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We all have slivers

Recently, as I talked to my wife about a topic she and her counselor discussed, I realized this topic may be exactly what one of you need to hear or share with someone. So, here it is….

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Forum Columns

Healing from grief and loss – Part 1

One June morning in 2017, I received a phone call from our son at Camp Grafton. A storm with 80 mph winds came through as he ate breakfast in a large tent. Just as he looked up, the center pole came crashing down on his plate, narrowly missing his head. He escaped the tent, ran across a field and took cover in a trailer. A month later, I talked to a friend in Costco. He has a friend who was also at Camp Grafton that day. That friend told him about a soldier that almost died in that storm. His friend couldn’t believe the soldier made it out of the tent as stakes were yanking out of the ground and other items flying through the air. I told my friend, “That soldier was my son!”

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Processing our pain in a helpful way

Ignoring the pain, minimizing the pain, overcompensating for the pain, internalizing the pain, and medicating the pain are commonly implemented and universally unhelpful. So, here are five helpful steps to process our pain. These are great steps to teach our children and grand-children. If we can help our children learn them as they are growing up, they can process pain much healthier throughout their adult lives.

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What do we do with our pain?

A month ago I hung up a wood message board in my 10-year-old daughter, Brooke’s, bathroom. A week later, as she was getting ready for school, we heard a loud bang in her bathroom. Soon after, she came out with tears in her eyes and a red mark on her foot. My wife, Teri, gave her a hug. After Brooke got herself composed I asked her, “What happened?” She said the message board fell off her wall and landed on her foot. My immediate thought was “I hope I didn’t do that to her by not putting a big enough nail in the wall.” So I asked her, “How did it fall?” She said she was not paying attention and bumped into it while combing her hair. I was sorry it happened but relieved I didn’t cause it. This was not my brightest shining moment as a dad. At that point in time it was not helpful for me to analyze. I struggle with that and have hurt my wife and my children by doing that.

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Prairie Heights Sermons

Every Scar Tells a Story