.
My mom has been gone for almost half my life now.
And grief, death, whatever you want to classify it as, the topic doesn't get easier to talk about.
Why talk about something that makes people feel uncomfortable? That could make people sad?
But for today, for right now, I'm going to do that. I'm going to say things that you may feel uncomfortable about (get over it), I'm going to say things that might make you sad (willing to bet I'll cry why typing this), and heaven help me, going to make myself extremely vulnerable, something I absolutely detest.
Why in the world would you do this, you might ask yourself. Because right now there are a lot of people hurting in this world that have lost loved ones, including many that I know personally. And while I sat here thinking about all they are going through, I was hit with fresh grief and a longing to share words that I wish I would've known so many years ago. So here are a few.
To me, it seems like when you lose someone you love, your house is immediately full of people. How does that happen? All of sudden there are people, everywhere, with casseroles. SO many casseroles. (do Northerners do this too? is this just a southern thing, to swoop in with casseroles?)
Everyone will offer, "whatever you need let me know" and you will blindly shake your head and thank them for their kindness. They will tell you to call them, they will bring food for a few weeks, and then, as soon as they've swooped in, most will swoop out.
And then they're gone, and you're left to figure out a new normal.
Here are a few things they probably won't tell you while they are there, things I've figured out over the past few years.
Here are a few things they probably won't tell you while they are there, things I've figured out over the past few years.
First of all, grief comes in random moments. There is no trick of the trade, no figuring out how or when. It hits, hits randomly and hard and one minute you are okay and the next you are crying in your car in the parking lot. A song plays that reminds you of them and it hurts.
You can't necessarily prepare for it, but you can be aware that sometimes.. it just happens.
You can't necessarily prepare for it, but you can be aware that sometimes.. it just happens.
There will be so many "what-if" moments. They will come late at night, brushing your teeth or laying in bed. They will come when you're vacationing with the rest of your family. They will come when you're trying to decide what color dress to wear to sorority formal sophomore year, and all you can think about is "what if they were here? would they help me choose? would they say this shade of blue brings out my skin tone but this dark green washes me out?" and there will be a lot of really, really awkward moments. You just have to learn to deal with the wondering questions and the times when everyone talks about how much they love having their mom come up for lunch.. and you smile and just keep smiling because while it's not easy, you figure it out.
Also, holidays and life celebrations are bittersweet. Especially that first year. When I said how you don't really know when to expect the random grief moments, you can expect to have some version of a hard time on Christmas. And your birthday, and their birthday. And other holidays.
The thing is that the degree of a "hard time" varies with every different person.. and it varies depending on the holiday and the year. It's totally possible to be happy and joyful with the rest of your family and still have a little part of your heart sad they aren't there. Same goes for graduation, and getting married, and having children and all those other "big life moments" when you just want them there SO, so bad but you also are living in the present and celebrating what life is now and it's taken me a long time to figure out that's okay.
I've been learning that sometimes the sweetest thing you can do for someone else who is mourning a loved one is to sit with them in their grief. To let them cry and be sad.
We see Jesus doing this, with his friends Mary and Martha over the loss of their brother.
"When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his sprint and greatly troubled. And He said, where have you laid him? They said to him, "Lord come and see." Jesus wept. So the Jews said, "See how He loved him!" -John 11:33-35
Also, people will tell you ALL kinds of things, because they don't know how to handle grief and sadness. Sometimes you just have to take them with a grain of salt, that they don't get it.
There's an old testament example of Job, whose friends sat with him for several days in silence when he was grieving and going through incredibly difficult trials. What a testament to many of us that his wise friends, who for sure could've said several things, gave him their companionship instead of empty words.
"Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place.. They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him. And when they saw him from a distance they did not recognize him. And they raised their voices and wept, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on the their heads toward heaven. And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great." -Job 2:11-13
No one mentions how your heart will soar when someone says how much alike you are to the person who passed away. When two years down the road, someone stops you in church or the grocery store, and they tell you how your sweet spirit is so reminiscent of the person you miss.. or even when you realize that your grownup handwriting mimics theirs a little bit, and you get that feeling of having a little bit of them with you.
No one will tell you that those handwritten recipes or the little notes on the pad in a kitchen drawer that they wrote on, how special those things become. They become little, sweet treasures and reminders of the person you love.
it won't be well with your soul all the time.
Your soul will be hurting, you will be sad, you will be confused as to when to be happy and when to be sad. You will wonder when it's acceptable talk about them and when it's not. You will be conflicted and unsure. How do you balance missing them but also living your life and still praising the Lord for all He has done in the midst of sadness and grief?
I have not the slightest clue what the right answer is.
Your soul will be hurting, you will be sad, you will be confused as to when to be happy and when to be sad. You will wonder when it's acceptable talk about them and when it's not. You will be conflicted and unsure. How do you balance missing them but also living your life and still praising the Lord for all He has done in the midst of sadness and grief?
I have not the slightest clue what the right answer is.
But I will tell you this. And this IS what you need to hear.
Cling to the Father. Run, sprint, hurry to His outstretched arms.
He understands your sorrows when others don't. He has felt the pain of separation. He knows. Oh, how he knows. And He will love you and sustain you and give you the strength when you don't know if you can keep going.
It is through Jesus that we have the hope that this world is not the end.
It is through HIM and HIM ALONE that we can have faith that for those that believe in Him, we will see those who we lost again.
All is not lost. All is not gone.
Death cannot win, because Jesus has already won. There is nothing, NOTHING, that can separate us from the love of God through Christ Jesus, if we choose to accept Him, to trust Him, to believe in Him.
"He who did not spare His own Son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died- more than that, who was raised- who is at the right hand of God, who need is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, For your sake we are begin killed all the day long ,we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor power, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." -Romans 8:31-39
There will be those that won't want to hear about your loved one. There will be those that make it uncomfortable and awkward. It's really okay. Hopefully you have better friends than that.
But, don't let the person you loved be forgotten. It's okay to talk about them. It's okay to share stories and life lessons they taught you. It isn't easy at first. It's hard to bring up their name, and memories are raw. But as you share them, as you tell about who they were and what they did, it brings comfort. It continues on their legacy of who they were.
There are so many of us who have lost those that we love.
We don't talk about it enough. We don't share it enough. But we are there.
I want to be able to sit with you in your grief, like those dear friends of mine that have walked me through that dark piece of life. I want to cry tears of hope and joy and goodness of the Lord's promises with you.
I want you to know that you are supported.
You are loved. You are not forgotten.
And neither are those that you love and those that you've lost.
If you've gotten to the bottom of this, thanks for reading. All praise and glory to the Father.
Sincerely,
Alana
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