grieving

I held my breath through October (reflecting on trauma, grief & living)

| Kimberly Smith

October last year was rough.

It was the month the foster care placement was completely imploding as she looked for anyway she could find to break it down. There were lots of nights spent wondering where she was. There were aggressive messages, slammed doors, defiance and rejection when she was home and fear and worry when she wasn’t. There were multiple calls to caseworkers, carers, teachers, youth leaders, after-hours support and even police. My nerves were shot, my heart broken as I watched her work to tear down what we had spent three years building.

It was a scary and lonely time. There wasn’t a blueprint for how these things play out – I guess others didn’t know what to do either. So, I cried alone – a lot. I didn’t sleep enough. I muddled my way through decisions and the necessities of life and work but it all felt very tenuous. I was constantly waiting for the next thing – the next message, the next report, the next demand, the next sighting. Plans were tentative; hope was suspended. And ultimately the outcome was not what it could’ve been or anything like what we’d been working towards.

So, this October I held my breath.

I held my breath and braced myself for the memories and reminders to come. The anniversaries of milestones missed and events disrupted. The triggers of moments and places where decisions were made and more distance was created. The reminders of opportunities missed to recover or redirect. The school holiday dates highlighted in my calendar in hopes that those things would still matter to my household. The advancing of plans and decisions that have been recalibrated in light of her leaving. The waves and waves of grief and guilt, and concern for her. My shoulders were tensed, my eyes were stinging, my reflexes were on alert.

In the physical, holding your breath makes you very self-focussed. When you’re holding your breath you don’t think about much else except for the sensations that develop in your body. (Are you trying it now? Go on!) Your chest gets tight. Your face can pucker. Your lips get taut and your mouth gets dry. Pressure builds in your ears. Your eyes squint. Your stomach contracts. Every activity in your body feels magnified and whatever else you might be trying to do at the time gets harder or even impossible.

In the emotional realm, holding your breath has a similar effect. In the space of self-awareness, one’s sensitivity to other feelings is heightened. For me, so many other sadnesses crept in. I became more aware of the pain points in my life – the disappointments, the rejections, the longings, the things I was missing or missing out on. Everything felt just that little bit harder – decision making, life admin, personal disciplines, relationships, physical tasks. As the days of holding my breath accumulated fatigue set in and things just got harder still.

It took a while to diagnose. As social isolation increased and functioning decreased it became a new normal of sorts. Things shifted incrementally and almost undetected. Until, in a moment of desperation-fueled clarity, I raised a flag with my best-friends. “I’m really not doing too well. I need your help.”

The door opened then to start to give voice and light to what I was experiencing. To name the unfamiliar anxiety, overthinking and second-guessing. To acknowledge the fears, and the dysregulation. To articulate the social apprehension and fretfulness that led to withdrawing in ways that did not support the well-being of this extroverted, external processing, people-needing soul. To describe the physical manifestations and observe how the body has its own way of holding and responding to trauma. To apologise for my absences, unresponsiveness and self-protection.

I breathed out.

Trauma and grief are unpredictable and uncontrollable. They’ll pop up when they want to, whether it’s convenient or not. They’ll grip your heart and distort your thinking if you pay them mind, or you don’t. But breathing out is the only way you’re able to breathe in again. Breathing out is necessary to make room for the intake of the sweet fresh air of the care of friends. For the voices of reason and compassion and kindness and grace to get a seat at the table. There is beauty and healing in tears cried in safe company. A mercy in being pointed to Jesus and reminded of God’s presence and power. There is release in shining light on the hurts and heartaches that spiral in on themselves in the dark.

I held my breath through October. It turned me in on myself and took me to places I’d rather not go again. It’s a recalibration, almost a retraining, but I’m paying attention to my inhaling AND my exhaling and … breathing.

I’m grieving

| Kimberly Smith

I’m having a moment to recognise how much grief there is – in me and around me.

This weekend, I was meant to be in Perth for a full 3 days of ministry. These are the things I love. Seven different workshops and preaches across three days to multiple different groups. The opportunity to invest in leaders who are engaging in Generations ministries across a number of churches. The privilege to be God’s voice of direction, correction, encouragement, inspiration or blessing as I deliver the messages He placed on my heart to bring.

But instead, I spent too many hours wrestling technology and sound and lighting and recording and editing and uploading … a whole lot of things that have absolutely zero to do with my gift and skill set! And I found myself becoming frustrated as every minute I spend on those things is a minute I’m not working on what I’m really being asked to do. Every ounce of energy and thought and focus spent watching to see that the screens were sharing correctly and the sun wasn’t shining on me in a weird way and that the delivery truck out the front of my house wasn’t going to start reversing and have its sensors beeping into my audio feed … had the potential to draw me away from the content I was delivering and the moment I was trying to hold for the people I was recording for.

And the people! Oh wow, do I miss the people!? I love the moments of exchanged encouragement – waiting in the coffee line, washing hands in the bathroom, sitting at a lunch table, in prayer response and worship. I miss the points of connection as we realise we share mutual friends, or similar life journeys or an interest in Disney movies or the work of Patrick Lencioni. I miss seeing the faces of people as I’m speaking. The nods of affirmation, that eyebrow-up-head-tilt-back movement that signifies an “aha moment” – the laughter over a mispronounced word or some other self-deprecating joke, the bent heads over notebooks that make my heart leap to know that God has nudged them in a personal way – “That’s for you! Remember that!”

And I’m also sad that I’m not in Perth! That for the second year in a row I haven’t been able to visit my friends there or see the beautiful beaches and sunsets or have my retreat time at Hilary’s Harbour. I miss being on the plane and going somewhere. I miss exploring new places and meeting new people.

And that’s just today.

More broadly, I’m missing meals and games nights in people’s houses and meetings in real life. I’m tired of rescheduling and cancelling and “waiting to see” and adjusting and reducing. Living in a relatively new town (I was here barely 4 months before Covid kicked in), I feel like I’m losing momentum on developing new relationships and routines. My friendship circle is shrinking. The freedoms of living regionally are overshadowed by how many of my people are on the other side of the ‘ring of steel’. My calendar mocks me with a holiday scheduled for last May that has been bumped and bumped and will likely just end up cancelled. I miss what psychologists term “collective effervescence”. The sense of “energy and harmony people feel when they come together in a group around a shared purpose” – the raucous laughter, the passionate exchange of ideas, the robust search for creative outcomes, reminiscing and story telling (that’s hard to recreate in the clinical environment of a Zoom meeting.) I’m genuinely weary from being depleted of extroverted emotional energy.

Etc, etc, etc … wah wah wah. That’s just me – having a pity party for one.

But then I consider my family and friends and I scroll through social media and watch the news and there are so many more stories of grief and loss. Those who can’t visit sick loved ones in hospital or farewell dying family members or attend funerals. Those whose weddings or parties or graduations or celebrations have been shifted and reimagined and cancelled or been adjusted and reduced to something far less than they’d hoped. Sports teams not able to play finals. Concerts cancelled or performed to empty theatres. Newborn babies taking weeks and months to be met. Increased financial pressures on families. Rising rates of Domestic violence and abuse in homes. Ever increasing numbers of children in out of home care. More businesses closing down after each lockdown. Families separated by oceans. Mental health struggles.

Etc etc etc … so much collective grief. So much loss. Languishing and fatigue. Depression and uncertainty. It’s real.

So, I’m having a moment to recognise how much grief there is – in me and around me.

I am easily able to identify good things in my life and the world around me. There is still much joy to be found – so much to celebrate, embrace and be grateful for. I am not without conscience that my lot is a far easier one to navigate than many many others. I’m ok.

But there is space for lament. In fact, it’s healthy to realistically assess what we’re seeing, feeling and experiencing. It’s right to acknowledge the hard and the non-preferred and the downright crappy. There is a “time for everything and a season for every activity”. We achieve nothing through suppressing our grief or forcing optimism.

Maybe you need to take a moment too? To have a cry or a rant or a release of some sort. To acknowledge the loss and grief you’re experiencing – personally or vicariously. And perhaps by doing so, to make room in your heart and mind for the energy required to keep going and to see the potential and hope in what’s still possible and the joy there is yet to be discovered.