From Broken Within

Why is it that real, gut-wrenching grief is so difficult to handle in other people?  Why is is that we can respond to broken bones but pretend that broken hearts are unimportant?

Just imagine that… Why is it that real, gut-wrenching grief is so difficult to handle in other people?  Why is is that we can respond to broken bones but pretend that broken hearts are unimportant?

Just imagine that you are paddling your canoe down a river, watching the birds and bees and butterflies.  You are so relaxed and enchanted that you don’t see the approaching cliff fall.  Your canoe hurtles over the edge and you tumble 30 feet or more trying to puzzle out what is happening to you.  You land badly and end up with broken limbs, but fortunately you have people around you and you are treated promptly.  The pain is real, but nobody complains that you can’t play sport that Sunday, or tells you to stop being silly and to pull yourself together.

For people who experience significant loss, the pain is devastating, though there are no broken bones to show on the surface.  Imagine suddenly falling 30 feet in a canoe – something that was somehow normal and safe suddenly disappears.  The loved-one suddenly dies, the job or health suddenly vanishes.  All significant losses are terrifying, shocking, painful.  But supposing no-one can see the real pain.  Supposing people want you to carry on as normal and then criticize you and accuse you of being self-indulgent when you cannot.

I had some significant conversations with a family recently who had a son who was killed by a drug overdose.  Months later, they are still trying to cope, still struggling to carry on with life, still hoping the pain will somehow ease, still trying to hold down a job and run a family.  They are both hurting and numbed.  Their whole perspective has changed.  Many things that were previously important have now become trivia making them angry.  Slowly they are edging towards a new normality without their son, but the healing of the internal wounds is understandably slow, and the internal trauma has left them emotionally weakened, tired, vulnerable.

Broken Within

~ by 1addicthelping on March 30, 2008.