I have had problems with associative grief for several years in my life. I did not celebrate my birthday on January 4th because I was born on my mother’s birthday, and we celebrated our birthdays together regularly all the years with my mother here when I lived in Indiana. Last year was the first year in 13 years since my mother passed away, I celebrated my birthday on my birthdate that it did not bother me. My husband and I celebrated it on another day. Which worked out fine for my husband since he liked to go skiing with his work friends that first week of January.
#1 killer in life is stress. My deceased husband was like a can I had to pry open at times to get him to open up and express his feelings. He was raised the same way I was in a family that did not have much affection. In my household, we did not discuss problems and issues, but just shoved them under the rug.
I know that stress was partly what led to his heart attack besides his asthma. I don’t see where David buried his feelings, he freely expressed them in the Psalms. I was able to help his stress level in getting him to open up about what was going on with his fear of losing his job over the failed economy in working for a land developer.
When I would cry as a child, my mother told me that I needed to toughen up that I was too much a cry baby. I did not cry from that time on until I was 16 years old. I grew cold as nails. There were problems I was dealing with as a 16-year old in high school when my brother went to college that I felt all alone. My parents had me later in life (unexpectantly) so I did not have a very close relationship with them. My sister was 12-years older than I and my brother was 5 years older. My boyfriend was treating me very badly, and I was going through an identity crisis as far as wanting more to life. I had no one that I could talk to or relate to and I wanted to die. I prayed to God whoever He was up there to help me, and I ended up having an experience with Him at that time which was a personal relationship through Jesus Christ.
There are times in my life that things have happened that I faint in my own strength. I find when I pick up my guitar to worship the Lord, read the word or have the encouragement (foot washing) of God's people it helps me to put off my sackcloth. I have a promise from God that when I faint if I wait on the Lord he will renew my strength.
Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not be weary, and they will walk and not faint. Isaiah 40:31
I experienced grief whenever my husband would go golfing with his parents and sister during our vacations, and would leave me with our teenage children. It’s because I lost my parents and my sister to cancer and it was a reminder that he still had his sister and parents. A holiday that was the hardest to deal with was Memorial Day (Race Day in Indiana) weekend because my family had large reunions on that day with cookouts with hot dogs/hamburgers and we would have a little drawing/bet on who would win the 500-Mile race.
When I first was married to my husband he would go off with his 13-year old daughter on Race Day since they attended the race as a tradition since she was three years old and I would feel lonely and miserable on Race Day. My husband became more sensitive to my needs later as far as including me and his sister on Race Day and tried to get extra tickets, but there were many Race Days during the 14 years I was married to him that he was insensitive to my loss.
Since my husband passed away, I've tried to go to some single functions during the holidays in hopes to have some normalcy in my life in missing so many family members, but it sort of reminds me of that scripture in Psalms where David talked about where can I flee from your presence Lord only it’s been I can’t seem to flee from grief and it’s my constant companion wherever I go the last four years of my life.
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. Psalm 139:7-8
My husband’s death amplified that I don’t have my parents and my sister in life anymore. He was a buffer in many ways (an inbetween like when you use a buffer to polish your wood floors) of my loss and when he passed away it became rather a snowball or dominos effect.
I heard one explanation that God really never made us capable of dealing with loss and death; it’s a result of the fall of man in the garden. My completeness or wholeness in life comes from my pulling towards God for healing. There is a tendency when harsh things happen to you to get angry and bitter either at the person who died, become a victim of your circumstances or angry at God for allowing the tragedy in our lives. In the movie, Jerry McGuire he said to his wife, "You complete me." Only, I am complete or whole through Jesus Christ.
We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ. Colossians 1:28
How could Paul overcome all those negative circumstances without having a martyr complex? When we thank God for the bad it’s realizing that we can’t control what happens in our lives. We only have an illusion that we control our lives. I had discussed that the Lord showed me that he wanted me to “take life by the balls.” I believe it’s thanking God for the negative, praising him in everything that does not go our way. We are giving God the reins in our lives because we can’t handle it. Letting God take over the sovereignty of our lives so we can rein as kings over our circumstances.
For if, through the transgression of the one individual, Death made use of the one individual to seize the sovereignty, all the more shall those who receive God's overflowing grace and gift of righteousness reign as kings in Life through the one individual, Jesus Christ. Romans 5:17
When I thanked God recently that my life stinks/that I have a sucky life since I lost the love of my life, the Lord spoke to me that my life does not suck with him. He told me that my life is a sweet fragrance to God. After I thanked God, it was as a huge weight lifted off my life. Before then I was saying all these positive scriptures and no scripture helped the grief until I thanked God my life was bad!
For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? 2 Cor. 2:16
That way whatever bad happens to us does not control us. It does not make “sense” to praise God for the bad and that is because it is not in the sense realm it’s in the spirit realm. When we thank God for the negative/bad in our lives we are giving God control over our circumstances.
Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. 1 Thess. 5:18
When I was a non-Christian I was into Eastern Religion and I would burn incense to the gods of Eastern Religion. Now, I offer up spiritual sacrifices to God by thanking him and praising him even when things do not go my way. It’s a sacrifice because it’s easy to thank God when you have a white picket fence life and you feel good. Not so easy when things go awry in your life.
As you come to him, the living Stone--rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him--you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 1 Peter 2:4-5
It’s similar to when Jesus was born that all the two-year old children and under were murdered in trying to kill the Christ child. Satan is trying to squelch out the son of God in our lives, the love in our heart through tragedy.
I speak to many people that quit attending church for various reasons. It is like there are many miscarriages in the Body of Christ as far as a failure to connect at a church or Bible study. A miscarriage is usually when the baby fails to connect in the uterus.
My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, Galatians 4:19
I was driving back from lunch to work a few weeks ago and I heard the scripture in my spirit, "Behold I am with you always." I then spoke to a woman at work who had lost her husband and she was very sad in getting ready to go to her mother-in-law's funeral. She told me that she never really got along very well with her mother-in-law until after her husband died. Her relationship became like the Ruth-Naomi relationship.
I'm hoping I can do more to help other widows in the future. I heard the single's ministry is like herding cats, well the widows ministry is like herding turtles as far as getting people to come out of their shell on the same day. I'm open to God to what God wants me to do in the future to reach out to others. It's just asking God what can we do and how can we serve him. I remember one scripture where Isaiah said, "Lord send me."
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!" Isaiah 6:8
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