GRIEF: A PAIN THAT NEVER ENDS

When I was putting down the points for today’s blog, I didn’t think an event would come up and plunge me into grief. I was going to analyse the loss suffered in the relationships I wrote about previously. Then, the train attack happened on Monday and it changed everything.

I first heard the term ‘Grief Reservoir’ a book written by W. Stewart. He explains how the losses we experience in life builds up like a reservoir of water. Each experience of grief we go through builds on the other, increases our experience, but expands the vacuum. Typically, in our culture , we do not resolve the grief that comes with a loss before tucking it away and then comes another and another. I must add here that these losses are not only the loved ones we lose but the loss of things that mean something or have great influence on our lives.

One day , we experience a new loss, and the pain we feel is so heavy , so deep. It’s like swimming in the reservoir, drinking up from different points of pain.

When the train attack happened, I instantly thought of the lives that were lost, what would their families do?, how do they begin to process this pain? In that instant, I also thought of the war in Ukraine, the families who have been separated, who have lost loved ones. The greatest loss I perceived here could be the loss of a voice to say how angry, how hurt, and how pained they must be feeling . I could be wrong, though, but think about it , losing a loved one for reasons that could have been avoided..hmmm.

Furthermore, the loss of the feeling of assurance that their loved one died peacefully, rather than the pervasive thoughts of them dying in pain, in fear, begging and praying for their lives.

The loss of confidence in a system that could have provided emergency ambulances or personnel, that could have lifted the injured immediately, taken them to safety, and got their wounds treated. Even in death, that would have been a source of comfort for the dying .

The loss of empathy from the world, that is so engrossed in its needs, its wants, and its daily successes. That it will put up a post or a message for a day and forget about the pains of the bereaved the very next day.

The loss of a system that would put in place groups to provide psychosocial support to the traumatised and grief care or counselling to the bereaved. To assure them that they are not alone . That the world stands with them.

The loss of comfort, from a system that takes responsibility, and remains accountable for the mishaps its citizens must endure daily. An explanation, a plan in progress that gives the confidence that these deaths will not be in vain.

The loss of true dedication to the things of God, the body of Christ coming together seeking those who hurt, standing together as a family, speaking against the injustices as a family and praying against these ills as a family.

The loss of love, the love that was given as a gift on the day that person was born. The gifts that were unwrapped with the turn of every year as the person evolved. The zillion minutes of laughter and the hugs that can never be felt again. The loss of the voice, the eyes that saw everything and knew everything . The loss of another human being.

And with every being you love and lose, you do not only lose them; you lose everything that came and would have come with them. I love these words written by. C.S Lewis .

“Did you ever know, dear, how much you took away with you when you left? You have stripped me even of my past, even of the things we never shared. I was wrong to say the stump was recovering from the pain of the amputation. I was deceived because it has so many ways to hurt me that I discover them only one by one”.

I hope it lingers in your thoughts for a while and, in doing so, gives you a deeper understanding of what it means to lose a loved one.