Category Archives: Widowhood

Force of Habit

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Even on vacation, needs arise for routine errands to the grocery store, the airport or a gift shop. Today I was at the Sanibel post office to finish a few mailing tasks. When I walked back into the parking lot, without even thinking I went right up to a white Chrysler mini-van identical to the one I used to own. My clicker wouldn’t open the locks, of course, which let me know of my mistake. My red Highlander was the next car over but had failed to break the hold of “what used to be.”

All of us are creatures of habit. We find comfort in routine and like regularity in our schedules. Even children have a rut-like mentality that causes them to love a rut. For example, it’s taken all week for Skylar and Micah, ages 2 and 1, to adjust to their vacation home-away-from-home and to sleep past 5-something in the morning.

I’ve had trouble adjusting to Nate’s absence this week, because our Sanibel “habit” began with him in 1980 and continued many years after that. It was our routine, our tradition, the way it was meant to be. Being here without him includes a measure of emptiness and makes me wonder if we should even come back next year. Yesterday Linnea and I both got teary talking about it.

In the past year I’ve spoken with quite a few widows. No two stories are alike, but the one constant is a radical break in “the way we were.” To be married several decades is to come into a period of the relationship characterized by the word “comfortable.” The two of you have become one entity, and you both like it that way.

When death disturbs the routine, happy habits are forcefully broken. After a husband (or wife) dies, every life pattern changes, and adjustments never end. It’s like being in an airplane that’s been flying a straight course, when suddenly it begins doing loops, dives and spirals. It’s hard to get our bearings.

Death wasn’t God’s plan, and he never intended we’d have to adjust to it. Apparently he meant for Adam and Eve to continue forever in the perfection of Eden. But sinful choices deep-sixed that arrangement, bringing spiritual death immediately and physical death later on. The Eden routine surely must have been a hard habit to surrender.

After sin, the break from “the way they were” changed everything for Adam and Eve including their home, their neighborhood, their work and their walk with God. Separation. Division. Disconnection. The adjustments must have taken quite some time.

Old habits die hard. It was true back then and is true today. But Adam and Eve finally did adjust, and God stuck with them in their new life. That’s true for us today, too. As long as we live, change will yank us from our comfortable ruts and insist we adjust.

We see these disruptions as painful endings, but God views them as fresh beginnings. And he will help us.

“The Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things.” (John 14:26)

The Desserts of Life

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While having a sleepover with my Knoxville friend Marge (en route to Florida), we sat at her kitchen table late into the evening talking about our lives as widows. She believes, as I do, that God is looking out for us, steadily taking care of our needs. Once in a while the Lord adds to that basic care, just like a yummy dessert sometimes follows a gourmet meal.

Marge has a name for these moments and the reason why they happen. She calls them “the desserts of life,” a little something that’s unnecessary but sweet. And the reason? God.

As we talked, our conversation was punctuated with these desserts. For example, the two of us stood at her upstairs bedroom window facing west. She said, “Sometimes I come here to watch the sunset. One especially pretty sky made me run for my camera. Just when I was ready to click the shutter, a crowd of geese flew by in a perfect V, and I snapped it. The picture is a lovely reminder of God’s presence in my life, a sweet dessert.”

Marge detailed a second example. The day her father died she was managing a job, a home, four kids and both parents in the hospital. Not knowing her father was near death, she arrived during visiting hours, walking past long elevator lines to the freight elevators in the back. When the doors opened, there was her father on a gurney, headed for emergency surgery. In a few critical moments she learned of his fragile condition, ministered comfort to him, told him what a wonderful father he was and kissed him goodbye. A dessert of life.

One more little example. After my root canal I needed the crown repaired. Calling the dentist’s office I said, “I’ll be in the area tomorrow. By any chance is there an opening?” It was a dessert of life to hear the receptionist tell me I’d called “at exactly the right time” because someone had just cancelled and there was an opening for me.

These desserts of life are labeled “coincidences” by most people but not by Marge. She’s daily trusting God to take care of her and as a result is quick to feel his touch. Then, as she attributes the unusual happenstances to him and acknowledges them as his gifts, her trust grows, and her joy increases.

She’s getting better and better at recognizing him and is savoring one tasty dessert after another.

Dessert… trust… joy… dessert… trust… joy.

“The Lord will tear down the house of the proud, but he will establish the boundary of the widow.” (Proverbs 15:25)

 

Cradling Grief

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Ever since Nate died in November of 2009, I’ve heard from blog readers who’ve also gone through the agony of losing their husbands. But the comments and emails haven’t been just about widowhood. I’ve heard from widowers and those who’ve experienced suffering in many categories other than through death.

In cyber-conversations people have described a variety of severe stresses that have caused depression, anguish, fear, isolation and physical decline, to name a few. The one universal is that a reason to suffer eventually comes to us all.

As my cyber-friends have shared their stories, it’s sometimes difficult to respond in helpful ways. None of us can know exactly what will reassure and soothe someone who is suffering. But I now know how it feels to be on the receiving end of sympathy from people who are trying to help.

When any of us purchase sympathy cards and think carefully about what to write inside, our intention is always to bring comfort to the recipient. None of us would want to cause a sad person to be sadder. And yet sometimes our words do that.

I remember in the days after Nate’s funeral that many cards contained wounding words: “God will bring good from this,” or “God wasn’t surprised by Nate’s cancer and is sovereign,” or “Now is the time to eat well and get plenty of rest.”

These things were all true, but none made sense at the time. Other cards said, “How about I come and visit you?” or “We should go out to eat,” or “Why don’t we plan a get-away?” Many cards included verses of Scripture.

I ignored them all.

The most meaningful words that came in the early weeks of widowhood were, “I have no words.” Her statement was proof she’d joined me in my suffering, and it was a comfort.

As time ticked by, the numbness slowly subsided, and written Scripture was what I craved. I began hoping it would be inside every card. When it was, I studied the passage carefully, sensing that God himself had chosen it just for me. Many had a powerful impact.

One lesson I’ve learned is that sympathy ought never to include a way to “fix” the problem. Grief is a process, not a puzzle to be solved or a hurdle to be jumped as quickly as possible. Although it sounds odd to say this, grief ought to be carefully cradled. A wounded heart can be broken if others move in too quickly with “you ought to…”

None of us fully understand the phenomenon of suffering, but one thing is sure.  God makes himself available to a sufferer in ways a non-sufferer doesn’t experience. He knows exactly when to be silent, when to communicate, and when to simply sit with us and record our tears.

He’s been perfect sufficiency to every stage of my suffering and will be the same to anyone who cries out to him.

”How abundant are the good things that you have stored up for… those who take refuge in you, [Lord]. In the shelter of your presence you hide them.” (Psalm 31:19-20)