Grace came calling - Week Fifteen

Home › Blogs › Grace came calling - Week Fifteen

October 9, 2016

Grace is that thing that whispers, "It's dark and hard in there. I cannot make it hurt any less, I cannot make it go any faster, all I can do is remind you that you walked through this before."

Week Fifteen (October 2 - 8)

Heartbreak is the ultimate path to wisdom and healing

I remember it well, how sleep was impossible as I attempted to wrap my mind around the loss that had occurred. A flood of agony losing my son, brother and father, the unfathomable devastation arriving in waves is either numbed by sleep or hijacked away from it, and for me, sleep is disrupted as the turmoil swirls within me.

Anguish is a consuming job stinging with the pain that would awaken every sense of my being and deliver a fresh batch of tears, a master at controlling my thoughts providing exhaustion as the only pathway to sleep.

Often when grief came calling I remained still, controlling my sobs while hot tears drench my face as I search for a place of softness. Seeking that space that would temporarily numb the pain and slow my breath while delivering peace without the pinch of guilt as the emptiness echoed in the void.

I imagined ways to discover calm, a distraction to deceive grief, as if I had control. I began by reading each night, desperate to understand these emotions while begging for a moment of solace. Reading to exhaustion to preoccupy my wandering thoughts began delivering a dose of quiet as I woke to discover a book splayed across me in the morning.

Twenty years later I still return to the comfort of stories to help ease myself to sleep, and with e-readers like the Kindle that option is a lot easier. Grace appeared in those stories of distraction, providing the ability to sleep, even if in short bursts and delivered an escape from the work of grief.

When grace first came to call, I shoved it away, claiming it could never understand the pain. But the support was not abandon, reminding me of the softness still surrounding me during the darkest moments. Providing the embrace necessary to gather myself, at first making small steps until I stumbled, stuck in the pit of grief where no one understood. It was there I waited, sometimes for days until that small voice of grace asked me to try again, and so I did.

From the list...

Things you like about spring: (Fall)

Since I began this list of gratitude at my birthday, the questions do not follow along well with the current season and so I will switch them up with the current season as I come to them.