Grief is such tricky thing to navigate. Mourning someone who still walks and breathes, is an even odder feeling. The heart is in constant turmoil with what the mind knows to be truth, back and forth they go, never ceasing to stop their endless fight. It’s like everything is at war with everything. Thoughts, feelings, truth, reality, pain, love, hope, anger, numbness. It all collides into one giant mess. When the dust begins to settle the silence is felt. The aloneness is felt. The heart wants to hope but knows that there is no more fixing this. And yet part of you still hopes, while the other part of you is glad to be done. I will not go back. I cannot go back. I know this. But the emotions we feel and the thoughts we think, these are the reality and the aftermath. These are the struggles that we hide away. The shame to voice the things we feel and want to say, while still knowing that it will never be.
To look around at the pictures and the memories. Wondering if it’s harder to leave them there a little longer or just put them away. Knowing you can’t live in this place of grief forever but when and what do you do to keep moving? Everyone gives you things to distract you, but that’s all they are, moments of distraction, the pain still courses through you. I know people are there for me and it gives comfort, but it doesn’t erase the pain. In all of this, I feel The Lord’s peace. I feel His comfort. I know this was the right choice. But it doesn’t stop the ache. This is just part of the process. Not avoid, not cover it with another or something else, but just let Him part the waters and walk through it. Letting His love engulf me. His love, that with every minute that passes, the mess of emotions and thoughts and feelings, He slowly and gently begins to untangle.