Turning the Page

Can you pray for me? How do you respond when someone asks you to pray?

I often get requests for me to pray, but I am often not sure what to pray for. Sometimes the need is very clear, but at other times it is vague.

They want me to pray, to intercede, to present their need, but do they truly know their deepest below the surface needs?

I also wonder if they are paying attention to notice how God might answer their needs? It may be yes and in exactly the way they would like it to happen or yes, but in a completely different way. Maybe the answer will ‘No’ or ‘not yet’?

Will they return and give thanks and worship to God? Or will be like nine out of ten that ignore the giver of good things? (Jesus Heals Ten Men With Leprosy)

As you can see, I ponder over many things when people ask me to pray.

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I haven’t lived a perfect life and I wonder if my problems are punishment from God, but maybe I don’t know the whole story and that God is overflowingly full of grace and mercy.

They wanted retribution. Payback.

A desire for revenge coursed through their veins for what had happened to them, but then, in a whisper of a moment, they thought of what they had done. Perhaps the other also wanted retribution, payback for what they had have done. Perhaps they were seeking revenge against them.

They had stolen from them and now they wanted it all back, plus interest.

If you do the crime then you recieve the punishment until the other is satisfied. But when will they be satisfied? What will truly restore the balance scales of justice to equilibrium?

And their pain seems like a bottomless hole that, try as you might and with all the resources you have, is impossible to fill. You realise that the hole, that dark hole of vacuumous space, has been growing from other intrusions on the soul.

Your crime is but one that has sculptured the walls of the heart.

They want you to pay, but you know nothing within your capability will even begin to calm their pain.

God, the judge, sits and weeps at the mess.

We may look at our suffering and consider that this must be payback from God for what we have done.

We see the suffering of others and make judgments that their suffering is retribution for what they have done. They’re getting what they deserve. Please don’t do this.

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We think we can do it all, manage life ourselves, but you simply can’t. You discover you can’t make it on your own.

They were told by their closest companion that they should not need others to affirm them. That they should be able to do it themselves. They should be totally self-reliant.

That was poor theology – the way we talk about God.

It drove them even further into dark loneliness.

There is a time and a place where all you truly want to have is the breath of an encouraging word flow over you and into you.

A friend who says, often without words, ‘I am with you, I am present, I know you, and I will not leave you.’

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When you’re depressed or in a psychotic crisis, it’s normal to believe our negativity is everything there is, but the power of love and light is a constant we can tap into.

Guest post by Sónia Monteiro

Pop culture immortalized this sequence of words that gives title to at least two well-known songs, one by Celine Dion, another by Frankie Goes to Hollywood. 

Both poems sing that facet of love between lovers. 

But there is more to love than eros.

According to the great academic and writer C. S. Lewis in his book The Four Loves, there are at least four types of love: Affection, Friendship, Eros and Charity.

All four features provide forms of love transmuted into different aspects of reality that share a common ground, or should I say, a common God.

Read this further here

I want to know, and because I want to know I will ask empowering questions. Ones that open up the treasure chest of the heart and mind.

It felt more like an interrogation than an invitation.

Questions poured out. Demanding, angry, harsh questions that sent me into a state of frigid shock.

I had no answers. This was the neighbourhood bully. This was the cat having perverse pleasure with a cornered mouse. This would not end well.

You would think a simple conversation wouldn’t be traumatic, but questions amplified with verbal and non-verbal tones can decimate a soul.

But questions framed in gentleness, love, and respect can also be one of the most healing gifts we can offer.

I call these gifts ’empowering questions.’

I came across the term ‘Empowerment’ back in the 1990s when I started working in the field of Mental Health care.

Large institutions that housed people with Mental Illnesses were closing down. 

People who once lived in isolated separation from communities were now living in houses next to your own. 

It had a big, long fancy word – deinstitutionalization. 

Deinstitutionalization – in sociology, movement that advocates the transfer of mentally disabled people from public or private institutions, such as psychiatric hospitals, back to their families or into community-based homes. Britannica

Coming from an environment where much of ones personal powers had been taken away, this was a time where people had freedom to choose. 

A new buzz word appeared in the conversations of everyone in Mental Health care. 

Empowerment. 

Empowerment meant to equip, encourage, and foster personal choice. 

I remember supporting a young man in his early twenties. He had been living in an institution for probably five years and his aging mother had managed his money all his life, giving him some pocket money each week. 

I asked him if he would like to manage his own money and he said he would. So he and I began the slow empowering process of opening a bank account. A completely foreign idea to him. We also talked about budgeting. 

We talked about this with his mother, and she was furious. She believed he was totally incapable of managing money. She withdrew him out of our support. I can’t tell you the rest of the story because I simply don’t know. 

Empowerment for me became the undergirding word for everything I do. Still does. 

French writer Albert Camus puts it well.

Don’t walk in front of me… I may not follow

I would suggest to Albert that to empower someone is to even be a fraction behind the other so that they feel they are making the advances.

Being in front means they are simply followers, walking in your wake.

Being behind them, they may feel isolated, alone, vulnerable.

But walking beside and slightly behind is an invitation to trust and to step forward.

Feet slightly behind.

I think this empowering pose is captured in the post crucifixion story of Jesus’ walk to Emmaus

Now that same day, two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem.

They were talking with each other about everything that had happened.

As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him. Luke 24:13-16

Jesus joined them on the journey. He walked along with them.

There is an invitation for us to be empowered by the risen Christ.

It has been reckoned that in the stories we have recorded of Jesus’ life, we find him asking over 300 questions. We also have his beautiful parables that contain within them questions created to empower us into a multitude of new thinking paths. 

One of the Jesus stories that shouts ’empowerment’ to me is that of  Bartimaues.

They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 

Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 

Jesus stood still and said, ‘Call him here.’ And they called the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’ 

So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. 

Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ The blind man said to him, ‘My teacher, let me see again.’ 

Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way. Mark 10:46-52

It should have been obvious that he would want his sight to be restored, but no, Jesus still asked an empowering question. He put the power back into the hands of Bartimaeus.

Look above, look below, look behind and look in front.

I think of a large iceberg floating in the ocean.

• Look above the waterline refers to what is being presented right here and now. It’s obvious, you know it they know it, it’s easily seen. Bartimaues is blind and a beggar. 

Jesus asks ‘What do you want me to do for you?’

Empowering questions open up the exploration. 

Empowering questions give the other power to be honest, vulnerable and even wrong in the face of love and possible rejection. 

I believe that we all want to be known, explored, discovered, and touched. There is something deep within needs presence more than the problem solving.

I want first things first.

I wonder if Bartimaues wanted his sight to be restored so that his life would be better or that he would be able to see Jesus.

Now that’s a big question! He got both.

1. “Suppose God proposed to you a deal and said, ‘I will give you anything you want. You can possess the whole world. Nothing will be impossible for you … Nothing will be a sin, nothing forbidden. You will never die, never have pain, never have anything you do not want and always have anything you do want–except for just one thing: you will never see my face.’Augustine closed with a question: “Did a chill rise in your hearts, when you heard the words, “you will never see my face?” That chill is the most precious thing in you; that is the pure love of God.”

Deep empowering questions discern, with a gentle curiosity, what is first and what is second.

What is it you most want? Restoration of sight? A better life now? To be in control when all seems to be mystery and fog?

I like to ask empowering questions because they reveal the Emmaus walk that I am part of with others.

So, what’s it like being you?

I’m curious? 🙂 [email protected] 

•  The quality of your life is a direct reflection of the quality of the questions you are asking yourself. Anthony Robbins

1. How does it feel when someone asks you deep, empowering questions?

Barry Pearman

Photo by Lauren Richmond on Unsplash

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Midst the struggle you wonder about the plans God has for you. I thought it was all about prosperity, but this is far from that. 

Some things don’t make sense.

It wasn’t meant to be like this. I didn’t see this as my future. How did I get here?

Questions and ponderings flow through the brain, and we wonder if God is there at all.

People say things that feel like grains of sand being rubbed into an open wound. 

• You need more faith

You wonder about the end product. Where is all this going?  

Can anything good come out of this mess I am in? 

You try to work it all out, but it’s all a bit of a puzzle. A jig-saw puzzle.

I think when I’m 94, if I make it to that age, I might be able to see how a few pieces have fitted together and something Godly good has emerged. 

At this moment, I still wonder how. It’s a mystery. 

I think it’s a bit like being given a 10000 piece jigsaw puzzle without the accompanying picture of what the puzzle will look like. Mountain scene, tropical birds, an old house. You have no idea. 

To complicate it even further, there are no straight edged pieces. This puzzle could seemingly go on forever. No easy parts for you to make a quick start with nice neat borders. 

So you make a start and find a few pieces that connect. This one fits in here and maybe this one will go here.

You notice that a lot of the pieces look the same. In fact, it looks like this complete puzzle has only slight shade differences to it. There is a lot of sky!

I thought this life was meant to be easy. No complications. Straightforward and simple, yet it’s more like a vast blue sky puzzle.

Did you ever think that mystery was in the plans God has for you?

I often receive requests for prayer. (email me at [email protected] if you want)

There is pain, loss, and desperation.

First, I believe, they want God to act in certain ways. But I also think there is a deep, probably unconscious, need to feel that someone else knows the struggle. 

That they are being held in someone’s thoughts.  

They want to be held, known and loved by at least one other person. Being alone and completely abandoned is the worst of crimes we can do to each other. 

I hold people in my thoughts during the day. Prayers form around Spirit nudges for this person and that person.

Their puzzle is jig-saw messy, like mine.

Then someone quotes Jeremiah 29:11, and especially the translation that has the word ‘prosper’. 

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

At this point, I understand why Jesus got angry and picked up a whip. 

Bitterly cold comfort to someone dying from cancer, or having had their house burn to ashes. 

We hear the word ‘plan’ and we think blueprint, map, already laid out for us.

We hear the word ‘prosper’ and we go to what the world considers as prosperity – the good life of health, wealth, beautiful people, and anything advertised to us as what will bring us personal fulfillment.

Yet here we are, like Job, sitting in an ash heap picking at our sores.

Quite frankly, I wish some people would just shut up and keep their band-aid clap trap verses for their own happy face mask wearing friends. 

In the original Hebrew, this verse would most likely be read in this way.

For I know the thoughts that I think towards you says Yahweh thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you a future and a hope Jeremiah 29:11

Thoughts. 

Thoughts that God thinks towards us.

Thoughts of peace, a future, a hope.

Reality hits that we are not there yet.

We, like the people of Israel that this verse was originally intended for, are in exile from the home always intended for us.

There are some words, that we may know from hearing them so often because people have said them to us as little mantras.

Forsaken, I believe, could be one of those words.

He will never leave you nor forsake you. Deuteronomy 31:6

Forsaken means to be remote, absent, depart from. 

In God’s thoughts, you always held, loved, known, even though you may feel in exile and in a strange land.

God is on the move with thoughts and intentions to bring you to jig-saw puzzle completion with no pieces missing or in the wrong place.

Jig-saw pieces move and clip together. Sometimes awkwardly, sometimes with ease. We look at our life and see how God’s thoughts have been shaping the puzzle.

Amid the pain of the present day, we know we are held, loved and known.  

Perhaps you have to change your thinking about the plans God has for you.

• The moment God is figured out with nice neat lines and definitions, we are no longer dealing with God. Rob Bell 

1. When you hear the words ‘I have thoughts towards you’ what is your first reaction? Why that reaction?

Barry Pearman

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When no one understands you, it can create a deep sense of loneliness. Perhaps there are reasons for the lack of being known. Forgive them anyway.

They were carrying something precious. Their inner world. Thoughts, feelings, motivations, desires, pains, and joys. Everything that goes on within their life and sometimes it’s heavy, very heavy. Too heavy for one dusty human to carry.

They needed a soul carrier. Someone who they could download the struggle to, safely. But the strongest memory of when they had done this was that their vulnerability had been thrown to the pigs.

It’s like you have found the most beautiful pearl in the world and you sell everything to buy it. You carry it with you and only show it to those you think will value it like you do. But instead they look at it, dismiss it as garbage, and then throw it to the pigs who grind it to sand.

Who is safe? Who will listen? Who cares about the beauty of the pearl within? Who is safe for in-to-me-see?

I want that. We all want that.

I want them to understand the hurt they have done. There is anger growing inside of me because of their actions, but I know that my pain will be shot down even more. There’s no point.

This is the dilemma. The tension point that I hear so often in people that download to me.

The loneliness, frustration, pain at not being heard or understood. Underneath is a desire to be known, but it’s like everyone has shields raised to stop the penetration of anything that might be uncomfortable.

It might be helpful to understand why people act in this way. Why they don’t understand?

Here are some potential reasons.

1. Too busy. They simply have too much going on to be able to listen to the depth you need. Forgive them anyway.

I think Jesus deeply felt the experience of not being fully understood.

My thoughts go to the night before his crucifixion. Anxiety and pain coursing through his veins so much so that he sweated blood.

No one understood him. Even his closest friends, his soul mates, went to sleep on him. He was utterly humanly alone.

He forgave them anyway. He knew their human weaknesses.

Even as he was dying, he defended our human fallibilities. He didn’t seek rightful justice and retribution against our dust.

When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left.

Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’ Luke 23:32-34

So often the people we hope for understanding and closeness are the ones that hurt us the most. Forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.

I hope that one of the outcomes of my writing and podcasts is that the world will have more listeners. People who might know a little more of what they are doing.

It seems to me that to find someone who will listen you deeply to a place where you feel you understood requires payment. Therapists, counsellors, psychologists etc all have a role, but I wonder if much of what they do could be done by people who know how to listen well.

Maybe we also need more older men and women on front porches. I remember a psychologist lamenting the loss of the old lady on the porch, welcoming the young mums into their homes for earthy wisdom. Older men working with younger men, and a passing on of the baton of age old wisdom.

We also need more third places. Places where we can go to for relationship, conversation, and hope.

But most of all, it’s over to you to be what you want from others. To be the deep listener and not an ‘average bear.’

When people present to you the beautiful pearl of themselves (Matthew 13:45-46), please don’t dismiss it and throw it to the pigs. Matthew 7:6

• I want us to relate to one another, not as moralist to sinner or therapist to patient, but as saint to saint, father to child, friend to friend, as true lovers, with the confidence that we can help each other believe that, by the grace of God, there is something good beneath the mess. Even when all we can see is the mess, I want us to believe that we can nourish the good and encourage its release.  Larry Crabb Connecting

1. What happens to you when you don’t feel heard and understood?

Barry Pearman

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

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Events happen in life, and we can get controlled by the lies we believe as truth, but there is hope. 

It is a memory seared into my brain.

I’m at an age now I can’t remember what I had for breakfast, but this is among those memories that I doubt I’ll ever forget. And it is a memory I want to retain, painful as it is.

It was my night to be the on-call chaplain at the hospital, and I was summoned to the emergency room because a man had been brought in, and the staff needed me to interface with his family as they arrived.

First to arrive was the man’s daughter, who was probably 11 or 12 years old, and her brother, who was perhaps two years younger, along with their stepmother. I guided them to the family waiting room and told them there was no news from the medical staff yet.

The daughter largely ignored me the rest of the evening. She was the perfect hostess for the other family and friends arriving. Her brother mostly stood silently in one corner of the room, staring blankly into space.

I made several trips to the treatment room and knew the man would not survive. When a patient did not survive, it was the doctor’s job to inform the family, but in situations like this, it was my task to pave the way for bad news by saying things like, “It’s not looking very hopeful right now,’ and then doing my best to comfort the family.

About 45 minutes passed before the doctors finally conceded that they could not revive him, and the primary ER doctor summoned me and asked me to pray with him before we went back into the family waiting room to give them the terrible news that their husband, son, father, and friend was dead.

The doctor assured the family that every measure had been taken to save his life but that they could not revive him.

There was an immediate outpouring of profound grief, but the young daughter finally turned to speak to me for the first time. With tears welling in her eyes, she asked me, “Chaplain, if I had been a better daughter, would Daddy not have killed himself?”

Then she collapsed against me and began to sob. Huge, uncontrollable sobbing. Her younger brother came over to me, collapsed against me, and began sobbing. 

I felt my tears join theirs, and I looked up to realize that the man’s mother, the children’s grandmother, was looking at me through her tears. She had now lost a second son to suicide. She asked me a question.

She was not angry. She just really needed to understand. She asked, “Why Chaplain? How can a good God let things like this happen?”

She didn’t expect an answer, thank God. She just needed to express what she was feeling.

I have no idea what I could have told her then that would have helped.

I have no idea what I could have told the man’s daughter that would have helped.

When her sobs abated somewhat, I finally was able to tell her that what had happened was not her fault and that sometimes people do things we do not understand, and that what her father had done did not mean he did not love her.

I am curious to know if it sank in.

I have doubts that it did.

Children usually think everything is about them, and words do not usually prevent that misconception from taking hold,

I’ve often thought of that young girl over the years. She would likely be in her early 40s by now.

Has she lived under the terrible burden of believing her father’s suicide was her fault?

Have her relationships suffered because she feels like she is damaged goods?

Did she ever find the comfort of Christ?

That has been my prayer for her – that somehow she experienced the love of Christ, who is the only one who can heal soul wounds like the one she suffered.

Her grandmother has likely moved on from this life, but I wonder about her, too.

I’m sure, like Job, she never got an answer to her questions, but did she, like Job, experience God in such a way that the questions did not matter anymore? That was my prayer for her.

So many of us live a life controlled by lies life tells us.

Life seems tilted that way.

Advertising only serves to reinforce those lies.

I watched a little television recently and intentionally watched the commercials for a time.

I learned some interesting things about myself. I was too fat, my gray hair was off-putting, and I needed to restore it to its original dark brown.

Because I suffer from ED (Erectile Dysfunction), I’m less than a man, and no woman would ever want to be with me.

I drive the wrong car, use the wrong toothpaste, eat the wrong food, wear unhip shoes, wear the wrong clothing, and use the wrong telephone.

Apparently, I’m of no use to anyone.

If it weren’t for the love of Christ that assures me that I am loved, I, too, might be tempted to end it all.

So what lies still govern your life?

You probably have to dig into your childhood to find the root of many of the lies, but, like the grandmother in this story, some lies attach themselves to us as we go through adulthood, too.

The enemy lies to us continually.

Jesus warned us that he would. He called him the “Father of all lies.” John 8:44

Jesus though is the truth, and, as he said, the truth sets us free. John 8:31-32

Many of us do not understand that the truth that sets us free isn’t some spoken concept – it is a living person – Jesus. It is an ongoing, vibrant relationship with Jesus that keeps us free from the lies the enemy wants us to believe.

I’ve struggled with guilt and shame for much of my life because of things that happened to me when I was young and the things I’ve done as a result.

When I mess up as an adult, those feelings of shame and guilt can well up inside me again, and it’s easy for me to think I’m nothing but a failure.

But the words of Paul at the end of Romans chapter eight have become bedrock for me, calling me back to life and reminding me who and whose I am.

“For I am convinced that neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38-39

Thank God for the One who is the truth!

• The warfare that the Christian is involved with is the battle between true and mistaken beliefs. It is warring for reality against the delusional world of lies. Which side will you take? David Riddell

1. What experiences have you had where you have realised you have been living under a false perception or a lie?

This is a guest post from Bruce Swartz

Bruce Swartz is a husband, father, and grandfather to a family he loves. Both he and his wife are abuse survivors. God eventually lead him to undertake training as a trauma therapist. Even in retirement, he occasionally walks beside a wounded person who needs a companion in their journey of recovery. He lives in Champaign, Illinois, USA, and can be reached by email.

Other posts by Bruce –

Photo by Fernando Rodrigues on Unsplash

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It’s a long way from there to there. Stuck in the middle, we have emotional pain, but we can also have presence. A comfort to the pain of now.

They wanted some relief. It wasn’t so much the highs and lows of a roller coaster; it was more like dragging a heavy sack of struggle around with them.

For others, it is like a dark shadow that has come over them. Engulfing them, creeping with unending persistence over the little light they have within them.

How would you describe emotional pain?

Emotional pain. It’s different from physical pain. You can tell the doctor that you have pain in your right leg and they can offer medical suggestions – physiotherapy, exercises, medication.

But what exercise can heal a broken heart?

What medication can resolve anger and resentment simmering in the soul?

There is physical pain and there is emotional pain and they seem to intertwine themselves where one feeds the other.

My back pain can resource my feelings of misery.

A merry heart can be like a medicine to the body. Proverbs 17:22

Have you noticed the intertwining between body and soul?

Christmas day and it was a two and half hour drive between my childhood home and my grandparents’ home.

Two and half hours of monotony and boredom.

Weaving around corners and up and over hills. Passing through towns, I would look out and see children playing on new bikes they had got that morning.

Groan.

My new red bike was back at home. I had a snatched look and a smell of that new bike, and then we were in the car for that long drive.

I watched those children with envy.

My grandparents’ home was not my home. It was nice to see them. Get slightly spoiled and experience life in another home different to my own. But it was not my home.

Groan.

But in a couple of days, we were back in that old Morris Marina and on the road. There was a quiet excitement and hope to return home.

Home, that’s where I long to be.

Or as Bono would sing ‘I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.’

Emotional pain is rooted in that experience of not being there yet. All of those feelings of anger, grief, loss, sadness, loneliness all have the smell of knowing this isn’t what we were meant for.

We were created for something we have never fully experienced. A garden of intimacy, delight, joy and peace.

I still have wafts of it in the relationships I have. I also still see it in this creative glory box God has made for me.

Creation, like myself, groans for what once was.

We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor,  and not only the creation, but we ourselves. Romans 8:22-23a 

That emotional pain is the groan. I know something better. It’s unconscious, but I’m not there yet.

There is also a groaning for what will be.

‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes.

I long for a fullness of presence like a deer pants for water when the sun is beating down hard.

There is a kind of archetype in all of us.

What’s an archetype?

In Jungian theory it’s a primitive mental image inherited from the earliest human ancestors, and supposed to be present in the collective unconscious. Oxford reference

It’s a simple thread of knowing that has been passed down through generations. Deeply unconscious to my awareness I still long for something of another world.

If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world. C. S. Lewis

So what do we do with the emotional pain?

The most common medication is self comfort. We self soothe to the point of addiction.

The obvious addictions are drugs, alcohol, pornography, sex, gambling, shopping, gaming, eating, etc

The not so obvious are those of demanding control, religious observance, success (however you define that), hobbies etc

But in every self soothing effort I have tried, it feels like there is a bungee cord wrapped around me. One of those huge rubber bands that wants to pull me back to something better, something that I can’t be in control of.

I’m not against self soothing. I think it’s important to have some practices that bring comfort to the pain of living in this state of ‘not there yet.’ But self-soothing must always bring me closer in a relationship to the one I’m going to spend eternity with.

That bungee cord pulls me back to God and maybe a few safe others that will listen with compassion to my groans. They won’t F.A.S.S. me (Fix, Advice, Save, or Set straight).

Instead, there will be a warm embracing community.

For the struggler in the valley of emotional pain, they simply want to be heard.

They don’t want criticism, or more burdens added.

After being listened to well, the most common response is ‘Thank you, that helped.’

It may not have taken the emotional pain away, instead it simply says that you’re not alone in it.

• Acceptance is not our mode nearly as much as aggression, resistance, fight, or flight. None of them achieve the deep and lasting results of true acceptance and peaceful surrender. Richard Rohr. Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps

The less we say about it the better

Feet on the ground

It’s ok I know nothing’s wrong… nothing

Hi yo I got plenty of time

And you’re standing here beside me

Never for money

Home, is where I want to be

I come home, she lifted up her wings

I can’t tell one from another

There was a time before we were born

Hi yo we drift in and out

Out of all those kinds of people

I’m just an animal looking for a home

And you love me till my heart stops

Eyes that light up, eyes look through you

1. Can you think of an experience where you sensed you were not there yet?

Barry Pearman

Photo by Nathaniel Flowers on Unsplash

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I never saw it coming -the cataclysmic argument that triggered my adult son to estrange me three years ago. I might never see it end -the suffering of ambiguous loss of the relationship without closure.

Coined by family therapist Pauline Boss, Ph.D., 40 years ago, ambiguous loss refers to unresolved physical or emotional loss or the loss of a relationship with no closure.

Unresolved closure might involve a physical loss with a psychological presence when a loved one’s absence is unknown, uncertain, or unresolved.

Likewise, a loved one might be physically present but psychologically absent because of dementia, traumatic brain injury, addiction, or mental illness.

Ambiguous loss refers to unresolved physical or emotional loss

So, too, the ambiguous loss may encompass physical and emotional loss because of divorce, adoption, estrangement, incarceration, immigration, or ghosting. Such loss is especially grievous around the loss of a fulfilling long-term relationship.

Such is my circumstance.

Three years after the meltdown with my 34-year-old son, an occasional flicker of hope for contact, connection, and reconciliation still moves me to reach out. But sadly, my text messages and phone calls go unreturned.

My invitations for meet-ups go unacknowledged. And his once frequent reach outs to check in on me, his mother who raised him as a single parent, are but a distant memory.

No matter the circumstance, the interminable suffering of ambiguous loss defies resolution, creates long-term uncertainty about the relationship, and freezes the grief process, according to Boss.

Yet, unlike death, whereby mourners receive confirmation of the loss and support through funerals, burials, and gatherings, none exist for unresolved loss.

So often, we who experience estrangement never see it coming. Only after a prolonged silence, separation, and isolation do we realize the exquisitely painful loss of the cherished relationship we once knew.

Hence, like an unsuspecting moth captured in a jar, we find ourselves trapped in the suffocating reality of ambiguous loss. We see our human swarm living interconnected lives, oblivious to the invisible suffering separating our reality from theirs. 

In numbness and shock, we expend untold energy attempting to escape the misery of separation. In yearning to restore the relationship, we resort to “bargaining” -with our Creator, ourselves, and the aggrieved party.

In anger, we deny, deflect, defend, and dismiss our role in the conflict. Finally, in anguish, we deplete our mental, emotional, and spiritual reserves for coping and thus descend into hopelessness and despair.

Alas! Like the entrapped moth, whose spirit succumbs to the oxygen-depletion, the light of our being fades in the reality of the depleted relationship – the “oxygen” that once breathed life, love, and interconnection into our hearts. 

How can we move forward amidst the interminable torment of estrangement by a parent, child, or partner with whom we once shared a fulfilling relationship?

I offer some insight based on my experience of ambiguous loss by estrangement.

Your loss is real, and your grief is bottomless. Whether you recognize what caused the shift or have no clue, berating yourself over what you could’ve, should, or might’ve done is moot. 

As the reality of the estrangement sets in, you may experience recurring bouts of guilt, shame, ignorance, naivete, anguish, anger, sadness, despair, worry, yearning, and a host of other complicated feelings.

The overwhelm of such feelings, especially when repressed, suppressed, dismissed, or denied over time, can derail your emotional mettle for coping. Carve out a set amount of time daily to meditate and sit with your feelings in nonjudgmental, loving self-kindness.

Every human being is flawed, fragile, broken, and wounded. The person who estranged you may have issues of which you are unaware, and they may not have the emotional capacity for the relationship they once shared with you. 

Likewise, they may not have the emotional intelligence or maturity to confront you about their grievance. The person may not recognize their lack of emotional capacity or maturity. Thus, they see estrangement as their only protective defense mechanism.

Forgive your loved one in your heart and in your prayers. Forgive them when gazing at their picture, and forgive them when remembering the joyful moments of your relationship.

Forgiveness might not heal the estranged, but it can heal us who suffer the estrangement. So, too, recognize that your loved one may suffer similar complicated feelings about ending the relationship without closure.

You are human. Whether it was a series of micro-hurts, a cataclysmic circumstance, or an unknown rift that shifted the relationship, forgive yourself. You had needs that, for whatever reason, you could not express, or the other person could not meet, or vice versa. It takes two persons to nourish a relationship and two to make it wither. 

Indeed, you may never know what drove your loved one to choose estrangement over relationship. Forgiving yourself is the first step in arriving at some degree of acceptance and peace in processing concomitant grief of ambiguous loss.

Seek community with others who live with ambiguous loss by estrangement. Like the moth trapped in the jar, we who suffer alienation sadly so often do so in isolation, amplifying the loss of our human interconnections.

As the shock of estrangement wanes, gently and with great self-compassion, begin looking at the parts of yourself that reflect your authentic essence and those that no longer reflect who you are.

Direct your focus to nurture the best parts about yourself and aim to surrender those that no longer serve you. 

And so, as you live in the reality of ambiguous grief, may you once again find the light of your being through healing, community, and the “oxygen” of new human interconnections.

• I am a stranger in this world, and there is a severe solitude and painful lonesomeness in my exile. Kahlil Gibran, The Treasured Writings of Kahlil Gibran

1. Ambiguous loss can encompass other types of loss beyond relationships. Have you experienced ambiguous loss around unrealized hopes, dreams, goals, or disappointments, such as the unexpected loss of a job, health, career, home, lifestyle, stage of life, or group of friends? Did you feel isolated in that no one seemed to notice or understand the depth of your grief?

Peggy M. Phillips is an author writing in the Christian Fiction-Metaphysical genre. Peggy debuted her first work of fiction in November 2022 with the poignant and powerful epistolary novella, “Letters to the Little Flower The Gift of Spiritual Companionship with St. Therese of Lisieux.” Born in Wichita, KS, United States, Peggy grew up in a large Catholic family in a small Kansas town. A Registered Nurse who works in mental health services, Peggy enjoys hiking the beautiful nature trails of Kansas and spending time with her family. 

Resources:

https://www.ambiguousloss.com/resources/  

https://whatsyourgrief.com/

Photo by Milo Bauman on Unsplash

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