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'For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?'
'Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?'
For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen." (Romans 11:33-36)
“Kubler-Ross,” I thought to myself. “Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief.”
It was a few months ago when these seemingly random thoughts came to my mind during an office visit for 9-year-old Jennifer*, a patient with severe spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy, a permanent neuromuscular disorder caused by some tragic events around birth, & only one of her many medical problems. Her grandmother had brought her in for an annual check-up. A deeply religious woman & sister-in-Christ, Grandma kept speaking with soaring hope about how Jennifer was soon going to walk & talk like other children her age. Certainly modern medicine had saved Jennifer’s life & brought a measure of stability to her body’s diseases, but in 9 years it had not helped her to walk or talk, or even come close. There in her wheelchair Jennifer sat: drooling, spastic, & uncommunicative, save for her smile.
“Grandma’s in denial,” I continued to think to myself. “Doesn’t she know that Jennifer will never be able to walk this side of eternity? Hasn’t anybody ever told her the prognosis of Jennifer’s case?” The truth is that probably many doctors over the years had told Grandma about the stark reality of Jennifer’s condition, & Grandma had yet to take it in. I was concerned because sometimes families’ unrealistic hopes can lead them to make decisions which ultimately keep the patient from receiving the full benefits of medical care. At times, families (or patients themselves) have refused safe & effective God-given therapies because they were “holding out” for God’s miraculous healing. Sometimes these people fail to see that faith in Christ doesn’t preclude accepting the stark, often grim realities of disease & suffering.
It was understandable, though, that Grandma would be grieving. She probably had many unspoken dreams & hopes for her grandchildren: that they’d be running around & chattering away with her about their days’ events. With Jennifer, these dreams & hopes had no substance – they were dead… and death, of anything worthwhile, rightly gives way to grief.
As I sat there in clinic with Jennifer that day, the remarkable thing wasn’t simply that I’d noted that Grandma’s state of denial was in line with what psychiatrist Kubler-Ross described as the stages of grief. There was a deeper, more poignant realization at hand: I too have been grieving the death of my own dreams.
In my mostly private thoughts that day, it slowly dawned on me that for the past 3 years I too have been grieving the death of my own dreams & hopes. I too have had a hard time coming to grips with the reality of my life situation & the loss of my own dream of marital bliss & a whole family with Jadon & his mother.
Dr. Kubler-Ross described 5 stages of grief, with a general progression from one to the next, though often with jumps back & forth between. I started down the mental checklist...
That day, I knew right away that I had spent much of the last few years in Kubler-Ross’ stage of denial. Wearing rose-colored glasses, I often refused to see or hear of the huge character problems in my own life & others’ which rendered my dream a fantasy. I ignored the pleas of many close friends & family to leave & let go of a relationship that was going nowhere. Even people who didn’t know me very well would point out issues that would make any relationship based on openness & honesty impossible. Yet I would pooh-pooh these people with such sayings as, “Well, you just don’t understand. If only you knew… then you would see where you’re wrong.” I would make up crazy excuses to explain away what to others was plain & simple. Worse yet, at times I would simply ignore the facts & just wish that what had become a painful pattern of life would somehow... just maybe... finally dissolve & turn around to its scripted, storybook ending. Despite the rose-colored glasses, it never did.
What about Kubler-Ross’ stage of anger? Yes, that had often been the case for my emotional life, too. At times I was very angry that my dream for a whole & happy family was dashed, despite having invested my whole being into it. I was angry at myself for making very wrong & hurtful decisions, & sometimes I was even angry with myself for missing all the cues around me that my hopes were not rightly founded. I was angry at Jadon’s mother on many counts too, including for her failure to live up to my expectations. Most horribly, I was angry at God. Though I did tell Him so on occasion, sadly most of my anger at God went unuttered, & my rage would act itself out in other ways… including ignoring Him for periods of time. These additional sins were borne of such angry thoughts as (if I had put them to words) “Aren’t You supposed to be a loving God? What kind of loving God would allow this ____? Didn’t You promise good things in my life? Don’t You even see what’s going on? Why don’t You do something about it? Haven’t You noticed that I’m bleeding to death here? Do You even care? You know what? You suck at being God! You’re not worth following anymore! You don’t even know how to provide a basic, loving family to Your children!” No doubt, I had my share of anger...
I’d forgotten some of Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief. My nurse had to remind me that bargaining was the next stage. And as I thought on it later that day & onward, I had to admit that I’d often been in this stage as well. Not wanting to accept that the basic building blocks for trust in marriage were absent, I often had bargained with Jadon’s mother for some kind of hope for us, but that left me in the end with even less hope. I hadn’t realized that love can only be freely given, never bargained for. And, of course, I even tried bargaining with God. I didn’t so much as lay it out in words, but it was clear that I was trying to bargain with Him by my reactions to disappointing circumstances. Put to words, it might have gone something like this: “OK, God, I’m only asking for a loving wife. If I shape up now & do my devotions with renewed rigor, would You please grant my request? I’m helping out in my church & telling people about You… isn’t that enough to make You want to give Jadon a whole family?” Such misguided legalism not only failed to work, but it more importantly failed to consider the grand sovereignty of God. He will not be confined to anyone’s box, no matter how hard the bargain...
I had to look up Kubler-Ross in the encyclopedia later on to recall that depression was the next stage in her description of grief. At first the stage of depression struck me as something I must have skipped (denial, anyone?), perhaps because as a physician I think of depression in clinical terms, with strict diagnostic criteria. I thought, “Of course I’d be sad when I’d enter my Jadon-less home filled with his things – his empty high-chair, his empty bed, his empty rocking horse. Sure, I’d get the blues sometimes when I thought about how so many of my friends were already happily married. But depressed? Me? No way!” This initial sense of objection, though, soon met with the realization that I had experienced this stage of grief too – quite often, in fact, usually as a meld with the other stages as I passed from one to the next & back. What else but depression would explain how an extrovert would so frequently dive into caverns of relative isolation for days at a time? Why else had I so often wasted away hours in mindless TV watching & internet surfing, searching for something – anything – to keep my mind from feeling anything painfully real? What else could make my nights so sleepless & days so restless? At times I felt so thoroughly beat that I would have preferred not to live at all anymore. How could I deny that depression hadn’t been part of my recent life?
What about Kubler-Ross’ final stage of grief: acceptance? I don’t know. I think I’ve been there for brief periods, always followed by quick reversion to the lower, unhealthier stages of grief. On occasion I think I’ve taken hold of the truth, & grasp it even with all its gravity: Jadon’s mother & I have no grounds for considering marriage. Barring miraculous change, Jadon will grow up in a broken home. My hopes & dreams for an intact family are really dead. I wonder if these last several days are an example of my finally taking hold of the death of these dreams.
What enables me to lay hold of such a heavy reality, to accept what has been so difficult for me to even consider? What will enable me to keep my head up, my eyes forward, & my shoulders strong under the burden of the very real disappointments of life?
I can trust in no other than Jesus.
As true & insightful as Kubler-Ross was in her description of grief, she did not provide the solution to grief, the way to godly acceptance of hard circumstances. As helpful as Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief are, they are not the Gospel!
- Only the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus’ life & death for me, opens my eyes to see the stark reality of sin (mine & others’) & its ugly effects. (See it for yourself in the Bible: Jeremiah 17:9; Romans 3:10-18.)
- Only the Gospel shows me not only that my dream for a shining unbroken family is dead, but also that the dream itself was an idol in my life that needed to die. That I put the dream of my future family above God (seen in how I would use ungodly means to try to obtain it, & my rebelliousness when I didn’t get it) was itself a heinous sin (Luke 14:26-33; Isaiah 55:1-7).
- Only the Gospel tells me of God’s love which forces bad things – even the consequences of my own many sins – to be for my benefit & others’ (Hebrews 12:5-11; Romans 8:28).
- Jesus understands like no other what it’s like to be alone & deserted, subject to scorn & shame, & misunderstood. He Himself is well acquainted with grief (Isaiah 53:3; Hebrews 4:15-16).
- Jesus actually upholds me when I feel weak. He carries my burdens with me, & is the Bridegroom to those who are lonely (Isaiah 53:4; Philippians 4:13; Isaiah 62:5).
Jesus has been so merciful to me. He opens my eyes to see where I’ve been wrong – so wrong, & gives the strength to change. His Word guarantees that He will use all of my life’s hardships & hurts to make me more like Him (Romans 8:29; Philippians 1:6). Through Him, I can seek forgiveness & forgive others where wrongs have been committed (Matthew 18:21-35). Through Him I know I have a loving family already, the Church, in which I can raise Jadon (1 Corinthians 12:12-27; Ephesians 2:19). Through Him I am learning to love Jadon & his mother with wisdom, free from the ungodly expectations of my dead hopes & dreams.
As I begin to more consistently accept the death of my selfish hopes & dreams, I’m reminded that the pangs of loneliness & confusion will probably never completely disappear this side of eternity. The other, longer (eternally longer!) side of eternity has yet to come. There, ALL of our God-given hopes & dreams, the deepest longings of our hearts, will finally find their fullest fruition. There, complete peace & joyful wholeness will be ours – not just for our hearts but for our bodies as well. In Jesus, this is our sure hope, & I look forward to that time. Little Jennifer – finally free from cerebral palsy – will be there too, singing & dancing with her grandmother. Together with our Savior, we will at last learn why we had to face all the suffering & disease which inflict us now. We’ll probably sit with our mouths agape as we hear of the good things God accomplished in & through our grief, both in our lives & in the generations after us. When we see His vast goodness, we’ll probably never cease to thank Him for including us in His perfect plan, no matter how much grief we bore. And, because we will know just how good our God is, in the end we will know our grief was good. Good… good... grief!
“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away… ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.’” (Revelation 21:1,3,4)
*name changed to protect patient confidentiality
Post-script: If you’re looking for a good book & would like to read more in-depth the things I’m barely beginning to learn, check out Joni Eareckson Tada & Steve Estes’ When God Weeps. I’m actually going through it for the fourth or fifth time (things take a LONG time to seep through this thick skull of mine)...
