Safe Space

It’s been almost 13 years since my father transitioned to the other side. It was years after he died before I felt somewhat whole again. I say somewhat because that kind of loss is life altering and you are never the same as you were before it happened. But I did finally get to a place where I could think of him or say his name and not fall apart. Even now if I say too many sentences in a row about my dear daddy I feel the knot begin to form in my throat and the tears start to well in my eyes. I know the length of my grieving was in direct relation to the amount of safety I felt to engage my feelings. There seemed to be no space to have the meltdown that I think everyone is entitled to when they lose people they truly love. Society allows 7-10 days tops and then you are expected to go back to “normal.” But there is very little acknowledgement of the fact that for the grieving there is a new normal to which we must adjust. Friends try to be supportive but they must go back to their own lives and responsibilities. And let’s face it, unless they too have lost a close loved one like a parent, they really aren’t equipped to help anyway.

I cried every day for a year and no one knew. I’m not one who asks for help easily. So, I put on my brave face and went on about my daily activities. But I would lay in my bed at night when the world was silent enough to allow me to hear my grieving soul and cry because I’d never hear his voice again, because I would never see that smile that could light up the world again, because I’d never hear him say he believed in me again. I’d cry for the conversations that only we could have that we’d never get to have now. Mostly, I’d cry because my constant, dependable, reliable safe space was gone. No matter his imperfection, he was daddy and the world was not so big and bad with him in it.

I’m thinking of this tonight as I think of Bobbi Kristina and her fight for life. Her situation is just the most recent that has caused me to contemplate how our consumptive nature as a society has crossed over from mere material to actual emotions. The advent of reality television has given rise to a culture that consumes drama and grief like Sunday supper and leaves not space for the very real people who live public lives to safely experience their emotions. Actually we prefer they not deal with things in a healthy way because a Kanye West mindlessly acting out his grief is far more entertaining than him taking time to truly process his loss and come out on the other side of it.   

This young woman lost her mother, whom we all laid claim to as our own. So, even in those initial moments when most of us would be dealing with the reality of what happened and letting it sink in she was floating through a world wind of tributes that kept the lonely at bay for a while. But after all the tributes were through and the last songs sung, where was her safe place to grieve. The same public who claimed to share in her grief in the beginning, made her the butt of their jokes and she became just another public figure for our consumption.

Tonight I pray for her, her father and her family. May the God of peace be with them through this trying time and may they find love and a safe space in each others presence. 

I also pray that we as a society increase our compassion and decrease our need to feed on people’s emotions as a form of entertainment. I pray we learn to view people who live public lives as the people that they are and allow them the space that we all deserve to experience their private emotions. 

Selah…