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Hope and Help for the Upcoming Christmas Season

 

Advent is a time of waiting; waiting for the coming or arrival of something. This is the season when “advent” is waiting for the arrival of Christmas, when we celebrate the fact that Jesus was born as a baby and entered our world. For most, it is a time of joyful anticipation, mixed with frazzled busyness.

But for many of us who have faced the death of our child, it is a time of waiting for the season to just… be…over. There are so many painful reminders of who we are missing, and painful reminders of what will never be.

We are also waiting to be reunited with our child, and that can’t seem to come soon enough. I remember in that first year after Becca died, telling God to just kill me, so I could be done here. Even though I had four other children, I just couldn’t get past the pain of having Becca gone, to be able to enjoy and love the ones who were still here.

Most of us are not suicidal. We just don’t want to live any more. I believe God knew from the very beginning of time that we would struggle with feeling so hopeless in our grief, and He did something about it.

Even though the Christmas season is all about Jesus entering the world of the humans He created and becoming one of us, the purpose of His birth was to die, so that we could have life. Not just life after we leave this world, but abundant life here on this earth (John 10:10). And believe it or not, He still wants to make good on that gift, that promise, in your life, after the death of your child.

God tells us that He is near to the broken hearted (Psalm 34:18). I don’t think there is anyone more broken hearted than those of us who have lost a child.

But no matter how broken you are today, tomorrow always promises new hope.

Why is that?

Because it may have looked like Jesus came as a sweet little baby, and He did. But he also came as a mighty King! We know He didn’t come as an earthly king to overthrow an earthly government, but to overthrow Satan, the spiritual ruler of this world, and to nullify the eternal effects of the horrible things Satan puts in our individual lives while we are here on this earth.

Jesus is not a ruthless king, although we might think so after the death of our child. Yes, He came to right the wrongs, but not the way we often think. (Just like it wasn’t the way the disciples thought.) He didn’t come for a temporary earthly fix. He came to make things permanent, for all of eternity.

He is the Alpha and the Omega (Revelation 1:8) which means He is the beginning of all things and He is the end of all things. Not only does He have the final word, He IS the final Word!

I want you to think about this. Jesus, our King, has never lost a battle that He was brought into. His strategies will often be different than ours, and there may be times we don’t like the playing field we find ourselves on, but when we bring Him into our battle, He always has the final Word, and the final victory!

There is a song that has been around for many years that says, “Sometimes He calms the storm, but sometimes He calms His child.” Earthly kings might be able to control some physical things here and there, but only King Jesus can bring His Kingdom inside of us. For instance, He can bring peace to our shattered hearts. That is a much greater rule than any earthly king or kingdom!

The Gift of Peace

Jesus is also our shepherd.

John chapter ten talks about the thief (the enemy who is after the sheep) who comes to steal, kill, and destroy them. The enemy attacks the flock and scatters it.

But we have a good shepherd, Jesus, who will leave the ninety-nine sheep to go after the one sheep who has been attacked and is lost and wounded. That would be you and me.

Psalm 23 says, “The Lord ADONAI is my shepherd… He restores my inner person (my soul)” (CJB).

And the best part is that it doesn’t matter how far away you are from God in your anger or unforgiveness; God has peace for you. How do I know this? He tells us in Isaiah 57:19 and Ephesians 2:17 that there is peace to those both far and near.

How about another promise from the One who has the final word? Jeremiah 33:6 states, “I will heal my people and will let them enjoy abundant peace.” He will heal your wounded shattered heart. Maybe not as soon as we want, and not even a complete healing here on this earth, but He will do it!

Jesus is our shepherd, to guide us into a place of peace; a peace that doesn’t make any sense after the death of our child. But their death isn’t the end, it is not the final word.

Peace is being extended to us. Our part is to let go of what we are carrying that keeps us from accepting His gift of peace. It is an exchange. We give Him our fear, anger, doubts, bitterness and so on, and He gives us peace. Sounds like a pretty good deal on our end!

Most of us are familiar with the promise in the book of Revelation about God wiping all the tears. But did you know it is because He is our shepherd? It is found in chapter 7, verse 17 and says, “For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes,” (NIV).

Prayer: Jesus, thank you for having the final word in my child’s life and in my life. And thank you that one of those final words is peace for my life. Help me to let go of the things that are keeping me from accepting that gift of peace. Amen.

This was taken from the book Hope for the Future: An Advent Book for Bereaved Parents.

Every year, the four Sundays before Christmas, author Laura Diehl, has a live Facebook time with bereaved parents, lighting an advent candle and bringing a word of encouragement within the pain of not having our child during the holiday season.

If you would like to participate, head to the GPS Hope Facebook page at 8:30PM Central on those four Sunday evenings. And while you are there, be sure to “like” and “follow” the GPS Hope Facebook page so you will continue getting hope and encouragement as a bereaved parent.

 

GPS Hope exists to walk with grieving parents through the suffocating darkness of child-loss to a place of hope, light and purpose.
 We also support families, friends and coworkers who want to know how to support these parents both short and long-term.

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Stop Telling Me I Need to be Thankful

Yes, this is the time of year where “thankfulness” abounds. It is everywhere we turn, from store decorations to commercials to Facebook posts.

But what do we do, when thankfulness is the furthest thing from our minds, and definitely not in our hearts? Do we stay in our house and pull the curtains tight? Do we yell at the TV, telling people who can’t hear us to stop it? Do we stay off social media, so we don’t have to feel like we are gagging at how happy and thankful everyone else is?

Yes, we might do all of those things and much more.

I KNOW how hard it is to be thankful or grateful this time of year, especially when those around us who have never lost a child tells us that is what we should do, because it will make us feel better!!!

Unless you can bring my child back, don’t tell me what to do to make me feel better! Right?

It has been seven years since Becca died, and this is a holiday I still struggle with, but for a different reason than you might think. You see, the last memory of all of us together for this holiday was at Becca’s house.

My Last Thanksgiving with My Daughter

Becca was very ill with severe heart damage (needing a heart transplant) and wheelchair bound. But in her LOVE for hosting and entertaining (it was a God-given gift she was quite good at) she begged to have Thanksgiving at her house instead of the tradition of everyone coming to ours. There were several people who said it would just be too hard; that she couldn’t do it. I knew I would still be the one making most of the food, and preferred using my own kitchen, but something in me knew she really needed to do this. So, I rallied around her, and convinced everyone (including her husband who would also need to shoulder much of the load) to let Becca host the family.

If you know anything about Becca, she always went (what some would consider) way overboard in decorating and preparing when she hosted, which is what made her so good at it. She was also OCD, and everything had to be done to her idea of perfection. (Not always a good combination, I must say…) And what made it worse that particular Thanksgiving Day, was that the only place to fit all fourteen of us was in their basement. This meant that she had to be carried up and down the stairs, with her wheelchair following, to be put back in it. It was a lot of extra work for several of us, causing some frazzled nerves for sure.

But she did it and was SO happy that day as we sat down to eat! My tears are running down my face right now, thinking about it.

This is one of those very bittersweet memories for sure.

And it is my choice to either dwell on the bitter, or on the sweet. As you well know, thinking about the pain of the deep loss, keeps us sucked under the suffocating darkness of grief. BUT, if we force ourselves to dwell on the sweet, such as how super glad I am that I convinced the rest of the family to let Becca host us, on what became her last Thanksgiving here on earth with us, and the wonderful memories I have because of it, I find myself so very thankful. (Oops, there is that word…)

And there you have it. You get to make the choice. Not because others tell you that you should, but because you want your memories to not only give you pain, but to also bring a smile to your heart within that pain.

If this is your first or second year without your child during the holiday season, it might not be possible yet. And that’s okay. But just know that you can eventually become thankful for the memories and the times you had, instead of swallowed up in indescribable pain at not having your child with you. It is possible.

From my personal experience, and many others who are on the same road, we have learned that finding even the tiniest things to be thankful for can start to make a huge difference on this journey. But it isn’t because someone told you that is what you should do. It is because you are ready to make a shift out of the darkness, and realize that this is one of those steps toward the light.

Are you already dreading the Christmas season? I invite you to join me each Sunday live during the advent season, to walk through this difficult time of year together, acknowledging Emmanuel, God with us, within the painful earthly loss of our children. To find out more about it, click here.

 

GPS Hope exists to walk with grieving parents through the suffocating darkness of child-loss to a place of hope, light and purpose.
 We also support families, friends and coworkers who want to know how to support these parents both short and long-term.

Expressions of Hope is written by author and speaker Laura Diehl. Laura is a national keynote speaker and also a workshop speaker for both The Compassionate Friends and Bereaved Parents USA national conferences. Laura has also been a guest on Open to Hope several times, and has hosted her own conferences, a virtual conference and many webinars. If you would like more information about Laura as a speaker for your next event, click here.

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Three Shifts in Perspective that Bring Hope in Our Grief

When our child dies, everything goes dark. We can’t think straight, we are numb, and it feels like we are in a nightmare and are trying to wake up.

As strange as it is, even in the numbness we can feel anger and intense emotional pain. All of this swirling inside of us goes on for months, and then even into years. That is normal for a parent who has lost a child, since experts have determined that:

  • most of us deal with what is considered fresh grief for up to five years
  • the death of a child falls under traumatic grief (we have suffered a trauma) and many parents also have PTSD depending on the circumstances of the death (finding his or her body, seeing it happen, etc.)

Our thoughts can get stuck in this place of darkness, and we wonder if we will ever be able to get out.

One of the things I discovered early in my grief journey after my daughter, Becca, died, was to ask God to help me shift my perspective. The way I saw everything was dark and painful, but I knew God saw things through different eyes, and I needed desperately to see what He saw.

Let me share three things with you that God showed me, helping make that shift in how I saw things. And before you read them, may I suggest that you pause and ask God to help you see these things with His eyes as well. And remember, this isn’t coming from someone who is trying to fix you by giving you Christian clichés and pat answers. This is coming from someone who has been right where you are.

  1. This life is not permanent. Thank you, God!!! This is only the blink of an eye, a dot on the line of eternity. Where we are going has none of this heartache, turmoil and separation.

God made a way so that we do not have to be permanently separated from those we love. Wow! That is pretty amazing when you stop   and think about it. And please do. Stop and think about it. This is not a permanent separation.

I remember confiding in a friend a year after Becca died that I felt guilty because I wanted to go to heaven to see Becca more than I did to see Jesus. Her answer? “But Laura, you have made a deposit!” I love that.

And when Jesus says, “Where your treasure is, your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21), I realized that since one of my greatest treasures is in heaven, my heart will be there as well. And that is okay.

  1. To live is Christ, to die is gain (Philippians 1:21). So, I have to ask, if that is true, what did Becca gain?

You and I have children hanging out in incredible glory and perfection; no sickness, no pain (physical or emotional), no hurtful rejections… I think you get the idea and could build on this list. When I take time to think about what my daughter has gained, I can start feeling happy for her, which eases my pain some.

And have you thought about how our children will be the first ones waiting to meet us when we arrive? I can actually get excited thinking about Becca showing me all around, knowing she couldn’t wait for me to get there and join her!

Honestly, when I spend time thinking about my deep loss, I cry and can hardly breath. When I think of her gain, and let my mind imagine what it is like for her, it moves me in the direction of peace.

Would I rather have Becca here with me? Absolutely, especially when I think about how much I miss her and all the things she is not, or will not, be part of as I continue living here on earth.  But since I have resigned myself to the fact that it isn’t going to happen, I have gotten to the point of enjoying picturing her in heaven, imagining the fun she is having, the people she is meeting and hanging out with, what her mansion might be like, etc.

  1. God IS always good. And good doesn’t mean I always get what I want. Good means that He sees what we cannot see, and knows what we don’t know, and sometimes allows natural consequences to take affect because of that.

And in His goodness, He made a way for death not to be final. Plus, He not only walks with us, He will carry us if needed, while offering everything we need as we travel through this very deep, very dark valley.

In other words, we need to see God as one who comes along beside us with deep sorrow and compassion, not as someone to blame who caused the death of our child. It is really helpful when we see God as the rescuer in our story, rather than the cause of our pain by something he did or didn’t do.

Asking God to make a shift in our perspective is so important. When I asked Him to do that for me, one of the biggest shifts God made for me that I so desperately needed was when I thought about getting further and further away from Becca. I could work myself up into hardly being able to breathe when I thought about moving into the new year without her, and then thinking about being three years, five years, ten or twenty years here without her. God spoke to my heart and told me that I wasn’t getting further away from her, but each year (and each day) I am getting closer to her!

Wow! Now I could appreciate that for sure! Every day I am here, every year that goes by, I am that much closer to seeing Becca and being with her again. Thank you, God for Your goodness in changing how I see it, and for making it possible.

What do you need to see differently? Maybe it’s every part of it and you don’t even know where to start. That’s okay. God knows. Just break through whatever is holding you back and ask Him.

 

Another thing that helps, is to find ways to honor your child to keep their memory alive so that others will know who he or she is. To receive a list of Ten Ways to Honor the Life of Your Child, just submit your name and email below. You will also begin to receive each Wednesday our Weekly Word of Hope. (No spamming, we promise!)

GPS Hope exists to walk with grieving parents through the suffocating darkness of child-loss to a place of hope, light and purpose.
 We also support families, friends and coworkers who want to know how to support these parents both short and long-term.

 

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Making Hard Choices Within Our Grief

When our child died, it was obviously not our choice!

Going through the darkness of grief is not our choice.

The pain that cannot be described is not our choice.

The way our brain is scrambled for so long and we can’t think straight is not our choice.

I could go on, but you know exactly what I am talking about.

Unfortunately, there are no shortcuts to getting off the path of this nightmarish journey we found ourselves thrown onto.

But I am not here to talk about the things we can’t control and the choices we cannot make. I want to talk about the choices we can make.

At the beginning, grief takes over EVERYTHING. But as the weeks and months go by, we find ourselves able to make small choices. We may choose to cook a somewhat decent meal instead of having fast food again or a bowl of cereal. We might choose to try and go out for coffee with a friend (in public). We might choose to pick up our Bible and try to read it (and sometimes put it right back down, for various reasons).

I want to help you move forward when you get to that point of being able to start making some choices, because some of those can be major, such as choosing to stay mad at God and blaming Him and refusing to allow Him to ease the pain in your heart that keeps you an angry, bitter person. (Ouch! Yes, I said it…)

Here is a key that may help you unlock some of those choices you need or want to make.

Instead of choosing to be against something, choose to be for something.

For instance, you can choose to be against facing another week because you can’t bear being away from your child for longer than you already have. Or you can choose to be for going through this next week because it gets you that much closer to being reunited with your child.

You can choose to be against spending time with a friend, because you feel guilty for doing something that might be kind of fun when your child can’t have any fun with his or her friends any more. Or you could choose to be for spending time with your friend, because you might get a chance to talk about your son or daughter with someone who will listen. Or because having an enjoyable evening might be like a needed medicine to your soul. Or because you can picture your child watching you enjoy yourself, and seeing you smile (and maybe even laugh), realizing it would make them happy instead of seeing you so horribly angry and miserable.

It can help even more to take just a minute and write down at least one thing (or a list of things) you are going to do your best to choose to do for something, instead of continuing to choose against something.

I did that recently, after being prompted by my friend Mary. One of the things I specifically wrote down in my list was, “I choose to be a size 10/12.” As Becca went through her severe illness and after she died, I allowed food to be a comfort and a distraction for me, gaining a good thirty pounds, becoming the heaviest I have ever been (including my five pregnancies). I have not been able to get it off for the last three to four years. Truthfully, I have not been motivated enough to want to stop eating sweets and other unhealthy foods enough to follow through. Until now. Since I wrote that down, I am ecstatic that I am down over ten pounds and still going!

Go ahead and write it out. I choose to _______________________.

And if you can’t think of how to flip it around to do it for a good reason, ask the Holy Spirit to show you one. (My motivation to choose to finally get serious about my unhealthy eating is being able to fit into the mother-of-the-bride gown I wore to Becca’s wedding for the red-carpet Author Academy Awards in which my book When Tragedy Strikes is a finalist.)

And with that, I choose to be for climbing into bed , tired but at a fairly decent hour (which means staying focused on working my way through today’s heavy schedule) instead of being against my day, feeling like it is out of control with too much going on (which means distracting myself from what I should be doing and climbing into bed exhausted because it is extremely late by the time I get everything done).

So, what are you going to be for, instead of against, that will help you move toward light and life? I would love to hear from you in the comments below.

We are coming up on the holiday season, when there are many events that are difficult to attend. If you would like a list of ideas on how to handle these events, just let us know and we would be happy to send it to you.

 

GPS Hope exists to walk with grieving parents through the suffocating darkness of child-loss to a place of hope, light and purpose.
 We also support families, friends and coworkers who want to know how to support these parents both short and long-term.

 

Expressions of Hope is written by author and speaker Laura Diehl. Laura is a national keynote speaker and also a workshop speaker for both The Compassionate Friends and Bereaved Parents USA national conferences. Laura has also been a guest on Open to Hope several times, and has hosted her own conferences, a virtual conference and many webinars. If you would like more information about Laura as a speaker for your next event, click here.

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When Life Stands Still After the Death of Your Child

Many grieving parents that I talk to share how hard it is that their life has come to a screeching halt after the death of their child, and don’t understand how everyone else just keeps going.

I remember feeling that way myself. I specifically remember that thought sitting in my car at a stop light. Even though I was out and about, I was numb. I was going through the motions and doing only what was absolutely necessary outside my home. I could see people walking, people in cars around me having conversations, and cars driving past me as if the world was okay. It was hard not to get angry and not start screaming at everyone for acting like things were normal.

Eventually (and by “eventually,” I mean two to three years), I found myself running those same errands without the sense that because my world had come to an end, everyone else’s should, too. Until recently…

On July 15, my husband, Dave, got a phone call from his dad who was having such intense back pain it was causing him to vomit, and asked Dave to take him to the ER to get checked out. Eight hours later, the family was being called to sit by my father-in-law’s bedside, waiting for him to pass from this world with a ruptured aorta that was inoperable.

Not only did we lose the first one of our four parents, but Dave and I became instant caregivers to his mom, whose dementia and other health issues need someone with her pretty much 24/7. For almost two months now, we have been taking shifts, living with her as we jump through all the hoops going through the process to get her placed in an assisted living facility.

Life has once again come to a standstill. I look around at life going on as normal for those around me, while my world has been turned upside down. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mother-in-law. We have never had that stereotypical difficult relationship. However, my son and his family purchased their first home and we have not been able to help them move or get settled much at all. My youngest son is moving, and we have not helped him either.

Dave and I were in the process of downsizing, to move into our Hope Mobile (the motor home we recently purchased to go on the road full time for GPS Hope, helping grieving parents). That not only came to a halt, I found myself bringing back to the house things I had already moved to the motor home. Our oldest son is buying our house, and that came to a standstill as well, since we could not move out, taking turns being full-time caregivers.

My writing to keep up with blogs, emails, and so on has been spotty at best. Even our marriage feels like it has come to a standstill, as most of the time one of us is at Mom’s apartment and one of us is home.

Because I have faced the worst thing that could happen in my life, the death of one of my children, and have come out the other side able to live again when I didn’t think that was possible, I know that it will happen again with this new situation that has me at a standstill.

“And it came to pass…” Those can be some of the most encouraging words in the Bible. Some translations say, “in time…” or “after that…” In other words, it won’t always be like this.

If you are frustrated that life is going on while you feel so very stuck, I want to help you think of it a little differently. It is actually a good thing to see life going on around you, because that means you are surrounded by people whose lives came to a standstill, but they have been able to move forward at some point. And that includes bereaved parents like Dave and me, who were once in that same place of suffocating darkness.

I am not saying that life goes on as normal, the way it was before the death of your child. That would be impossible. What I am saying is that if you keep going, one day, one hour, one breath at a time, (and I know sometimes it feels like you can’t), at some point down the road you will find yourself feeling a stirring of being alive again. Just keep watching those who are ahead of you as a hopeful reminder that just maybe, it can happen to you

also.

And I am now happy to be someone you and others can look at, wondering how I ever got past Becca’s death to be able to live again. And a few years into this journey, I believe that you will have others wondering that about you.

We would love to send you a list of thirty suggestions to help bring yourself comfort and take care of yourself body, soul, and spirit. Just fill in the information, hit submit, and it will be sent to you right away.

GPS Hope exists to walk with grieving parents through the suffocating darkness of child-loss to a place of hope, light and purpose.
 We also support families, friends and coworkers who want to know how to support these parents both short and long-term.

Expressions of Hope is written by author and speaker Laura Diehl. Laura is a national keynote speaker and also a workshop speaker for both The Compassionate Friends and Bereaved Parents USA national conferences. Laura has also been a guest on Open to Hope several times, and has hosted her own conferences, a virtual conference and many webinars. If you would like more information about Laura as a speaker for your next event, click here.

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