February 23, 2025, Alpine skier Mikaela Shiffrin became the first skier, male or female, to win 100 World Cup races – fourteen more than any other skier. Her celebration of that accomplishment was dimmed by the absence of her father, Jeff, who died suddenly from a fall in 2020. His death had left a huge hole in her life. In an essay in 2022 she spoke openly about her experience with grief, describing it this way, “It’s not a climb up a mountain. It’s more like a maze.”
No matter what metaphor is used to describe grief that comes from the death of a loved one, it will not connote something pleasant because grief will always be found in the company of loss – the loss of someone for whom a person has affection at least to some degree. Grief is the price we pay for choosing to love someone. The deeper the love, the deeper the grief. Grief will always be linked to some level of pain – emotional, physical, mental, and/or spiritual.
Over my lifetime of almost 75 years, including 47 years as a pastor, I’ve experienced my own grief and have observed the grief of many others. I want to share some conclusions I’ve drawn regarding grief that I pray will be helpful to you as you navigate your own grief journey associated with the death of a loved one.
- Grief is a friend.
Whereas our tendency is to think of grief as an enemy, actually grief is a friend. It is an emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual buffer God has put in place which will allow us to acknowledge, deal with, and work through the maze of grief that Mikaela Shiffrin spoke of in her essay. Grief is a friend because it is a gift from God which allows us to love freely, because we know there is a God-given process in place which will enable us to walk through the valley of the shadow of our grieving. - Grief is personal.
Everybody grieves differently and should be allowed to do so. This life lesson came to me years ago as I stood in the hospital room of a man who was knocking hard on death’s door. His breathing was shallow and sporadic. In the room were his wife of 40 plus years and their six children. The youngest child was a nineteen-year-old daughter who was on her knees beside his bed with her head lying on his chest. When his final breath came, the youngest daughter began sobbing and held tightly onto her daddy. As she did, her older brother chided her for being so demonstrative in her grief – almost in an “act like an adult” spirit. I quickly seized the moment and told him, “Everybody grieves differently. Let her grieve as she grieves best.” The point I made to that older brother is one we need to remember. We should not expect people to grieve just like we do, and especially we should not expect them to grieve at the same speed that we do. - Grief varies.
Just like we should not expect others to grieve the same as we do, we should not expect others to grieve the same way for every grief opportunity we face. I had this truth reinforced as I reflected upon the differences between my grief over my mother’s and father’s deaths. When Mama died in her sleep, my grief was deep. She was only 71. It was sudden. Tears flowed freely and emotional ambushes came regularly for the first year. When Daddy died in his sleep five years ago, by comparison, my grief was not as deep. There weren’t as many tears. Emotional ambushes were not as prevalent. Did that mean I wasn’t as sad over his death? Not in the least. My grief was just as real, but it was a different grief because I experienced what I have come to call “relief grief”. My grief was tempered by the fact that that he was 98, had stage 5 kidney failure, was legally blind, and itched 24/7 from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet. I grieved, but I was grateful to God that Daddy had been relieved of his suffering and was in heaven free of it all. It’s ok that my grief for Daddy was not as intense as it was for Mama. - We can’t move forward in our grief if our hearts and minds stay chained to the past.
It’s one thing in our grieving to be anchored in the past. It is quite different for it to be chained to the past. To be anchored in the past means that as we move forward in our grieving, we do so in strength and stability provided by our memories and thoughts of the joy and happiness created by the relationship we had with them. To be chained to the past means that we cannot move forward because all the meaning and purpose in our life is still bound to our memories from the relationships we had with our loved one. Being chained to the past in the early days, weeks, and months following a loss is to be expected. But for us to remain chained after a number of months with no sense of moving forward should be of concern to us. Therefore, if you find yourself still chained to your grief, then give yourself permission to unlock.
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