We talk a lot after loss about giving ourselves permission to grieve. And that’s important! But we don’t talk as much about giving ourselves permission to laugh. To sing. To feel joy, even here. So consider this permission. I’m sharing three practices I’m adopting to welcome joy into my life.
We’ve gotten accustomed to “no contact” delivery - drop it off on the porch and avoid contact, connection, and contamination. But, while that might be a good option for our dinner, groceries, and mail, it’s a poor system for our relationship with God.
It feels powerfully defiant to look suffering in the face, to stare it down, and say, “You can’t have my voice. You can’t have my praise, my affection, my song. No matter how shaky my voice gets, it won’t ever change its tune." Worship isn't always the easy choice when we're facing suffering, grief, and pain but it is a powerful weapon in this battle we're fighting - and we're never fighting alone!
When we've tried everything - kicking, screaming, resisting, begging, pleading - and the pain still doesn't go away, we're tempted to believe that God is inactive, distant, and aloof. But what if God is more present than ever, waiting out our pain with us, and delivering us through the very trial we're in.
When I think back on the hours leading up to Imogen’s birth and the few days afterward, I have no idea how we made it through. It is only the Lord’s grace that allowed us to keep breathing and moving forward through those horrible days. But we survived. And now that we’re a few months out, I have such a deeper understanding of grief and how to support those in the middle of the fog.
Peter and I delivered our first baby girl, Imogen Dorothy, on June 14, 2019. We had found out the day before (at 40 weeks 6 days) that she no longer had a heartbeat, and delivered her stillborn one week past her due date. We are devastated. There are no words to describe the depth of our pain and grief. And, yet, we know this is not the end of the story.
