NOTE: Becky Oswald is a resource for our ministries in understanding death, the grief process, and providing support for our workers. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Education, a certification in Death and Grief Studies, and a Master of Science in Thanatology. Through grief coaching, she walks alongside individuals to explore and utilize tools to engage in authentic mourning to process grief and move to health and healing. She found this passion through her own journey with grief after the death of her husband and the experience of living in a grief-avoidant culture. Recently, she was able to assist two NOW District congregations as they came alongside and cared for their workers who had experienced the loss of a close loved one.
I find a lot of things to be curious… the way a sunflower turns with the direction of the sun, how my dog always seems to know how I feel, how people can unite with one another for a brief moment in a shared experience, and never have interaction again.
I also find it curious that one of the experiences in life that nearly every human will encounter is so difficult to talk about and engage with. I’m talking about grief. For many, just the word “grief” brings about an uncomfortable sensation that often leads to a redirection of the conversation. I believe grief is not something that should be ignored but rather held with respect and even embraced. Grief isn’t an illness to treat, a hurdle to jump over, a bump in the road to leave behind. Grief isn’t something we get over. Instead, we can learn to integrate it into our lives as we rebuild after someone we love has died, or there has been some other life-changing loss.
As a thanatologist, grief coach, and grief educator, I embrace the practice of finding and using unique tools to facilitate the process of each person’s distinctive grief story through the means of authentic mourning. Grief, all the things we feel and think internally after a loss, must be processed. Mourning is what we do externally to process our grief. There is no right or wrong way to grieve and mourn; each person’s individual story will forge its own path. As fellow humans, companions on life’s journey, it is essential to give space for those we love to grieve and mourn in the way that is best for them.
In American culture, the slow and recursive nature of grief and mourning creates dissonance with our typical approach to life, even within American Christianity. There is an overwhelming push to “get-over-it” or have “closure” as quickly as possible. The truth is, grief never ends, but we can learn how to integrate it into our lives. So, when NOW District Director of Ministry Leadership, Dust Kunkel, contacted me to learn more about supporting church workers who are grieving, I was more than happy to step in as a resource. From that conversation, a plan was put into place to provide a Zoom training for leadership at two congregations, both of which had church workers who had recently experienced the death of a beloved person in their lives. We spent about an hour talking about what grief is, how it can manifest in diverse ways we may not always recognize as grief, and how to best support their grieving worker. Of utmost importance was to remember their worker is a person who had just experienced the death of a most beloved person in their life. Being a church worker is a piece of the mosaic of their life; it isn’t the entire picture. Everyone needs community, care, support, and a place to be supported in times of grief.
In my work, I have the honor of walking alongside individuals as they grieve and mourn the losses in their lives, supporting those who seek to care for those who are grieving, and educating a variety of communities how to come alongside the grieving in meaningful, compassionate, and empathetic ways. I do this through grief coaching, providing both online and in-person support groups, and offering educational opportunities that meet the needs of congregations and other communities.
We all have the capacity to integrate grief into life after loss. As I accompany people and congregations, we work to understand that the things we do, the ways we authentically mourn, are expressions of coping, not symptoms of a disorder or disease. They are how we do the necessary work of grief and mourning.