Having emotional difficulty after mothers death

All but a few years of my life have I been with my mother.
Several months ago she died a very hard death. Initially I was numb thinking I was okay enough, but I wasn't. My grief has been slow to identify, and properly deal with.
I need to know how to pull up from this depression.It is almost a tangable weight.
I am going to ask the fundamental question. How do I connect with Christ to carry this weight and heal my mind?
There are believers who are able to lay every thing at the cross.It would be wonderful to know how to facilitate that.
Loving christian feed back is sorely needed.
Pamy

Hi pamy...

I feel hurt for your loss.

I don't know that anyone can truly understand the weight of that loss unless they have also experienced something similar. It is difficult to grasp the pain from the loss of a close loved one. I have never had to deal with that pain at such an intimate family level.

I think that it is important to remember that God knows your pain. Of course, we all know that...and it is probably easier to say than accept. However, our Father has FELT your pain. He lost His only Son.

I have long believed that God also experiences emotions. After all, we are made in the image and likeness of God. We are the only animal that is known to love or grieve. The Bible says that God rejoices (Zephaniah 3:17) and grieves (Ephesians 4:30). The shortest verse in the Bible, John 11:35, mentions that "Jesus wept" at the loss of a dear friend. So, it is natural (and, perhaps, supernatural) to grieve over the loss of a loved one.

It could help to ponder on the realization that God knows us better than we know ourselves. He understands our grief even more than we do! He actually hurts with us. If I hurt with compassion over the pain that you have described, how much more does our God -- who knows all things and knows ultimate love for us -- feel a greater hurt for the pain that you experience?

We often think about the pain that Jesus experienced when He suffered. We know that He took upon Himself the sins of this world. We know that His stripes brought us healing. However, we often forget that he not only carried our infirmities -- but our sorrows too (Isaiah 53:4).

So, we can rest in the assurance that God is infinitely omniscient. He knows us inside and out -- including all of our joys and all of our sorrows. Yet He is there with you at all times. He is with you even as you read this computer screen. He is with you during those "highest of mountains" of your greatest personal and spiritual victories. He is also with you during the lowest of valleys -- including the Valley of the Shadow of Death (Psalm 23:4).

It helps to see things from such an eternal perspective too. God is not limited by time. Eternity sits outside of the realm of time! This life is just so temporary -- not just for your mother -- but for all of us. In the middle of Eternity, life will feel like an extremely short dream. This takes the sting out of death.

The realization of how fleeting that life is in comparison with eternity helped my sister overcome a depression over the loss of her firstborn son. My sister came to the realization that her beloved child was in Eternity, a realm that -- if we truly understood it -- we would ALL desperately long to be! This is our great "hope." As such, I Thessalonians 4:13 says that this hope helps us to not grieve like the rest of mankind. It also helps us to not fear death -- because the other side of death is much better!

I apologize if my words haven't helped much. However, I will be praying for you, Pamy. God is right there with you. He knows you. He understands you. He knows your heart. He knows your hurt. He feels that grief and pain. Yet, He offers you Himself...His love...His friendship...His sweet and tender embrace. He thinks only good things for you and loves you with a love that cannot be fully comprehended on this side of Eternity.

May the Lord bless you and give you peace that passes all understanding.

GOD knows and understands your
grief much more than you realize.
HE is the Father of mercies and
the GOD of all comfort.
Embrace HIS grace and be comforted
by HIS great mercies!

Hi Pamy,

There is a time for everything including griefing. Give yourself time to grief.
Ecclesiastes 3

You asked:
'I am going to ask the fundamental question. How do I connect with Christ to carry this weight and heal my mind?'

Just talk to God. Pour out your heart to God, cry to God. He understands. The more you talk to God, you will realize He understands. Read the bible and pray. Spend time with Him so that He can minister to you, so that you are able to lean on Him, so that He can replace the pain in your heart with His love and joy.

I don't know how much the below will help. Hopefully it will help some.
I too will have to go through what you have gone through some day. There has only been 1 time when I dreamt of my parents dieing. I dreamt that I lost them both and the pain was unbearable. Then I felt Jesus's pain at Gethsamane which was a pain that was even worse than my own pain. After that it was Jesus's pain at the cross. That was the worst pain of all. I admit I am scared to dream of that again because no matter how much pain I was in at my parents' death, it paled in comparison with Jesus's pain (that was a pain that was truly unbearable).

So know this, Jesus knows your pain. He experience pain, sorrow too in his lifetime. He cares. He was acquainted with sorrow, the bible tells us. Pour your heart out to God. Allow yourself time to grief. Allow God to tend to you.

I read your post, your profile but still know very little about you which limits me a tad bit in what I am going to say. What I will share is a personal testimony. Somewhere here on SI there is a lengthy version of what I will share briefly here.

In 1996 we lost our only daughter to a brain tumor, glioblastoma. She was married, had two children and she also had four brothers. She technically battled this cancer for 18 months although she was not aware of its existence in its early stages.

In the meantime she got pregnant and the baby was taken by C-section at 30 weeks gestation due to the fact that she was dying. This happened in March but she lived until the following January when she died.

At this time the doctor told me that they need to surgically remove the baby because she was dying. I cried hard for two days. I mean hard. Regina and I were close and she lived 730 miles from us.

At the end of the second day I knew I could not survive long in this emotional state, so after putting my granddaughter to bed I decided to have this thing out with God. I sat on the bed and I prayed, read the Scriptures and was quiet before God. I do not recall how long this time was, but at the end a few truths emerged which became part and parcel of what I am today: make life happen each and every day; do not worry about tomorrow and whatever happens then God will provide us with whatever is needed to cope; and I may die before Regina does, who knows? The docs say she will not live long but then she may outlive me! so, then do not worry. And if or when Gina dies, God will be with me to deal with it when it happens.

After this time of meeting with the LORD, I was able to embrace life each day knowing full well she may die, but I no longer wept. When she did die 10 months later, I never cried as hard as I did before the time I wrestled with God on this issue.

When Gina died the Holy Spirit was there to give me comfort, the like I never imagined. It was glorious. It is my personal conviction that when you submit to God's will in this matter and live in the expectation that he will provide you with the strength to deal with it when it happens you will be the recipient of some awesome comfort. I am also of the conviction that the comfort will take on different forms. The manner in which I was comforted will not be the same for others, hence I will not share those details here for your benefit because you may look to experience the same and there is no cookie-cutter comfort. You must look to a person, not a method - huge difference.

Grief will follow you for some time: this is normal and to be expected - do not fight it. Allow it to happen. If you feel like crying, cry and do not allow tears to embarrass you. One time I was at a Wal-Mart and was standing in from of a clothes item Gina liked and suddenly it hit me - hard, and I battled tears. How I wished for a corner to go to hide...Yes, tears can come at the most unexpected times.

I also made sure I kept my personal time with the LORD EVERYDAY. My spiritual, emotion well-being depended on it, no, my survival. In the meantime, God used a lot of things to bring me comfort...did you notice I said things? Yes, things. And then there were social interactions.

One of the worst things that crept up on me was anger. I was a perfect grouch - it did not take much to get me cranked up until one day the LORD showed me what was happening. Once I recognized it, I could deal with it.

Pamy, I have seen three people die: Regina, my mother-in-law and Dad. The situations for all three were different but they were ready to meet the LORD. This alone brings with it great comfort because the LORD is delighted when His children finish their race and they make it home. If the person would not be ready to meet the LORD and they died, I would guess this grief to be so terrible that one would have to have a supper abundance of grace from the LORD to cope. Knowing God I am sure He will supply that to the person who casts all this care upon Him.

This is my testimony. I simply echo what other posters have said and am here to tell you it works. If you are looking to a method to deal with your grief, nothing mentioned here will work.

In the time since Gina died I have talked some with other parents of terminally ill children but no one wants to submit this child to God's will. They are angry and fight God! I think - how dumb can you get! Really! God gave them a gift - now use it!!! Unless you submit to God's will in these matters of life and death you will end up angry at God and bitterness will invade your soul and you will have troubles for which God can do nothing until you repent of your stubbornness.

God bless and I hope this helps. Go ahead and cry, that is OK...I still can cry but have made peace with this emotion..

God bless,
ginnyrose

Pamy, I am a professional mortician/funeral director/embalmer by trade. I work at a very busy funeral home and see death up close just about everyday. I'm the person in the nice suit that does all the mysterious work behind the curtain in the funeral parlor that no one ever sees, and I also sit with the grieving families before I prepare their loved ones and direct their funerals. I see children, young and old, tragic deaths, homicides, cancer, drownings, etc. The nature of my profession has afforded me a special insight by God into the precious frailty and brevity of life...but also into His amazing supernatural comfort that is given to those who "cast their cares" upon Him for bereavement support.

What sister Ginny has shared with you is very true and sound. She expressed it perfectly I think. Take her words to heart as you submit your affections to God, and see what He does. If you would like additional information, you can at anytime ask me - either personally or publically - but Ginny has shared her heart so well that I don't think there's much I could add!

God bless you during this time, may God comfort you as only He can. As He takes you through this, you will gain a greater intimacy with Him, a more profound awareness of His presence and - if possible! - an even greater hope of the blessed assurance we have in Jesus Christ and in the resurrection of the dead to come.

Many of us have been where you are now. the pain of loss never goes away. My father pass when I was fifteen years old at home 1982.

My mom passed back in 1999. this was totally unexpected and she was released from the hospital the day before.
i still grieve to this day. Especially during the holidays.

You need to go through the grieving process. it could take months and the loss never goes away. However, over time it does get lighter.

Jesus has already sent the comforter to you. You need to lay your head on Jesus's lap and allow him to minister to you.

I take it your mom was a christian?

If so, then you know that she is watching you along with others in the faith. Know that she is in a better place. A perfect place.

Paul the Apostle wrote in an epistle whether in body or in spirit he did not know. take comfort in knowing that when we move on to the next life (with Christ), we are translated meaning we have arrived we step out from this earthly body and step into the eternal. no pain or limitations of our earthly body.
this is true freedom.

Hold onto your memories and speak with all of your family members about their memories of your mom. I have found this also helps during the grieving process.

I'll be praying for you and your family and I am sorry for your loss.

My mother passed away this past Thurs. morning. It was sudden and unexpected. My younger handicapped sister passed away almost two months ago. Alot of grief. Pray for my Dad especially. He is taking it hard (as well as the rest of us). I'm glad we have Jesus to help us. I'm trusting Him to help. Thankfully we have someone much bigger than ourselves to lean on!

This morning I thought of something else that I would like to share.

After Regina died the LORD asked me a question: how are you going to deal with reports of people who had this kind of cancer but were healed supernaturally? OH! Oh. Well... (To give you a little perspective, back when Gina was infected with glioblastoma, there was only a 5% survival rate. To survive it at all required a miracle.)

How am I going to deal with people who insist that if we had faith she would have been healed? EEEeeeekkk.

OK. What is the truth? This is where comforts begins, not always painless but it is found there. Jesus says He is Truth. Never forget that.

In our case, Gina was anointed with oil at least three times, including one for her unborn child. Thousands of people prayed for her - she was well known by many people. I even looked into the possibility of her entering clinical trials for some treatment. During this process I got the sense to not do this which was confirmed to us by my brother-in-law and his wife who are professionals in the physical/biological sciences. They discouraged it - interesting considering that the BIL has done research himself. They said "DYING IS NOT THE WORST THING THAT CAN HAPPEN TO A PERSON!" I had come to the same conclusion about the same time.

A very important truth for me to remember is that through all of this God was with us, providing us with EVERYTHING we needed. Simple. That is all. The fact that Regina died was no accident - He planned it all and in the process cared for us as well. This is the truth. And God was right in the middle of it all. God said "no" so let us accept this fact.

Now if God were to decide to heal somebody I will rejoice with them! I would be glad for them because I know their life's mission is not done. Gina's was - to live beyond that would be disastrous spiritually. God had blessed us with her presence for 25 years and for that we should be thankful - and we are.

The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the LORD!

Comfort is always found in the LORD...ALWAYS. ALl you have to do is submit.

JB1968 wrote:

Thankfully we have someone much bigger than ourselves to lean on!

God bless you, JB...I know this will be a reality. Just hang tightly onto his hand.

Blessings,
ginnyrose

Thank You Lord we have the Comforter. It is so sad to realize there are people who do not have Him to turn to. How tormenting for them.

This Dec. 22nd. is the second year of my Mother's passing. And Dad went Home 6 months later. One year ago this past June.

Step Dad in his grief for Mom said, Mom got Jesus for Christmas. This was actually very comforting.

It was a time for being in shock & grief and all sorts of emotions. But I chose to draw as close to the Lord for He is my Rock, He is my Solid Rock and I just hung onto Him in the Word, in talking to Him. It has taken a while to give myself permission to grieve. I still have tears.

People said I should have......I should.....I should have....etc. I just ran to the Rock of my Salvation and hid in with Him.

Another person said, no one has the right to say when we should grieve, how long or even how. It is ours and ours alone. Except for the Lord. And I found this true. It is between us and the Lord.

The Lord gives us things to our heart to comfort us. One of mine is that my parents who bore me are together in Heaven. I was not raised in a Christian home but the Lord revealed His love to us and we embraced Him.

My heart and my prayers goes out to all who have lost loved ones. He is faithful. He is all together lovely in His care for us. May our Lord wrap His arms around you like only He can and bring you comfort. Amen

Lord,

My prayer right now is that you simply strengthen the heart of Pamy through this time and moment of grief. Help Lord as only you can and no one else.

You are our strength, and please, become Pamy's song, Oh my Lord, the heart of Pamy is broken n steadily breaking, and may you be the absolute source during this time and season of life.

I plead this in Jesus Christ magnificent name

For with His stripes we were healed
Amen

Thanks for the prayers. God is still on the throne. The funeral is tomorrow (Tues.).