My Grief

The week before we headed out here, I lost my grandpa.  To date, I still have no clue what he died from or where his remains are. My greedy family had him cremated and he had not been buried beside my grandma as of the last time we were back in Kansas in November.

Let me start by saying, my grief is not motivated by some idea that I would have spent the holidays with him. I would not have.

My grandma died 19 years ago. I was angry for a long time. Then, the dam broke and I was angry at both of them for abuse and their inability to stop the abuse they knew was happening in my home. It took years of counseling for me to come to a place of forgiveness with both of them.

I forgave my grandpa in my heart, thinking I would never see him again. I had been told in the last few years that he had developed dementia. Even when I had the opportunity to see him, I did not.

When I went to see him in the hospital, days before he died, something happened. There is a huge difference between forgiving someone in your heart and mind and forgiving someone face to face.

In his hospital room, with my husband watching, I forgave him. I held his hand, kissed his head. I told him I was sorry he was going to die and that I forgave him. I told him that I loved him and left.

Despite the next several days of high emotion over what my family was doing, I was forever changed.

I can't really say it enough. Forgiving in person is far more powerful than forgiving a person you never see again. It is life changing.

For me, it has allowed me to release and file away the bad things that happened with my grandparents. With that, there has been a flood of memories with them. Not bad, but all good. Keep in mind, there were usually other bad memories associated with them, but they weren't related to them. Ie.being molested by a cousin at their house, abused by my dad for going to their house, etc.

One of the things my grandparents did well was celebrating Christmas. This season has brought memories of so many good times. My grandparents had a santa come to their house. They loaded us all up and took us to look at Christmas lights. They gave us very personal gifts that were usually something we really, really wanted.

Not only have I been able to enjoy those memories, I have been able to grieve them for the first time since they ended over 25 years ago. That has been really good for me. I know grief isn't typically something that is good. This is. It is good to grieve something from my childhood that I miss, something I loved. With my childhood the way it was, this is probably the only thing that was good.

This experience has allowed me to truly grieve my grandparents and the ways they were good in my life. I finally have some permanent closure in part of my life and it is good. I hate that he is gone. I believe there's a possibility he was a christian when he died. I know he had health problems that he would not recover from and he is no longer suffering with those.

There was a point when I questioned what all of this was for. I questioned why my brother made it possible to say goodbye to him but then bailed on me and still has never told me why. I questioned why they couldn't have just let me know when he died and be done with it. Obviously, I have explained the greatest reason why above. Losing him was ultimately a good gift to me. But there was something else.

As I sat crying with my husband in the car on our way to the dump one day, I got his perspective.

He shared with me what he saw that day at the hospital. He told me that he saw a strong woman who had been hurt and who walked in without any doubt and forgave the person who hurt her. He said he not only saw me forgive him, but he saw me love him. My husband who rarely shares anything from his perspective when it comes to my family and me, had seen the entire thing. He was telling me what I knew but what he saw. He said he saw in that moment someone who had maturity and love and healing.

Sometimes I think he only sees the bad stuff that I go through. I am glad he was able to see with his own eyes this experience. I think it was important for him to see that all the tears and years of counseling and fighting has brought progress. Of course we know the cost, but it isn't lost on me that without it none of this would have been possible.

Weeks later, I can certainly reflect on this and see how God uses trials for His good. Beauty from ashes. My grandpas death has brought some beautiful things along with the grief.