Jesus Grieved

March is Child Life Month – a month set aside to celebrate child life specialists around the world. For me, Child Life Week is always a time to reflect on this crazy, beautiful – often brutal – job. As I share my heart and stories in this space, it is important to know that my professional job is working in an emergency department as a child life specialist two nights a week. I absolutely love my job, and I’ve known this was the trajectory of my life since I was 18. I often get asked what child life specialists do. In short, child life specialists meet children and their families in whatever place they find themselves in the hospital or other healthcare facilities to prepare them for what they can expect, support them through whatever procedures and interventions they may encounter, and advocate for their emotional safety. We cover everything from helping children get an x-ray completed, to supporting them through IV starts to supporting families through the most devastating experience of not getting to leave the hospital with their child. We do this mostly through normalizing their environment through play and developmentally appropriate language and advocating for their emotional safety in every way we can. We go from blowing bubbles and laughing with a child to comforting parents and siblings grieving a child. It can be an exhausting transition that is almost so second nature for me and my co-workers that we forget how unnatural this transition is. We support play and grief sometimes simultaneously.

As I walked into a work lunch to celebrate Child Life Week, my heart and my brain just couldn’t get in sync. A week before, the most important job I have – mom – had left me in shambles. My middle daughter had her follow-up appointments at St. Jude. They were disappointing to say the least.  A small portion of her brain tumor may be reoccurring. It has grown a very small amount since the last scan in September. There is nothing to be done right now, but we genuinely felt that we were on the other side of this journey. Yet, it may just be the beginning. It was a terribly deflating appointment, and while many of this work group follow our journey on social media, this same group of people support parents like me for a living – they were not going to dodge this reality. My worlds colliding. I knew they would have questions and want to hear my heart. This was the first day that I didn’t have the kids and was work free. I started the day filled to the brim with a recognizable old friend – anxiety. It had been quite a while since anxiety had taken over to this level, but it had. I had done deep breathing all morning, listened to worship music, and read the Word. I had worked out and showered and done all the things that are a good part of my routine. Yet the tears were so close to the surface, I could barely hold it together, and my heart felt like it was beating out of my chest. I made it through lunch and a group photo, only to find myself breaking down when I stopped to say hello to a nurse friend that I had not seen in a long time. I started telling her about our past appointment. The news was flying off my tongue like the initial diagnosis… ‘My daughter has a brain tumor…” Now, “Her tumor is growing… there is a small part that they will need to watch…”  I truly know no other way. The tears began to flow, and they didn’t stop for the rest of the day.

While I love my job, I have not loved its intersection with my real life. I am fully equipped to be in this with my daughter, yet I sure wish I wasn’t. When your 11-year-old sobs in the room with the oncologist and tells you every day that she is still thinking (worrying) about her tumor, there is no job in the world that helps you feel equipped. Yet, it is what I do every day. I sit with kiddos in what they believe are their absolute worst moments of life… and sometimes they are.

But this is different. I can’t tell every kiddo I meet about Jesus. I can tell them they are safe. I can tell them they are brave. I can tell them it sucks, but that they should be so proud of themselves. But I can only show them Jesus and silently pray for miracles and healing for them. But, since day one of walking this journey out with my middle daughter, I have told her and her sisters that Jesus is WITH them. I have told them that He will not leave us. I know it to the very core of my soul. I knew Him before this. I’ve known Him during this, and I will not stop knowing Him. It has been my prayer that through this journey that my girls encounter the Living God and are met by Him – His love and His power and His kindness. While it would be so easy to turn away, I have begged the Holy Spirit to help them all FIND HIM in this story. And I remind them of Him and His goodness and His infinite love Every. Single. Day.

The anxiety this past week has been tangible, though. Even the things I know to be true and can claim to my core are still challenged by my body’s paralysis from anxiety. My hair is falling out again. I must remind myself to breath throughout the day. I am literally holding my breath.  Unfortunately, so is my daughter. She is paralyzed with irrational fear of storms and is having nightmares that put her real life to shame. It is heartbreaking to watch her and sit in her pain with her. The morning of her brain surgery, we wept together. I know no other way except to be in this with her fully. The most sacred moments are snuggling with my girls at bedtime and literally laying in the pain. I recently said on a social media post that the grieving is necessary, but so is hope.

This week, Holy Week, I am grieving. I have been grieving. My daughter is grieving. I know (because we have been here before) that this grief will lift. Yet, we are called to sit in it. Jesus sat in His grief of the Cross. He begged the Father to take His cup. I am there…begging. Scripture says that Jesus was in “agony” (Luke 22:44, ESV).

“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done.”

Luke 22:42, ESV

Every one of us has crosses – something the Lord is asking us to bear and walk into. We are not Jesus, but we are called to become more like Him. (2 Corinthians 3:18) This is not a cross I ever wanted to bear. I have seen far too many crosses bore in my line of work. But what I know of this Kingdom economy is that with every cross, there is more Glory – more love and power and beauty of the Lord. Jesus knew the other side, yet He still grieved. He still asked His Father for another way. I know the other side, too, because I know my God is good. But I will sit in this space and tell Him how sad this cross makes me.

Since last week, the anxiety has come and gone. It has not been as paralyzing, but very present. The Lord met me yesterday and so graciously gave me a verse. I shared it with my daughter, too, and printed it for her.

The Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued my faithfulness to you.

Jeremiah 31:3 (ESV, emphasis added)

While we grieve, we will still claim this Truth… He sees us. He will continue His faithfulness to us. And with this cross, there will be resurrection because that is other side of the story…