It doesn't hurt any more...

It startled me, the realization.

When did it stop, I wondered.

I thought back and I think the last time it was truly painful

    was more than 15 months ago

        when I met our great-grandson for the first time.

 

Due to the death of my friend's husband,

    seeing her pain,

        walking that similar path with her,

            the wound has been salty lately,

but it hasn't left me in a personal puddle of tears and pain

    as it has in the past when even simple acquaintances

        lost their husbands.

I wonder if it would be so

    were I not so joyously remarried.

I'll never know for sure.

I just know that it did for a long time after remarriage

    and now it doesn't.

 

A post from a dear fellow remarried-widow friend (Rachel Moore)

on this, the 11th anniversary of her widowhood,

made me think about it.

And then this afternoon I heard "our" song and

    it didn't make me stop in my tracks to listen,

        sing along,

            remember,

                long........

And I wondered when it stopped.

There is still a wistfulness,

    a missing the familiarity

        that comes from having basically grown up together,

            raising children and welcoming grandchildren together,

                being married to one another for nearly 37 years;

but that hurt,

    that gut-wrenching pain,

        that regular longing for what was,

            what might have been,

that painful ache in my heart at certain memories and events,

    that's gone it seems.

It may come again,

    likely will,

        but the regular occurrences,

            the normalcy of pain,

that has stopped.

I anticipate that future occurrences will be short and manageable.

In nine days, it will be exactly ten and a half years

    since he died

        and that realization does not bring pain,

            just that wistfulness.....

 

I love him still.

    I miss him still.

That has not changed

    and will not change.

But the pain is gone -

    as I was told it someday would be.

In its place are joyous memories

    and gratitude for our life together.

In its place is a joy-filled life and love

    and gratitude for God's grace and mercy and healing touch.

 

As my friend said, 

    it is "disheartening and encouraging at the same time." 

 

 

Lifeline

She was my lifeline.

She wasn't the only one,

    but she is the one upon whom 

        I have been most dependent in the long term,

            during all ten-and-a-half years of my widowhood,

                even in remarriage.

 

I had asked her "before" to be sure

    I didn't become a hermit,

        to ensure that I learn to live alone,

            not merely exist until God called me home. 

She did her job magnificently!

 

She prayed.

She called.

She texted.

She came by.

She invited me out for lunch -

    and periodically said something along the lines of,

        "I know you don't feel like it, come anyway."

Sometimes she brought lunch to me

    if I was being particularly obstinate

        or simply so sad I could not move.

She cried with me and for me.

She listened when it was hard to hear what I was saying.

She never, ever judged how I felt,

    the words I spoke,

        how I behaved.

She never said she missed the old Gina -

    though I am sure she did.

 

She embraced her when the new Gina began to emerge,

        my heart began to open,

            and wept with me when it got broken,

                but she never said "I told you so."

She listened as I reasoned,

    "I don't need to love, it's easier not to, I just want companionship."

She helped me talk it through.

And when I broke his heart,

    because, as it turns out, I did need to love,

        she didn't criticize or shame or say "I told you so."

She sat quietly with me in the stillness of those months

    when I simply waited and listened for God

        rather than to my own loneliness.

She laughed with me at the funny dates

    and clicked her tongue at the pigs.

She positively beamed when Mr. Miracle

    walked right into my life and swept me off my feet.

And she did say "I told you so! I told you he would come!"

 

She stayed when others didn't, couldn't

    because walking with someone through grief is very, very hard work!

She helped me carry a burden that was so heavy

    it would have been impossible to carry alone

        and she never, ever once complained

            or asked me to carry it on my own

                or wondered out loud

                    how much longer the burden would weigh so stinkin' much.

She just helped me carry it. 

 

She was truly a Proverbs 17:17 friend:

 

A friend loves at all times,

and a [sister] is born for adversity. 

It is a debt I hoped never to have to repay

    but last week, it came due.

May Chris and God find me faithful!