Not the End of the Story

My household consists of my patient and kind husband, my two basketball-playing and computer-loving sons, and one loyal rescue dog. I’m grateful every day for every one of them.

My family could have looked quite different, though. Seventeen years ago, my first pregnancy ended prematurely and tragically. One year later, my second pregnancy ended in loss as well. My grief, both times, was indescribable. It was visceral, in my body as well as my head. I wondered if I'd ever crawl out of it.

I could never have imagined, in the depths of that loss, where I’d be today: writing about that grief as something in the past.

"I will turn their mourning into joy, I will console and gladden them after their sorrows," says today’s reading, Jeremiah 31:13. For me, it didn’t happen right away. I was hurt and angry for a long time. And even now, I sometimes wonder about those two little lives I never got a chance to know. It’s not quite grief, but it’s still a kind of pain.

But there is good in my life now that wasn’t there before. In processing those losses, I opened up to other women who supported and heard me. I opened up to a priest who supported and heard me. My husband and I took lots of hikes around the local area, discovering beauty we had never seen before. All those things helped me see how much goodness there is, in the world and in other people.

Our faith promises this: Suffering is not the end of the story. Death is not the end. There will come a time when the grief has been transformed into something new, as hard as that may be to believe.

So today, remember a time when your own suffering was not the end of the story. Reflect on all the forces—the passage of time, the love of other people—that pulled you through. Let those memories sustain you in whatever suffering, large or small, you face today.

Suffering is not the end of the story. // Ginny Kubitz Moyer Click to tweet

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