The Cost of Avoidance

I have been working very hard at avoiding my grief since Mom's death. I sobbed during worship the last night of the conference, as the closing hymn had been the closing hymn at Mom's memorial service. Daughter was very concerned. She's always watching me to make sure I'm okay-- she's terrified something will happen to me. If I sigh or move in a way that she thinks is unusual she's right beside me demanding to know what is wrong. It was very disconcerting for her to see my cry that way. That has been the only time I've really cried since Mom's death.

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Last week there were lots of things to remind me of Mom's death. I was hanging out at the nursing home ministering to dying members on a daily basis. As A confessed her despair to me and asked where God was, I found my self wondering if Mom had felt such emotional pain. As M sat by the bedside of her dying father, I regretted that Mom had been alone when she died, and wished one of us could have been with her. When I came home, there were all these items we'd brought from my parents' apartment that I needed to find a place for in my home. Then D died, and I found myself facing my first funeral since Mom's memorial service. Rather than facing my emotions, I set about to avoid them, and to avoid the things that would serve as reminders.

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So we came to Saturday night with the house still a mess, no sermon for Sunday, no funeral written for Sunday afternoon, the house not fit for the board meeting that would be happening after the funeral, and the challenge of trying to figure out when I could meet with the couple I'm marrying next weekend (who are only available to meet with me on weekends due to work obligations). Rather than dig in and tackle these tasks, I continued to avoid, and it was 1:30 Sunday morning before I finally went to bed-- and the sermon and funeral still weren't done. Not the best way to prepare for a very full day.

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At some point I realized that I was avoiding things that were painful to face, and that in the process of avoiding, I'd dug myself into a pretty deep hole. I was exhausted yesterday, but made it through worship and then Daughter folded funeral bulletins while I figured out all the liturgy. We had time to eat at McDonald's before the funeral, and then skipped the funeral dinner (after I did the obligatory prayer) so I could finish preparations for the board meeting. We had just finished supper (with fresh picked corn courtesy of one of the members) when the couple arrived for their premarital counseling.

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All that I accomplished by avoiding my grief was create a great deal of stress for myself. It would have been less painful to face my grief and have a good cry. Matters weren't helped by the fact that I worked every day last week, visiting the hospital, nursing home, grieving family, and/or funeral home. That gave rise to lots of emotions I had to work very hard to avoid-- which is exhausting.

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Today I'm not going to do church work (it is supposed to be my day off, after all). I'm going to pull pork to put in the freezer for my Dad's birthday celebration. I'm going to experiment with a blueberry dessert. I'm going to seek to bring some order to the chaos of my home and find places for the treasures I brought back with me. As I deal with those treasures, I will grieve. Daughter is safely at the workshop, so she won't be hovering and asking me what's wrong. When she gets home, we're going to go see the Harry Potter movie. We'll go out to eat after the movie. I will use my day off to address the stress in my life. I will make time for something fun tonight.

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My hope is that be facing my grief I will begin to heal and will be able to face the challenges of the week and be more effective in my work. The cost of avoiding it was just too high last week.