It hurts my heart so bad to see people grieving. It’s something I think I’ve become pretty good at or at least extremely familiar with.

I watched a little argument (if you could even call it that) take place on Facebook this morning between two friends and brought a lot of memories flooding back. I think typically people mean well but constantly telling someone that they need to just let go, is not really helpful. Like, at all.

I wish more people understood what grieving really looks like. I wish people who haven’t experienced a great amount of loss in their life, didn’t have such great opinions on how one should grieve. Just love people, love them no matter how they’re processing it, love them no matter how long it takes, love them no matter how difficult it is for them to let go – just love them. I lost one of my oldest friends a few years ago when I was processing and dealing with my brother‘s grief (I was also in the process of eliminating alcohol from my life and rebuilding my relationship with Christ) so it was a very confusing time for me. I was a lot. It hurt a lot that she was accusing me of drinking when I was making such great efforts and strides to stop. I was just hurting- because death hurts. It’s a pain that you can’t understand until you’ve experienced it. I mean, we’ve all experienced death, but it’s very different when it’s someone in your immediate family. I hardly even remember anything from that year, but I do find it very sad that a relationship was lost based on the way that I was grieving and coping. It will never sit right with me.

That’s really neither here nor there though. God knows what he’s doing, and I trust the process of the people he brings in and out of my life, but I would like to speak on behalf of people who have had multiple losses in life, just be kind I try to have patience with people when they’re grieving. Again, I have very little recollection of that time at all. I was simply going through the motions and trying to stay alive.

Just love people enough to let them grieve like they need to, that’s it. And if you don’t love them that much, just be quiet.