Culture of Secrecy.

 

It happened again; my grief was raw and unfiltered, it looked like anger, there was hurt there. It shocked some of the people around me, one person wasn’t shocked, my feelings weren’t too much, she asked me questions and was concerned and joined in with me. The people it shocked didn’t know that level of feeling was lying just under the surface in my soul. They care about me but have no idea about the inner workings of my heart, maybe they don’t know how, on good days I choose to believe its ignorance not indifference.

 

It was the silence that got me again. I abhor silence, actually I crave quietness, the day before suicide so cruelly destroyed our world, Jesus gave me a word for the year ahead; “Be Still” and attached to the promise “and you will know I am God.” I clung to that promise, it all the turmoil. When everything was swirling around, all the chaos and pain and emotion and the thousands of questions, the command to “Be Still” was balm. And I can truly say I came to know God, the depths of intimacy with a God who offered to be known in the middle of the crucible was beauty and a reality I don’t want to exchange.

 

The silence of secrecy is something I will no longer tolerate in my life if at all possible. Obviously not the delicious secrecy of a gift or a surprise, the almost palpable excitement that begs to be shared and when the moment finally comes it bursts out desperate to be shared and known. We were at a surprise birthday party on Friday, the birthday boy is 20 years older than us and the expectation of 100 people waiting to shout “surprise” was incredible, it stuck me how much fun was the level of excitement in the room, the eagerness and expectation of a good surprise. And the emotional response when he was hit with the triumphant yell; his body almost buckled, his hand on his heart, turned around and almost fled before his brain caught up with himself and he entered in fully. The joy and anticipation wasn’t limited to a younger crowd and the most incredible part? 100 people kept the secret.

 

The flip side of that joyous secrecy is the type that divides and separates and builds mistrust and tells the lie that you are alone. It’s driven by shame and control. The whispers behind hands, the abrupt ending of conversations when you walk in a room, the evasive answers to questions, the getting up and walking out of a room when conversation gets close to authenticity. Suicide is perhaps the ultimate secret act, hope lost and the utter devastation of feeling alone and the utter devastation of leaving the ones you love feeling alone when you leave them. The baby version of that level of secrecy and silence is where I wish I could have changed the trajectory of where we were heading. I won’t tolerate the baby version in my life anymore, even today I ended a text to a new acquaintance “you are not alone.”  I want to articulate connection, authenticity and openness, that’s culture I want to build.

 

Last night when the shock of the silence hit me again and I had a violent reaction to the brutality of indifference I was angry. Angry that people who are paid to care don’t. Angry that my pain wasn’t enough to register. Angry that the last time we saw them was at the funeral and this week of the anniversary surely they would remember that? They knew who we were, we went to school with them, my brain scrambled for excuses – maybe they forgot, maybe they didn’t know who we were, maybe. But we sat with them, we talked with them, they know us and sitting on the couch together in a false sense of intimacy they didn’t ask anything. When they left, in their continued silence, I was angry. It hurt. I didn’t expect it, maybe its just the week that’s in it, but then it became more than that, the silence my outburst was met with also shocked me.

 

What do I wish I had been asked? If the silence was broken? And would I have answered? Do I trust these people who for four years have observed my brokenness with silence? I wish I had been asked “And how are you doing?” You must miss him. How has your faith changed? How did you reconcile the goodness of God with the brutality of suicide? Has you brain integrated the fact he’s dead yet? How are his kids? How is his wife? How is his mum? How do you think they are? Are you worried? Have you dreamt about him lately? Did you get help? Do you feel supported in your grief? Has the build up to the anniversary been hard? How do you find easter? What verses did you hang onto? How have you known God’s help in this? Is suicide still a shame? Is suicide talked about? Do people avoid you? Have you felt cared for in this? How was having a newborn in that level of trauma? How is your health? Are you mentally fit? How did you stop expecting disappointment? Are you able to go on holidays? Does your heart still fear when you get an unexpected phone call? Do you think you’ve recovered from the trauma? How has it shaped your marriage? Your parenting? Your hopes and dreams for the future? What has it caused you to hate? How have you rebuilt your life? What things have you restructured in the rebuilding of everything? Where did God meet you in this? Do you have new values? New hopes? New dreams? How do you deal with fears? What promises do you live by? Has your language changed? How can I help you?

 

There are another thousand questions I could ask, ones that have very few answers. But in a culture of love, care and authenticity I wouldn’t be given the silent treatment. So what is this culture that the people around me are operating in? And did it contribute to the silence, aloneness and hopelessness my brother in law wasn’t able to endure under?

 

They say silence is golden unless is from an awake toddler. I would add the caveat that silence in the face of pain is cruel. There was one time where we offered to share our story, it was only a few weeks after and my husband said he would like to tell some of the people we love his story and when he said that, it was met with a groan. I was astounded at the gift he offered, it was so incredibly beautiful seeing the depths of his heart, laid bare for everyone as an offering. I knew I couldn’t have offered that much of me for fear of rejection. He had nothing left except that rawness and he had decided he was going to grieve well and be authentic. The courage he had to be real, transparent and authentic still challenges me. Am I fully integrated?

In the moment of the groan I realised our pain was too much for them. I know they had their own grief and pain, they had their own story and on top of that the palpable pain was an injury they didn’t want to take with us. They did not want to grieve with the ones who were grieving, they couldn’t reconcile grieving well and living simultaneously. And I’m not going to lie, I feel like too much for them. If my pain, which was almost what defined us for months was too much, does that make me too much? If it hadn’t of been for two of my siblings supporting me, ringing me, feeding me, dressing my children and letting me say the depths of my heart out loud and still caring for me I may not have been strong enough to endure the silence. I would like to think I would have remembered I had all the strength of Jesus but I may have cut off the silent people because it was such a great pain on top of agony. I don’t think I am brave enough to ask the silent people why they stayed silent, I’m afraid the answer is they just don’t care. I heard someone say recently that the opposite of love is not hate, it is indifference. I can relate to that.

 

The silence culture screams “you don’t belong.” It shouts in your face that you are alone and cut off and aren’t good enough. It blankets shame over you and breeds loneliness. The beautiful thing this week for me was that as I was reflecting on how much of an outsider I felt, God whispered aloud in my heart that “I belong.” It was the weapon of choice I unsheathed as I walked rejected into a crowd, I stood taller as I declared The Truth over my truth. The lies slipped away and had no effect because I knew the One who declared daughter-ship, unconditional acceptance and had sung my belonging to me. The joy of walking in His presence, knowing who I am and whose I am outweighed my little truth, the true reality but not the Supreme Truth. I used to say to my daughters as they walked into school “just straighten your crown there” and they would look at me and remember who they really are, a daughter of the King, royalty, one whose bloodline is redeemed and they would smile and walk a little taller. I want to cancel the silence culture with Truth and build a culture of light because I have been transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of Light.  Two words changed my reality this week; “I belong.”