Peace family, grieving can be especially painful during the holidays. Gary Roe, chaplain with Hospice Brazos Valley, is going to be checking in with us for the next several weeks, and he has some tips for healing and making it through the holidays.
Gary says that we love holidays, but at the same time, they’re tough, whether we’ve lost someone recently, or if you’ve ever lost a loved one near the holidays. It’s okay to be sad to be sad over the holidays. God created us for relationship, and we don’t do separation very well, so when someone dies or leaves, it hurts. When we’ve grieving, we really need to pay attention to our expectations of ourselves, other people, and these holidays, and kind of down grade those.
Another very important aspect of grieving over the holidays is relationships. When you lose a loved one, something changes. Your life changes. You change! Hopefully, we heal, recover, and grow, because when we change, our relationships change, too. When we’re grieving, some people distance themselves from us. Other people disappear. Still other people come closer. New people come into our lives and become major influences.
If you’re grieving this holiday season, a real key is to get around people who are helpful to you: people who you know love you, accept you, support you and encourage you, and people who are going to enter your grief with you and accept you in your grief, right where you are. On the converse, if you can, limit your exposure to people who are critical of you, who aren’t helpful to you, who don’t accept you or your grief, or who tend to be judgmental. You really don’t need that right now.
If you’re not grieving these holidays, for all of those out there who are grieving, put judgment aside. Seeing someone sad or hurting during the holidays is not pleasant, and it’s not maybe what you want to experience during these holidays, but it’s where some people are. We are admonished to, like Jesus, accept one another where we are.
Jesus is our companion for this journey, and if you are grieving, take heart. Jesus “gets” it. He knows and he walks with you. Just lean into him during these holidays and God bless you.
You can find more details to help get through the holidays and get through them well by going to Gary Roe’s website, HERE, or copy and paste this link into your browser: https://www.garyroe.com/
Click below to listen to Gary chat with Peace 107’s Brian and Kat:
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