This is the 4th set of holidays without my big brother here. The 4th year where we don’t get to do holiday things together. No Thanksgiving Day traditions. He can’t take a picture of me as I’m preparing the turkey for cooking. He can’t come and laugh at me as I cheer on the Cowboys in hopes of them not choking during the game. No Black Friday shopping for some ridiculous ornament he didn’t really need. No pushing past other people to get what someone in our family “needed”. To be clear, he did the pushing, I watched our basket with the rest of our stuff. No Christmas lights. No Christmas trees. Definitely no cookie baking- we lost that privilege the year he made over 100 sugar cookies, and I started to ice the gingerbread men like aliens. No Die Hard on Christmas Eve. All of the things we did together, they won’t happen again like they once did.
The first set of holidays were ROUGH. I spent 12 hours in Atlanta trying to get home for Thanksgiving. I walked away after the prayer for the meal on Thanksgiving because I was just so overwhelmed with the fact Thomas wasn’t here. Christmas was his favorite holiday. There were no gifts under the tree with his name on it. The grief and sadness was heavy in our house that day. Year 2 was hard, maybe even harder than the first year, because it was sinking in the reality that the last year hadn’t been some nightmare or alternate reality- it was real life. Year 3 I was living my best life in Cambodia. Sure it was sad. I missed by brother and I missed celebrating with my family, but I was alive and thriving in the place God called me to be. It was just a different holiday season. I’ve been trying to wrap my head around something all week. Why have I been downward spiraling mentally and emotionally since last weekend? What has happened that could have caused this? It’s the holidays. The holidays are always harder.
You can follow all the grief related things across social media. You can read all the books. Listen to all the podcasts. A lot of them talk about holidays. If I’m honest, I think I had convinced myself at some point throughout the year that this set of holidays wouldn’t be hard. I wouldn’t get sad or tear up thinking about my brother. It wouldn’t make me sad…or even jealous when I see people posting pictures with their whole family. I wouldn’t “hate families and holidays” like I have the last two out of three years. Yet, I think I’ve found myself there again. I’ve found myself hoping the pizza I ate for dinner will make me sick and allow me to bail on the plans I’ve made for Thanksgiving tomorrow. Not because I don’t want to go, but because I’m scared. Scared of the emotions it will cause and the memories it would bring. It would just be easier mentally and emotionally to stay at the house with the dogs and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
Not everyone will have the same extreme views and reactions to things that I’ve had. Each persons’ loss is different. Every relationship is unique thus making every loss unique. Everyone in my family lost Thomas, but all of our grief journeys have been different. So how do we, people who have lost loved ones and now experience grief during the holiday season, continue on with life? How do we enjoy the holiday season again. For me, how do I stop being a mixture of the grinch and the hulk?
I obviously don’t have it all figured out as you can tell from the above, but I’m thankful for the growth I’ve seen and the way I’ve learned to navigate the holiday season.
- I’ve found it helpful not to suppress my emotions or tears. Despite what my brothers both told me growing up, it’s okay to cry. Tears aren’t a sign of weakness.
- I’ve found that it’s okay to say no if you think an event will be too much for you. If appropriate, it’s okay to find that safe person to go with you to an event. If it’s too much, you have someone you trust and that can help you with whatever you need.
- It’s okay if you continue with the traditions you had with your loved ones. I still watch Die Hard every Christmas Eve. If those traditions don’t feel the same anymore, it’s OKAY if you have to make new traditions or make some kind of change to the original traditions.
- Unlike the beliefs of the grinch who isolated himself all the time and the hulk who isolated himself when things were hard, community really does make grief and the holidays better. Community makes life in general better, but there always seems to be an extra sweetness from community during hard times.
- Finding things to be grateful for. Yes, loss and grief can be difficult, but even so, there are still good things in life. There are still things to be grateful for. I have a running list on my phone that I add to every few days of things I’m grateful for. I was originally working on a post about gratitude because you know, tomorrow’s Thanksgiving, but I felt this was what I needed to write on.
- Praying on the behalf of other people. The last few months, whenever I was sad or I missed Thomas, as I was talking to the Lord, He would bring other people to mind who are also dealing with the loss of a loved one. It helps take the focus off of me and my loss and remember those that I know who are hurting.
- The most important one for me and one that I struggle with the most is being intentional in my time with the Lord. Making sure it happens everyday. Making sure that I’m reminding myself of truth. Making sure that I can meditate on the Word day and night because I’ve been in it. The Lord is close to the broken hearted. He wants us to spend time with Him and take all of our concerns, feelings, hurts, worries, and everything else to Him. I know I respond better to grief anytime of the year when I’ve been meeting with the Lord daily.
If you’re reading this and you are walking through your first, second, third or so on holiday season involving grief, you aren’t alone. There’s a community of us out there. Grief and living without your loved one will get easier. Grief will resurface from time to time. It’ll be overwhelming again, but it won’t continue to be that way forever. I have learned and am continually reminded that joy and sorrow, joy and sadness, joy and grief can all coexist. If you are a believer, remember our true comfort comes from God. If you aren’t a believer and want to know more about God, I would love to share with you. Wherever you find yourself on this grief journey, keep going. Take it a day at a time. It will get easier.
Grief. Going. Healing. 
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