It's Okay To Cry

I have recently been doing some journaling homework in my, "Journey To Healing and Joy," workbook written by Marsha Means. This past week the chapter I worked on was on, "Losses."

In taking an inventory of the things I feel I've lost in the wake of my husband's sexual addiction, I realized I've lost some things I may have overlooked had I not been working through the workbook. Emotional connection; warmth; authenticity; tenderness to name a handful, are some of the things I might have otherwise passed over as losses in comparison to the obvious things I feel I've lost. 

I also realized I've stuffed A LOT of pain from other losses in my life, such as the deaths of my parents in 1998 and 2000 as well as stuffing the pain of childhood sexual abuse...a secret I had kept from my parents until my senior year of highschool. Telling my parents was a huge relief (they cried) but I still didn't deal with it...I remained closed off to the idea that it had even negatively impacted me (BOY WAS I BLIND)! Thankfully, during a counseling session at the place we'd been sent to for my husband's sexual addiction, in which I talked for the first time with a complete stranger about the sexual abuse in my past, I finally connected the dots between the sexual abuse and the things I've struggled with growing up that were a direct result of the sexual trauma I had experienced as a child.  

As I worked through the chapter on losses, I realized how much I had allowed other people's (un-healthy) philosophy of broken-ness, grief, and pain to influence me and at a time when tears, sadness, pain, grief and broken-ness were TOTALLY appropriate! At that time, I felt the enormous pressure to just put a smile on my face, to be quiet and trust God, rather than to grieve and feel my pain and process my losses...what a MISTAKE! It's NEVER healthy (nor is it Biblical) to stuff our emotions...it's damaging to our bodies and to our emotional, mental, and spiritual health and growth.

It is okay to cry and to grieve and to feel our pain. It's even okay to acknowledge we're sometimes broken. God created our tear ducts for a reason. Yes, He created us to smile and to laugh and to enjoy life BUT He also created us to feel deeply, to grieve, to cry and eventually...to heal...but the tears are okay...they ARE called for and they ARE appropriate and they ARE vital to our healing. 

Broken hearts, tears, questions, doubts, and pain DO NOT make God uncomfortable. On the contrary, He comes near to the broken in heart and He heals our wounds. He even collects our tears in a bottle. So our tears must have incredible value to God. I wonder what He does with all those tears? I like to imagine He does something very special with them. People sometimes grow weary with our weakness and woundedness, but God doesn't. Each tear is significant to God.  

I have a LONG list of losses and I'm going to take the time to feel each loss, to cry (if need be), to process my feelings, and allow healing to come so I can move forward inside, that way I can embrace my life with hope and joy.