Grief is a crazy thing. Everyone handles it so differently. Even the circumstances leading up to the death of a loved one profoundly affects how grief plays out. I’m no expert in grieving, these are just observations. To one words spoken, heal. To another they don’t want to talk about it. To me, I can’t seem to find myself in the midst of this grief. I wonder if this short tempered, grey, full of regret person, is the new me. I shudder to think I may be stuck like this. It’s natural to lose your dad at some point. But I’m left with an ocean of regret. It’s a long story, a two and a half year story, but it always ends the same. My dad was dying after complications from surgery but no one could correctly diagnose him. Turns out, what he likely died from is not detectable. So we watched him suffer day after day and I tried to “fix” him. “Dad, just try to eat better. Just use your spirometer more. You’re not eating any of the food I brought.” These conversations play out in my mind daily because the one thing we realized after his death is that he couldn’t have done any of the things I asked. His likely cause of death was micro embolisms due to 40 inches of blood clots that had formed in his legs after the surgery that successfully removed the cancer from his lungs. He didn’t die from the grapefruit sized tumor, but from a slow suffocation. I spent months trying to cheerlead someone into doing more and trying harder. I operated entirely out of fear. Fear of his death, fear of failing him, God, myself. In the end I’m left not even knowing what I’m grieving. I hate to break it to myself but my dad is completely fine now. Whole, happy and in perfect peace and love, worshiping Jesus without human pain, shame or hurt for the very first time. So while I miss him everyday, I’m also happy for him. I’m also grieving my choice of words. Why was I constantly asking him to do stuff? Because I desperately wanted him to recover. I wanted my dad back. When you go through two and a half years helping to take care of someone, you want a pay off. You want them to go back to who they were. Or something, anything like it. I’m also grieving the fact that I may have grieved the Holy Spirit in my fear-fueled state. I worried from the time I got up until I went to bed. What if the power went out and his oxygen went off? What if he fell trying to take the dog out? What if the doctors are missing something? Well, he did fall going outside because he took his oxygen off (3 times!), the doctors totally missed what was going on with him and God showed up in a big way every time. A neighbor who just happened to be outside when he fell all 3 times? I don’t think so. That’s a grace filled God providing, but still fear attacked my mind like a flesh eating virus. I begged God to deliver me every morning on my way to his house before work. Every time I walked into his house and called out “Good morning Dad!” and he would answer “Ain’t nobody here but us chickens!” relief would wash over me only to start again as I drove away. I would then go at it all over again asking God to deliver me from the crippling fear. I didn’t want to find him if he died. I begged God not to let me be the one. I didn’t want it to be my sister either but I was terrified it would be me. After months of begging God to protect me from that on August 25th I told God “OK, if it has to be me, please help me”. And he did. On August 26th, 2016 I drove to my dad’s house as always before work and as I pulled up I saw that his front door was open. At first I was worried but then I thought, maybe he remembers it’s my birthday! I walked up to the glass screen door and saw him laying on the ground. The neighbor “just happened” to be outside again. I screamed for him, and he came running. He said “I’m sorry, he’s gone” I asked him “Can you check again because it’s my birthday”. I have no idea why I said that. But I do know that I was delivered from my fear that day. The thing I feared the most had happened and I lived. I kept breathing, the world didn’t collapse. God was there with me providing exactly what (or who) I needed. He didn’t leave me or forsake me. He knew before I was ever born that my dad would die on my birthday and He would never hurt me. His purpose is always good and His plan for deliverance isn’t usually easy. That day he delivered my dad out of his physical suffering and me out of my emotional suffering. I think He allowed my Dad to die on my birthday because I needed reminding that He alone is sovereign. My worry added nothing. My fear served no purpose, but having gone through what I was most afraid of, did. Fear is a liar. It convinces you that you cannot do something when God knows that you can. The blessing is often in the burden. So is God. He doesn’t create the burden but He allows it sometimes to show us how dearly He loves us. I know my grief is normal and incomparable to what others have had to go through but still, it’s mine. As I try to figure out who I am now, I don’t want to trade a duffel bag of fear for a mountain of regrets. I don’t want to live in the nothing anymore. The grey area of unbelief. I miss the sun, the glorious Son. I miss hope and life and the stirring of the Holy Spirit. I know it will come again. I wish I could pull it closer to me by sheer will power. I long for Spring in my soul. But grace is God’s alone to give. I live daily by His grace but sometimes you just want an all-you-can-handle buffet of God’s blessings. I don’t want to go back to who I was but I’m still trying to figure out who I am now. Only God knows, and I’m OK with that.
Psalm 121:1-2 I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.
Photo Credit: Bobbi Adams
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An Imperfect Christian 