Handling grief and loss. You are allowed to feel however you feel. Just don’t do it alone.
People typically deal with a life event that causes great pain in their life at some point. Could be the loss of a parent, a loved one gets terminally ill, or perhaps you lose a child. How do you handle it? Do you rage against the void? Do you curse God? Do you compartmentalize and pretend it doesn’t exist? Isolate maybe? Whatever it is, remember that you are indeed allowed to be pissed, confused, sad, and any other emotion these types of things leave on your heart. You are allowed.
The other day I went in for a tox check in the oncology clinic because I had been having a headache for about 6 days straight. They sent me to the ER and admitted me as a trauma patient so they could get an MRI of my brain around 11AM, I sat there until 9:30pm. I didn’t want my family to have to sit in the ER, we all know how miserable that shit is. Well, I cried about my sitution.. I was alone in a hospital bed thinking about my life and what this kind of visit to the ER means for me. Is this going to be constant, am I even considered the protector and provider for my family anymore, how am I going to continue with Tactical Clarity? I feel like a part of me is fighting for my manhood still. It has been hard.
I am bitter and sad that I feel robbed of half my life, confined to frequent ER visits, and never feeling 100% again. I cry when I am alone sometimes, got to have a release. Anyway, the next day I was getting released and I talked to the guy who comes by to make sure you have everything you need when you go home. He was a 66-year-old man in a wheelchair. I started talking to him because that’s what I do, and it turns out he too has suffered and had problems letting people be with him when the storm is swirling. He said he does everything alone because he doesn’t want to burden others, I know exactly what that feels like. His situation was that he was putting up a shed in his back yard, the following day of doing it alone at 66 resulted in 3 of his spinal discs were herniated.
We are not meant to endure alone. This is why humans are ALWAYS drawn to community. Tribalism is real and it is psychologically wired into each and every one of us.
God’s sense of humor shows up after I do my best to minister to this guy about how God wants him to let others bless him. He was trying to back out of the room and one of his wheels got stuck on some of the hospital equipment in the small room. I said, “Let me help.” He insisted he didn’t need any help. It took me a second to get out of the bed so he is struggling the whole time as I rock my stiff body out of bed, it was probably a sight. Two stubborn men in a hospital struggling to get up or steer their motorized cart. Anyway, once I am up, I am easily able to unplug and wheel the unused equipment out of his way. I say, “Didn’t we just talk about this?”
Nobody does it alone.
