Reflections on my grief-share

On April 17th, 2012, my beloved wife of over 44 years died of cancer.
Her name was “Linda.”
At first I was devastated and heartbroken, stunned for over a year.
I lost a really good one, so I was crying all the time.
An old friend suggested I attend a grief-share at his church.
I was leery at first. It had already been suggested I attend other grief-shares.
Most were in faraway Rochester, and all seemed religiously-based.
One was affiliated with the hospice we used, but that was 45 minutes east. It wasn’t church-sponsored, but its facilitator was a reverend.
Plus I could never get ahold of that reverend despite leaving telephone messages.
My friend’s grief-share was only 25 minutes away, plus he would go with me to my first meeting.
Similarly bereaved watch a DVD video called “Grief Share.”
People on it share advice. All were bereaved themselves.
The video can be somewhat pertinent, but tends to be boring. It has an undercurrent of proselytizing.
“Now that we’ve solved that problem......”
“Oh you have?” I’d think to myself.
“What you’ve done is lob Bible verses at it, as if they solved the problem.”
What this presumes is you’ve decided the Bible is the final word on everything, which I cannot do.
I always remember the Bible was assembled long ago by prelates: human beings.
Some religious texts were left out, yet those included occasionally contradict. I always remember Song of Solomon, how it glorifies sex, yet other Bible teachings tell us sex is evil, because it’s carnal.
Religious zealots seem to have this penchant for finding some Bible verse that applies to your specific problem, then trumpet that as if it were the be-all and end-all.
I can’t accept that.
Anyway, the God they parade is some kind of all-loving Santa Claus, not the capricious and judgmental God I grew up with.
God was my father, who beat me for reasons unknown.
One time I repeated a bumper-sticker that had the word “damn” in it.
My father was driving, but turned around and clobbered me anyway.
I was about seven or eight.
When I asked why, I was clobbered again, accused of lying. Like I knew why my father clobbered me, even if I didn’t.
The fact my wife died is sorrowful.
I mentioned that to a girl I graduated with in high-school, a person comparable to my wife in gray-matter.
“You’ll see her again in Heaven,” I was told.
“Yes, Janet,” I thought to myself.
“Except I won’t get to Heaven.” I disrespected my father. “Hell for you, baby!” I was always told.
And my wife wouldn’t make it either. Like me, she was an unbeliever.
My grief-share (especially the video) was pounding me with religion. They claimed the only way to deal with grief was believe.
I’ve attended two grief-shares so far, all at the same church, with the same facilitators. I do so despite being out-of-it. The people there have become friends.
People in the real world don’t understand grief. The attenders are all bereaved, so understand where I’m at.
They also tell me they see improvement. And that’s despite my not becoming an arm-waving zealot. What the grief-share claims is time doesn’t heal all wounds — it takes God.
Yet they keep seeing improvement. Well over a year has passed.
I appreciate all that, enough to withstand all the proselytizing.
And proselytizing I’m very familiar with. Zealots have been after me all my life.
I’m basically a do-gooder. So they want me to become one of them. —Plus I also listen to them instead of tell them to buzz off.
“Why always me?” I ask. “Why not the flagrant sinners?”
Now I have to be careful who sees this. I e-mail links to these blogs all over the planet.
But my grief-share people won’t get it. I don’t want to hurt their feelings.