I am worn out from my groaning.
All night long I flood my bed with weeping
and drench my couch with tears.
-Psalm 6:6, NIV
Yesterday, grief surprised me.
This wasn’t grief over my first marriage. It was grief over a lost mentor and true friend. He died in a car accident last year.
I was simply enjoying a beautiful evening at the cabin in Northern Minnesota. Something about the evening made me think of Will. Then I was ambushed by a wave of sadness.
That is the thing about grief. It ambushes us.
The moment is not predictable. Working through grief is a life-long journey. The moments the grief returns sometimes are surprising.
I share this as I believe healing from an adulterous end of a marriage comes with a great deal of grief.
In fact, I believe the most important task for faithful spouses to do in healing is to grieve. We have to learn to see, acknowledge, and let go of the losses. It is hard work.
We might be fine for months then reduced to a puddle in a parking lot after a certain song comes on the radio transporting us to what we lost.
That is how grief works. It ambushes us.
Do not be ashamed of your grief–even or especially when it ambushes you. It just means you valued greatly what was lost. That is a good thing. It means you are able to care deeply.
I do not know about you, but I want people around me with caring hearts.
Be that person, even if it feels less than convenient. Feeling the loss is how we make our way through the grief, after all.
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*A version of this post ran previously. Grief still ambushes.
