Are you ready to run a marathon with your grief???

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.Hebrews 12:1
There is absolutely no coorelation between one's ability to recite the proper order of the Kubler-Ross stages of grief and your recovery from grief. At the same time there is no coorelation between one's level of Spiritual maturity and grief recovery.  While most of us would rather think of grief as a nice easy process of simply filing away the emotions and never returning to that file again it is on the contrary messy, messy and messy.

Recovering from grief is akin to playing a game of paint ball. There is a reason they recommend that you wear a protective clothing ovet you because when you play paint ball you never know where on your body those paint ball pellets will land. When they do those pellets make a mess that is unavoidable to miss. That is what grief should feel like and that is the goal that every one should have when running a marathon with those who grieve.

In a book entitled 'Healing the wounds: A Physician looks at His work Dr. David Hilfiker, M.D, shares his experiences of dealing with the perfectionism that is so often ingrained in those who pursue the medical professions and their inability to process their own grief when one of their patients dies.  He shares about the code of silence that permeates through out the subculture of medicine and the high incidence of alcoholism, divorce and suicide of many of it's members.  Somehow, we have to get over this notion that recovery from grief is simply stuffing all of your awful emotions into a bottle and placing a cork in it

I remember becoming Facebook friends with a friend of my wife and learning through Facebook that her husband, a gifted small town surgeon, committed suicide. In light with what Dr. Hilfiker writes I understand now why this would even be a consideration for a surgeon who experiences death and is told to just tough it up.  Dr. Hilfiker went on to say that when there are obvious medical errors that causes a death of a patient doctors are told to not admit those errors with the family. Instead of recovery and healing doctors must keep their grief inside and choosing instead to drown those sorrows with alcohol, extra-marital affairs, and worst suicide.

If we are to truly recover from our grief we must get over this notion that grief is a simple emotion ready to be filed away because it is not. Grief, instead, is akin to putting on your most comfortable running shoes, doing your stretches and training for a marathon. Grief recovery works best when you accept the reality that it will take time to recover from grief and like playing a game of paint ball you should expect those pellets to splash just about anywhere.

There is good news out of your grief. God will not waste your sorrow. God has a plan to use your pain and your sorrow to help others. Some say that an artist greatest works in life come out of their personal grief. A musician composes some of  his beautiful works while recovering from grief. An artist creates some of his best works out of grief. A man of sorrow will one day be used by God to help others to understand  and affirm others entering the forlorn desert of grief. So go ahead.  Put on your best pair of running shoes and run the race set before you because at the end will be the prize of coming out of grief a stronger man or woman of God.