Pain Demands To Be Felt

It was so sunny outside, and I am so very pale. So I put on my swimsuit and out I went. Emmabeth had left her tanning blanket and Kindle outside, so I thought "Perfect!" 

I flipped on the Kindle and scanned through her library. "A Fault In Our Stars" was among the most recently read. I had seen the movie preview and I thought I would probably see the movie, but I didn't really know much about it. Other than that it was a cancer story. And a love story. What could go wrong?

I started reading. "Pain demands to be felt."

A few months ago, I went to see a movie that I had been looking forward to for months! "Saving Mr. Banks" finally came to our small theatre and I bought tickets with my mom and brother's girlfriend and in we went. SPOILER ALERT: The dad dies. I should have probably prefaced this with the fact that my Dad's all-time favorite movie was Mary Poppins and that, while I held it together when a little girl stared at the unmoving, unfeeling face of her dead father and Mom and Gabby cried, the final moments of "Let's Go Fly A Kite" brought tears to my eyes. Not because the song is sad, but because it made me  remember him. 

And miss him. "Pain demands to be felt."

I don't talk very much about my grief or my sadness about Dad, or anything else really. Even my infertility struggles have been fairly private and secret, before this blog. But the words from "A Fault In Our Stars" gave me a kick in the butt. I am a strong woman. I have a good business head and I don't make mistakes. If I do, I am harder on myself than anyone else. I honestly thought I didn't need time to grieve. And if the tears began to come sitting in the pew at church, knowing that he wasn't sitting behind me and remembering the last day that I saw him, in that church, in a casket, I let them come and I say "Good job, Lindsey. You are such a good griever. Now let's get ourselves together and on to the next thing." 

If you have experienced loss of any kind from a bad breakup to loss of health or a death, you are familiar with this question: "How are you doing…?" and if you hesitate even a moment, that is the invitation for a followup question: "No, how are you really doing?" My answer has been steadfastly "I'm doing ok, I really am." And I really thought that was true. I was doing ok. I was missing Dad, I was grieving appropriately, I was taking time for myself in the midst of the chaos of life. But then I realized if I am fine, then why can't I talk to anyone about the movie "Saving Mr. Banks" or tell Emmabeth what I thought about "The Fault In Our Stars?" Why can't I sit in my pew on Sunday? Why can't I cry uncontrollably and just feel? 

"Pain demands to be felt."

I was the dutch boy with my finger in the dyke, keeping the world at bay behind the wall I built with purpose and determination and strength. But the world needed to come in. I spent weeks feeling conflicted and confused and distracted, all of my energy and resources being used up just to keep that hole plugged up, by myself. And then I realized this truth, before I read it, and maybe not in these exact words, but my pain was demanding to be felt. And I let go. I felt pain. 

I went back and I read my journals from the last days of Dad's life and I remembered them. I cried, I laughed. I listened to a voicemail from him that I hadn't been able to bring myself to hear before. I heard his voice. I hugged my sweet husband and I said the words that made the dam burst: "I miss him." 

I am still working through this on my own. I am still working to balance my two personalties and bring them into accordance with one another. The one girl who is "real', strong, determined, on top of it all and has an unending amount of energy. Then the other girl who used to love fairy tales and believe in the principles behind them, the girl who cries and hopes and who is sometimes disappointed. They are both me and I need to let both be a part of me. And that will take some time to be whole again, instead of fractured. And part of that is feeling the relief and the anguish of the pain, the hurt, the loss. 

Pain does demand to be felt. It insists that it is acknowledged. It will boil inside of you if you try to suppress it and it will only hurt more. 

Is pain hopeless? No, I don't think so. I think that pain is a part of change and that in every pain, physical or emotional, there is hope in Christ. He bore all of our pain and suffering and sin and carried it, balanced on a wooden cross through the streets. He died for our redemption from pain and our hope in eternal joy. He rose to conquer pain and death. He lives to give us life. He lives to give us hope. 

Feel pain, but also feel hope. That is my personal goal today. 

And we can cry with hope

We can say goodbye with hope

'Cause we know our good-bye is not the end

And we can grieve with hope

'Cause we believe with hope

There's a place where we'll see your face again

SCC "With Hope"

Love.