I have been here before. Thirteen years ago to be exact. The only difference is, this time, I am not as frozen. I am not gripped by fear, unable to move about in my neighbourhood. I am stronger and more resilient and yet, the grief is familiar. In the days since “the event” I have been doing the hard work of healing. I have set boundaries in place; people who once had access to me no longer have a screen’s view into my life as I recover from the effects of their actions and words. I am grateful for those who have loved and accompanied me as I regroup, heal, and discern to what and to where I am called. “The event” has taken a significant toll on my mental health, my identity, and my self confidence as a pastor.

My efforts to heal have been stitched with a familiar grief. As I hold up and examine the threads of myself, I realize the fabric of me, that is my identity, looks different now. I am having to relearn who I am in the aftermath of “the event”. Grief counselor and author, Emery Hollace (Grief Recovery Workbook for Seniors. 2025. Amazon self-published) states, “The hardest part about grief is that it changes your identity” (pg 13) Yes, it certainly does. Who you understand yourself to be is called into question the moment grief creates a hole in your life. The only thing able to mend that hole is time and listening. Time stitched with a different colour of thread than the fabric.

For me, I find grief to be disorienting and it is such hard work. Grief revisits time and again in varied textures, colours, and shapes. At times when it arrives its texture is like that of a hard spun wool, raw and rough to the touch. It takes a tremendous amount of energy to work with it and hear what it is saying to me. Other times it slips in like a soft silk, but it always makes itself known.

Each time grief arrives it asks to be held in our hands, to be touched and felt. To have its memories, hopes, and dreams be woven together with the hurt, the anger, the disbelief, the rage, the discomfort of it all. You are welcome to journey with me as I circle back to a familiar grief as I learn once again who I am and to see the fabric that is then created by this grief. I can’t guarantee it will be pretty but it will be a unique.