CHAPTER I - BY JOYCE AND DENNIS ASHTON

    The scriptures remind us that “God sendeth rain on the just and the unjust and maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good.” (3 Nephi 12:45, Matt 5:45) We’ve also heard the phrase “Life is what happens when you had other things planned.”

    Many members understand intellectually that bad things happen to good LDS people. However, when they actually experience a serious crisis firsthand, they struggle emotionally, finding it hard to believe that a significant tragedy has occurred to them. One struggling woman facing a serious personal crisis was told, “People of real faith don’t have trials or crisis.” One might imagine how that made her feel.

    Members experiencing adversity often ask, “Why me?” “Where did I go wrong?” Others will reason, “I have faith, I live the Gospel, why am I struggling so much?”

    In reality, bad things DO happen to good people, even worthy members of the church. Circumstances, often beyond our control, can result in pain and loss for both the righteous and the unrighteous. Some of us may think adversity affects only those who make poor choices, sin, lack sufficient faith, or are not wise enough to prevent or avoid adverse situations. We can bring trials upon ourselves; however, even when we are sincerely attempting to do everything the Lord would have us do, things can and do go astray. Marital discord, divorce, abuse, illness, death, disabilities, infertility, miscarriage, rebellious children, financial struggles, unemployment, homelessness, singleness, homosexuality, mid-life crisis, empty nest syndrome, or any unexpected change in life’s expectations can bring feelings of pain, distress, sorrow, and despair.

    Individuals experiencing severe grief seldom seem prepared to understand and successfully deal with all the emotions they are feeling. Some have been taught falsely, or have mistakenly understood that if they are righteous and faithful, they can avoid serious pain and loss in their lives. Others have believed that if something difficult happens to them, that their faith, obedience and prayer would protect or shield them from experiencing or FEELING serious emotional or physical pain. It may be especially confusing for those who have strong faith, believe in miracles and are striving to live the gospel, when they are not protected or shielded from serious adversity. Unfortunately, not even the righteous are granted all they desire or pray for. Many faithful individuals do not receive “the miracle” that they sincerely and desperately seek. Others endure pain as a result of the misuse of agency or poor choices of others.

    Grief is immeasurable, difficult to describe, and often impossible to comprehend. The intensity of our grief can be correlated to the time invested, depth of our love, and the breadth of our relationship to the lost person, object or situation. The quality and quantity of our commitment and service, (emotional investment) often coincides with the difficulty and duration of our grief. Grief work will likely become the hardest work we will ever do. It will extract more time, patience and energy than most of us expect or feel capable of enduring.

    “Grief cannot be compared, measured, or quantified...Healing...does not mean a quick cure; healing is putting the loss in perspective.” (2 p. xiv)

    No two individual’s adjustment following a crisis will be the same. Our reactions are as unique as our thumbprints. The type of loss is only one factor that affects our adjustment. Individual circumstances, former life experiences, and previous exposure to loss are a few of the other factors that contribute to our recovery process. (See figure # 2)

    The Chinese symbol for “crisis” consists of two figures: danger and opportunity. Crisis and adversity provide us with opportunities to transform our pain into healing.

    The following analogy is helpful when vexing the process of healing. I injured my knee snow skiing a few years ago. My knee has since healed; however, it has never quite been the same. Its vulnerability for re-injury has increased. Healing from my carpal tunnel surgery took about two years and, though much improved, my hand has never really been the same since. When we say we can heal from a tragic event or from a major loss which assaults both our body and soul, we need to remember that we will likely never be exactly the same again. Our loss becomes part of who we are, and although we can find joy and happiness again, we are forever different people.

    Though many use the term “recovery” when referring to the grief process, professionals suggest that to “accommodate” may be a more accurate description of what most individuals experience. (3) Two additional concepts that more accurately describe this process are “adjustment and reconciliation”. The Gospel assures me that I can anticipate full recovery for my knee and hand, as well as complete relief from any grief in the eternities!

    Most members depend on their spiritual strength and religious beliefs to get them through difficult challenges. (See Chapter 9 on Spiritual healing) We are blessed to have the Gospel, and the gift of the Holy Ghost to comfort us. Christ offers us comfort and healing even when our adversity is not removed. While our faith and spiritual feelings bring great comfort, Dennis and I have also found it helpful to utilize and apply other therapeutic principles that facilitate the grief process. Just as I found splints, medication, surgery, and physical therapy helped my hand and knee, likewise therapeutic principles and healing interventions can help us accommodate or reconciliate our losses.

    Accepting hardship is the first step in healing from any loss. (4) However, In the beginning or the acute phase, we may not have much control over our reactions and adjustment. As we acknowledge and actually pursue our “grief work”, using faith and the tools discussed in the following chapters, we can gain increased control and peace. We will likely still experience grief attacks or grief bursts (just like I may re-sprain my knee). However, by exercising faith and doing our grief work, we are choosing to be a survivor rather than a victim of our circumstance.

    Dennis and I quickly discovered that surviving our own personal crisis was more difficult than supporting others who were experiencing their losses. Most of us have not studied the impact of loss and grief in our formal education. In fact, we may have been conditioned to believe that others value us most when we deny our losses and appear capable and emotionally strong. As a result we choose to consciously hide (suppress) or subconsciously bury (repress) our painful or negative emotions. As church members we sometimes feel ashamed to openly admit our true feelings to ourselves or others. Unfortunately, when active members feel pain and loss and have a need to grieve, they sometimes choose to “mask” their true feelings, or shortcomings in order to save face. We may pretend to be functioning well in a desperate attempt to fool others and ourselves. This facade is reinforced when others compliment us with statements such as, “You are so strong and doing so well.” Our desire not to disappoint others precludes us from sharing our true feelings and admitting we are struggling and need help. We then grieve in the shadows. This was explained well in a hospice newsletter:

“Whenever we doubt the legitimacy of our feelings, we begin to suppress ourselves and deny our own experience. In this way we inhibit our ability to recover from a loss, for allowing our feelings, whatever they may be, is essential to healing.” (5)

    There are many among us who have become silent sufferers. Some become inactive. They are afraid they will be judged negatively, especially if they feel somehow responsible for the adversity that they are enduring. This is often true of parents experiencing a rebellious child and couples going through divorce. Our guilt complicates the grieving process, causing us to feel shame and loss of control over our lives. Our grief becomes “disenfranchised” when no one allows, acknowledges or understands our loss. Consequently many of us suffer in silence, trying to make sense of our personal pain in private, and wonder if we are at fault, unworthy or responsible for our difficult circumstances, thinking, “Why am I having these feelings? I really must be a weak or bad person.”

    The wife of a prominent physician and church leader found it difficult to openly seek the help she needed following her husband’s death. When he died, she said, “Everyone told me how strong I was, and how wonderfully I was handling his death.” Initially she received a lot of support from family, friends and church members. Shortly thereafter she decided to serve a mission. When she returned home from her mission a concerned friend called LDS Family Services in her behalf. It was painful for her to admit many months later that she was still hurting and struggling as she continued to deal with the death of her husband. She was too ashamed to admit she needed help. She feared she would disappoint those who had commented on her strength if they discovered her seeking professional help after all these months. She did not realize her reactions to her husband’s death were typical and that it can take many years to reconcile such a loss.

    Unfortunately, this example is an all-too-common phenomena experienced by many church members as they contemplate seeking help from their church leaders, LDS Family Services or other health-care providers. Some choose nonmember counselors and practitioners to save face and avoid feeling judged. Others choose professional help offered by individuals who lack eternal perspectives rather than facing church members or leaders. Still others seeking help from LDS Family Services or other LDS therapists resist admitting to all the problems, stress, or adversity in their lives because they want to appear emotionally and spiritually strong.

    If we look to the Savior for our example, we can find personal meaning in our losses. Christ is a “man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. (Isaiah 53:3)

    In John 11:35, we read two profound words: “Jesus wept.”

    The Savior was apparently not afraid to share emotion and grief with others who were mourning the loss of Lazarus. As they saw the Savior weep, some concluded: “...behold how he loved him” 11:36. “Jesus, therefore, again GROANING in himself cometh to the grave” 11:38. The Savior of the World openly expressed emotion in spite of knowing he could raise Lazarus or that his soul would live on.

    Do we allow others and ourselves to openly express loss without judgment? Or do we hide from our grief, trying to ignore our pain and appear strong and faithful? Do we fear much like the following individual that it will somehow diminish the gospel message of hope if we acknowledge our true struggles and limitations? “I kept my fears and feelings to myself. What would the ward think of me if they knew I couldn’t handle this?”

    We have come to realize that when emotions resulting from loss are suppressed or repressed, they will eventually be expressed in some other form often resulting in serious distress in our physical, spiritual, and emotional lives. Serious mental illness also may result, leaving us unable to accomplish our grief work, or function fully at home, work, or church.

    About eight months after the death of our son Cameron, I developed an eye twitch and some abnormal blood chemistry. Several doctors were unable to discover a cause or cure. Both conditions lasted about two years and then went away. Looking back I’ve realized that these physical ailments likely resulted from the impact of loss and grief on my body.

    Grief work is hard work. It is the work of thoughts and feelings. In the beginning we often cannot choose or control the flood of emotions we experience. Over time most of us will have greater control and can decide how and when we’ll grieve. Gaining emotional control will take longer than most of us expect or desire. We cannot make emotional injury go away any more than we can mend a broken leg with willpower alone.

    "You cannot plant an acorn in the morning and expect that afternoon to sit in the shade of the oak.” (6 p.58 Antoine De Saint-Excupery)

    Recovery time will vary depending on multiple factors. Most individuals’ recovery or adaptation will take from eighteen to twenty-four months following a traumatic loss. (7) Recovery time will be influenced by several factors including our emotional investment, the amount of grief work accomplished and additional factors indicated on Figure # 2 —Coping Variables.

    Most individuals report fearing they will never be the same again following a major crisis. In reality they won’t be! Their experience has become a part of them and has forever changed how they look at the world and themselves. They can, however, adapt to their loss, as they discover their “New Normal”(2 p.xv) and realize peace and “joy cometh in the morning”. (Psalm 30:5)

    In the Bible we see forcefully illustrated the life-changing result of a major loss in the account of Jacob and his twelve sons. Jacob was led to believe his favorite son, Joseph, had died after his other eleven sons staged his death and sold him to the Egyptians. Jacob experienced intense grief.

    “And Jacob rent his clothes and put sackcloth upon his loins and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted.

    “For I will go down into the grave unto my son, mourning. Thus his father WEPT for him.” (Genesis 37:34-35)

    Jacob outwardly displayed his grief and acknowledged that he would always miss his son. He realized he would not be able to enjoy his son’s company and association on earth. He wouldn’t see him marry and bear grandchildren. Expectations of how he thought his life would be, his assumptive world, were altered. Jacob felt initially that he would never get “over” his loss. Eventually he did get “through” his loss by adjusting to his new circumstances. We know he went on to live a long and abundant life full of joy and adversity.

    Later when he was told that Benjamin must go down to Egypt, he displayed his vulnerability and fear concerning the possibility of experiencing another major loss.

    “. . . Ye know my wife (Rebecca) bare me two sons: (Joseph and Benjamin) And the one (Joseph) went out from me, and I said, Surely he is torn in pieces; and I saw him not since: And if ye take this (Benjamin) also from me, and mischief befall him, ye shall bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.” (Genesis 44:27-29)

    The accumulative impact of Jacob’s multiple losses complicated his grief process. Nevertheless, adaptation or recovery is possible. We can find joy and happiness again. (Psalms 50:5) However, for many it will follow a long and difficult journey.

CHANGE AND LOSS

    Adversity and loss are usually the result of life’s changing circumstances and expectations. Any major alteration in one’s life can result in feelings of loss and grief requiring transition and resolution.(8 p.1) Changes in living conditions, location, status, employment, health, appearance, weight, responsibility, stewardships, etc. can all produce feelings of loss and give birth to a need to grieve. (9). Many believe that we can only lose what we have once had. Some, however, will grieve over hopes and dreams that were never fully realized or completely fulfilled. Those who never marry or who never bare children often experience this kind of grief. It can also be felt by children who have been abused or unloved. A friend raised by an emotionally disabled mother shared, “I grieve for the love my mother couldn’t give me.” This friend, like many other individuals, are born into or inherit their loss, similar to children who are orphaned, abandoned or raised in poverty and despair.

    “We experience losses throughout our lives; separation, divorce transitions, all kinds of changes, yet our culture has not prepared us well to deal with them... This world is not reality. It takes a brave soul with an adventurous outlook to prepare for the inevitable losses that are to come.” (10 p. 13)

    The following three chapters contain a number of common losses. They primarily focus on the personal experiences and feelings of church members enduring adversity. The purpose of these chapters is to help us identify with and understand the challenges others are experiencing as they deal with their feelings of loss and grief. These chapters are also designed to help us normalize our own loss and grief symptoms as we realize we are not grieving alone.  It is not possible to specifically mention every conceivable human loss; however, it is hoped that the reader can identify grief-recovery principles that may prove applicable to numerous loss issues. Keep in mind that what may be a crisis for one person may not be for another.

    Also remember that we are entering the private world of another’s adversity. Please enter with compassion, empathy, and a nonjudgmental attitude, remembering our baptismal covenant to “mourn with those that mourn” (Mosiah 18:9).