What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, OTHELLO
WHAT DO I do now?” I would sometimes sit on my couch and ask that through my tears. The easiest response would be to do nothing. I didn’t feel like doing anything. I didn’t have the energy to do anything. Nothing I could do would change anything.
And yet the long list of things needing to be done seemed endless. While nothing I could do would change the reality of my husband’s death, doing nothing wasn’t really an option—unless I wanted to become homeless and forever dysfunctional. The only way anything would ever happen would be if I got up and did something.
Feeling overwhelmed with the physical, emotional, and spiritual responses to grief would be bad enough, but practical matters also present themselves. There’s so much to do when you seem to have the fewest internal resources to do anything at all.
In this chapter we’ll talk about a helpful way to go about handling the mountain of stuff you need to do while also doing your grief work. The foundational principle is this: just do the next thing.
Looking a day, a month, or a year ahead is not something your brain can likely handle right now. Sometimes an hour is too much to think about. So just do the next thing.
Emotions and confusion seem to overwhelm your ability to plan, think, or do much at all. So just do the one next thing.
Sometimes the next thing means doing what’s necessary for your survival. Sometimes it means doing your grief work. In this chapter we will explore what doing the next thing can look like.
Caring for Your Physical Health
Your body is under a lot of stress while you’re grieving, and it will need some extra care during this time. Taking care of yourself in this way is not selfish or lazy. Think of it as similar to recovering after a major surgery; your body will need nutrition, rest, and exercise in order to get better. It’s the same with your journey through grief.
Some have suggested the acronym DEER as a simple way to remember what your body needs:
D—Drink
E—Eat
E—Exercise
R—Rest
Sometimes doing the next thing means simply getting out of bed and putting on some clothes. Sometimes it will mean getting a drink of water. While it sounds simple, your brain will function better when you are well hydrated. Make sure you are drinking lots of water each day. It’s easy to forget something so simple while you’re grieving.
Sometimes doing the next thing will mean eating. A change in appetite is common during grief. You may feel unable to eat or want to constantly munch on junk food as a way to “cope.” Neither is healthy. Eating some healthy food each day is often difficult for someone who is grieving, but it will be so helpful for your journey.
Make the effort to choose reasonably nutritious food. I found grocery shopping emotionally painful, and often I couldn’t imagine what I could possibly want to eat. But eating healthy food is one of those “next things” that’s worth putting your limited energy toward. Buy food that’s easy to prepare and reasonably healthy. Consider fresh or dried fruit, yogurt, whole grain bread or crackers, or nuts. You may not feel like cooking, so look for easy-to-prepare soup or frozen meals. While limiting processed foods is generally wise, during your time of grief it’s most important that you eat. Think “healthy,” but prioritize getting something to eat over winning a nutrition prize.
Your body also needs to move. Grief will make you feel like sitting around and doing nothing, but some exercise will support your mental and physical well-being in many ways. If you have a porch, sit out there for a few minutes to drink your cup of coffee. Put on your shoes and take a fifteen-minute walk. Let the sunshine or the rain touch your face. Do that a couple times a day if you can. Moving, outside if possible, will improve blood flow to your brain and may even help you feel a little better in general.
One of the most surprising things in my own grief journey was how exhausted I felt. Getting rest while grieving is something many people struggle with, but it’s likely you will need more than your usual amount of rest. The mental and emotional stress of the loss of your loved one drains enormous amounts of energy from your system, and you cannot recover without adequate rest.
As discussed in the last chapter, your sleep will probably be disrupted, but you are likely to feel tired. Use your body’s signals to remind you to rest. That may look like a brief nap every afternoon or even a couple times during the day. If you feel able to sleep, take advantage of it. Your need for extra sleep will not last forever; it’s OK to sleep whenever you’re able.
To help you sleep at night, take the measures you can to prepare your mind, body, and environment for rest. Some mild exercise during the day will often help. Think about making your bedroom cool and dark. Play some calming nature sounds, white noise, or soft music if you find that relaxing. Pray specifically for God’s peace and claim His promise of sleep: “In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, LORD, make me dwell in safety” (Ps. 4:8).
Here’s another technique you may find helpful. When preparing for bed, imagine your grief with all its pain, worry, and confusion as a “thing” that you can look at in your hands. Feel it and examine it for a few moments. Then take your grief and put it somewhere safe, such as in an imaginary box on a shelf or dresser. It will be there tomorrow morning for you to take up again. At that time, you can continue feeling what you need to feel, doing what you need to do, and going through your grief work. Don’t worry if this technique doesn’t work immediately or every time; it’s just one additional way to help you be intentional about getting rest when you can.
Rest will be important in other ways as well. Think of some ways your mind has found refreshment in the past and do some of those things now. That might mean reading a book, sitting outside in a beautiful place in nature, listening to music, enjoying a spa, etc. Choosing some nourishment like this for your grieving soul will be helpful.
Caring for Your Mind and Emotions
Sometimes doing the next thing will mean being intentional with your grief work. That’s the only way you will make progress through the dark valley of grief. Here are a few practical ways to do that.
Journal
Even if you’ve never journaled in the past, writing about your journey through grief may become one of the most meaningful and helpful aspects of your grief work. It doesn’t have to be fancy or follow a specific format. You may wish to obtain a special journal to write about your loved one and your journey, but what’s important is that you just begin. Even if you start with just a few sentences, the process will almost certainly become one of the “next things” that you will end up treasuring.
What do you write? Anything can be helpful. Write about your loved one, about how you are responding to his or her death, and what your thoughts and feelings are now. If you need some ideas on what to write about, consider writing a letter to your loved one or writing a letter to Jesus about what you’re feeling. You can also use the following questions as writing prompts.
• What did your loved one mean to you? What was special about the person as an individual?
• What do you miss right now about your loved one?
• What would you like to tell your loved one if you could do so?
• What reminded you of your loved one today? How did it feel?
• What worries you about the future? What challenges are you facing as a result of your loved one’s death?
• What about your loved one’s life do you want to carry with you into the future?
• How did your loved one impact who you are as a person?
• Has God been saying anything to you through your grief journey?
When a wave of emotion overwhelms you, make journaling one of your “go to” things to do. Writing about what you feel and about what triggered those feelings can be an important way to both embrace and work through your feelings. It can also be a helpful way to bring God’s perspective to your grief journey. Write out the questions you have for Him. Write anything you may hear Him saying to you. Write about what you are learning. You may be surprised how helpful this tool can become.
Remember.
There are many ways to remember your loved one. Spending a portion of your time and energy in remembering will be a helpful way to work through your emotions and thoughts.
During the initial days after your loved one’s death you may have received many messages from friends and family expressing what your loved one meant to them and how much they care about you. Read those messages again—the ones on social media, in the cards or letters you received, or on the online obituary page for your loved one. You may wish to look at pictures or listen to recordings from your loved one’s funeral or memorial service. Those can become precious times.
You may wish to create some physical ways to remember your loved one. I made a shadow box of items from my husband’s funeral and had a memory quilt made from a number of his favorite shirts and jackets. There are many other creative options to remember your loved one. You may not feel able to do something like this right away; that’s one of the important reasons not to get rid of your loved one’s personal effects until you feel ready. Going through his or her belongings can be a treasure trove of help in your grief work. We’ll talk more about this in chapter 6.
Visiting your loved one’s resting place is very meaningful for some and not helpful at all for others. There’s no right or wrong frequency of visiting, and some people never do so. For some the grave site can be a place to say things to their loved one as a way of working through thoughts and feelings, and at times they experience God’s presence in a very healing way. If circumstances prevented you from having a resting place for your loved one, you may wish to choose a special place to remember him or her anyway, such as somewhere in nature or a lovely chapel your loved one enjoyed.
Remembering cannot be done all at once. It’s one of the “next things” to regularly return to as you walk this journey through grief.
Address legal or business matters.
Frequently a loved one’s death will result in a multitude of financial, business, and/or legal matters that must be addressed. We’ll talk more about this in chapter 6, but for now just know that sometimes doing the next thing means making progress in these practical areas.
Your next thing today might be making a list of the organizations you need to contact, asking a friend for a referral to an attorney, making a single phone call, or taking some other small action in relation to a practical matter. These practical matters may feel overwhelming or confusing, and you shouldn’t expect to be able to handle them all at once or quickly. The important thing is to just do one small “next thing” when you can.
It bears repeating that, if possible, it’s wise to delay any big decisions, perhaps for six months or a year. There will be plenty of matters that cannot be delayed, but put off what you can. If you don’t absolutely have to move or change jobs, for example, don’t. There will be many “next things” to handle in the meantime.
Take time to feel.
Sometimes you need to take a break simply to allow a feeling to run its course. A wave of sadness, anger, frustration, or some other emotion will come, and you will need to find a safe place to let it wash over you. Trying to stuff those emotional waves underground will take even more of your precious energy and end up sabotaging your journey through grief. And the feelings you deny or refuse to experience today have real potential to become destructive in the future.
An emotional wave may come when you least expect it—at the grocery store, at work, while you are with friends, at church, or wherever. If possible, allow yourself to experience that wave right away. If alone, just pause what you’re doing and feel it. If you’re with someone safe, you may wish to talk about it. If you’re with others and can excuse yourself to step outside or go to the bathroom for a moment, that may help.
Sometimes these emotional waves come when you can’t excuse yourself, such as when you’re at work or doing something important with your children. Acknowledge to yourself what you have felt, and give yourself some grace. Then it’s important to return to that emotional place later when you have some space to deal with it. Intentionally doing some grief work at least several times a week will help you regain some sense of mastery over your emotions. Trust that you won’t always feel as out of control as you do now.
Do nothing.
It’s likely you will feel significantly energy-depleted as you journey through grief. As when recovering from some serious illness or surgery, your system will not be able to do things at the pace you’re used to. Even if you are trying to be intentional about using your energy wisely, you may find yourself unable to spend more than a few hours a day doing “next things.” Your brain does not have the capacity to process grief twenty-four hours a day. It’s perfectly normal and healthy to have times when you do nothing. Vegging out in front of the TV or doing something similar may be an OK distraction from your uncertain feelings and tumultuous thoughts.
Simply finding distraction and doing nothing can be a necessary part of your grief process. Just make certain you don’t fall into the trap of only distracting yourself. If you are doing some grief work several times a week, you are probably doing what you need to do. Some type of distraction or entertainment, or simply sitting and doing nothing, may be the only “next thing” you can do the rest of the time. Remember, there are no medals for speed in this journey.
Seek God’s comfort.
Among the “next things” you will need to do is seek and embrace God’s comfort. You would not have picked up this book if you didn’t believe God is somehow involved in this whole thing about life and death. At times, it may be very difficult to hear His voice or feel His presence. The emotions of grief can be like clouds that cover the sun; He hasn’t gone away, but your ability to see or hear Him can be obscured by grief. That’s only human.
God isn’t overwhelmed by your emotions, confusion, questions, or anger. He isn’t going anywhere, and He’ll be as patient as you need Him to be in walking this journey with you.
God will not try to hurry you up just to make you feel better. He respects your humanness and limitations, and He understands them even better than you do. But you can be assured from the Bible and from the testimony of countless others who have experienced grief before you that He is still there. He’s not overwhelmed by your emotions, confusion, questions, or anger. He isn’t going anywhere, and He’ll be as patient as you need Him to be in walking this journey with you.
Your journey through grief can be smoothed, softened, and shortened by intentionally taking steps to connect with God and the comfort He offers. This is different from sitting back and waiting for God to magically make your pain go away. Remember that healing and comfort are things you choose. It’s like food. God puts fish in the sea, but He doesn’t put them on your plate or in your mouth. He makes the grain grow, but He doesn’t bake your bread or hand you a sandwich. Healing and comfort are available, but you must intentionally seek them.
Here are some ways to seek and embrace God’s comfort in this process.
Read God’s Word.
Your mind may struggle to focus on reading the Bible even if that has been a part of your routine in the past. That’s OK. Use this season to look at what God has to say about the very things you are wrestling with. A few verses a day may be all your mind can take in, but that will be like superfood to your soul if you do it regularly.
There are devotional books and email series for people going through grief. That may be a great resource for you to assist in taking God’s Word into your being daily. I encourage you to also do some Bible reading on your own. Here are a few passages you may find especially helpful during this time.
• Psalm 90, Moses’ prayer about God’s constancy and man’s frailty
• John 11, the story of Jesus, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus
• First Corinthians 15, Paul’s treatise on death and resurrection
So many of the psalms express honest human emotion in prayer to God, emotions such as fear, grief, hopelessness, feeling overwhelmed, frustration, confusion, anger, and pain as well as hope and faith. If you can’t do anything else, open to Psalms and read a few verses. See if you don’t soon find your own thoughts and feelings expressed. You may want to use a psalm as your own prayer to God.
Talk to God.
Prayer is like breathing. You can’t survive without it. Many believers find prayer challenging during the journey through grief. You may not know what to say, or you may struggle with believing God hears you. That’s normal.
More than any other “next thing,” please just pray. That may be nothing more than a word or two: “God, help me! I’m drowning!” Or, “What do I do now?” Or, “I don’t like this!” It may be a silent “Jesus!” through your tears or frustration. Just do it. Direct your mind and words to God. When you can cry out, do it. Prayer may look different during your process of grief than it does at other times. What makes it prayer is that you point your soul in God’s direction and reach out to Him. Sometimes tears are your prayer if they’re pointed in His direction.
And as often as you can, stay there. Don’t rush out of His presence. Be your real, confused, tired, broken, angry, hurting, or overwhelmed self with Him. Sometimes try to imagine Him there with you. This is such an important step that we’ll mention it in several different contexts throughout this book.
It’s usually in those quiet moments in God’s presence, when your own emotions have played themselves out and you are still, that He will minister to your heart. It’s in those moments when He will say, “I’m here.” You won’t feel, see, or hear Him the same way every time. Sometimes your humanness may not feel Him there at all. But stick around. That’s part of putting yourself in the position to receive His healing and comfort. You can be certain that He will meet you there if you keep coming back.
Find what helps you connect with Him.
There are other ways many people have found meaningful in connecting with God during their grief process. Worship music can open doors to the soul that are sometimes hard to open any other way. You can listen to worship music while alone, while doing other activities, and in corporate gatherings. Try listening to music, and see if there aren’t places in your soul that open up.
Being around God’s creation can minister peace and healing in meaningful ways, and it’s often where grieving people hear His voice. One of the most meaningful times I had with God in my own journey through grief was a very long walk along the beach where He ministered deeply to my heart. Find places in nature that are enjoyable to you. Watch the squirrels play or listen to the birds sing. Walk slowly through a garden or along a creek. Take a really long look at the stars at night. God’s creation is where you may meet Him.
Being around other believers will also be important. You may not feel able to engage in church the way you’re used to, or perhaps you haven’t gone in some time. Make an effort to go now when you can. It’s OK to sit in the back alone if you wish, or to ask a friend to go with you and just sit beside you quietly. Being in the company of other believers can allow their faith to rub off on you a bit, and it will help you choose healing and comfort. And if you get emotional in church, that’s just fine. It’s part of the journey.
During your time of grief it will seem as though there are so many things to do at the very time you have so little energy and capacity for doing anything. Don’t try to do everything. Just do the next thing.
Those “next things” will include taking care of your body with nutrition and rest. It will include doing your grief work such as journaling, remembering, and giving space to your emotions. It must also include intentionally seeking connection with God on a daily basis, as difficult as that sometimes seems.
As you do these “next things” regularly, a few of them each day, you will be making progress. Periodically you will realize that you’ve moved a little further along on the journey. And when you notice that, pause for a moment of gratitude. The dark valley will have an end.
TWO STEPS FORWARD
1. How are you doing with DEER: drinking, eating, exercising, and resting? Which one do you need to gently encourage yourself to do more consistently? Write in your journal about some way in which you will take care of yourself regularly.
2. Are you allowing yourself some specific times to feel and remember each week? If not, when will you do that in the next few days?