Uniquely Yours

Grief Is a Unique Experience
Day 2

You may feel it is useless to talk about your grief because no one truly understands what you are going through.

"You sometimes feel after an experience like this that you're talking a foreign language," says Dora, whose daughter died. "You feel like there's no way anybody can know what you're feeling. There is absolutely no way anyone can know the depth of your pain. So you feel like it's futile to talk about it because words can't express the pain."

Although countless people have experienced grief before you, each person's response to grief is different. Your path of grief will be uniquely your own.

Be encouraged that regardless of how your grief appears to you or others, it has a precious uniqueness to the One who created you. God, who knows intimately your personality, your relationships, and the experiences of your life, knows your grief and isn't shocked or surprised by your responses.

"O LORD, You have examined my heart and know everything about me. . . . Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex. . . . You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed" (Psalm 139:1, 14, 16 NLT).
I really felt after reading the above scripture left by the writing of the devotion that this whole first part of Psalm 139 needed to be written, applied to this devotion.  

Psalm 139

1 

You have searched me, Lord,
    and you know me.
² You know when I sit and when I rise;
    you perceive my thoughts from afar.
³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
    you are familiar with all my ways.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
    you, Lord, know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in behind and before,
    and you lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
    too lofty for me to attain.

Before I can even think it or speak it, God knows it is there.  He knows when my heart is torn and broken.  He knows when I feel I can't go on and he also knows when I am full of confusion at the bittersweetness of our twin journey.  He knows when I don't understand other people's reactions to me and my 'story' and he also knows where it is that I need to go on those kind of days. Our God is an Awesome God!
I know that is impossible to understand anyone else's pain.  There is nothing more difficult to hear as a grieving parent then "I know how you feel"...because you don't.  If you have been there then you might have an idea but you don't know exactly how I feel.  You aren't inside my head and my heart and you aren't me.  I am glad those who haven't experienced loss can't understand because it means they have not had those life altering experiences and at the same time I wish they could sometimes....just so that it might be a bit easier to explain myself.  Those that do get it have had a different journey, their pregnancy was different, their feelings about it were different. Their experiences with what lead up to the loss were different.  Sometimes it makes you feel alone but we all need to remember that we although we are all unique and our grief is our own, we do all have something in common.. we are never alone.  

Father, thank You that my way of grieving is distinctly my own, reflective of all You have sovereignly created me to be and experience.
Thank you for giving me the gifts to be able to share my grief so that I may help others to see that they are not alone and that they have permission to grieve in their own way and at their own pace. Amen.