Please Don’t Put Me in a Psychiatric Hospital but Do Tell Your Story

I have not been newly diagnosed with some horrible illness nor do I have a death wish. I promise.

I do realize though, that death has played a part in my last couple of personal posts. Maybe it’s because I feared death with sick parents as a child, walked with many people up to death in my young adult and midlife in pastoral ministry, and approaching my more “mature” years, I see death all the time as a farmer.

My family even thinks my nickname should change from “Bear” to “Big Cat” because there are so many situations in my life where I should have died and didn’t. I must have nine lives.

Maybe I am writing about death because I am still working through being around it so much, but I THINK I have come to peace with the fact that death is simply a part of life.

In that vain, I have already planned every part of my memorial service as well as the location, transportation, form of burial, obituary placement, dress options for those attending service, and participants in the service.

*No need to put a call into the psychiatric floor at Presbyterian Hospital on my behalf. I promise. Really.

It’s just that when I met with families as a pastor to plan their loved ones memorial service and they desperately needed to just be with one another to grieve, there was often overwhelming anxiety about the details around all the things that needed immediate attention.

When I do die, there will still be plenty to do for the task-doers in the family, but I don’t want my family to have to plan a memorial service on top of everything else.

There is however, one part of the preparation for a memorial service I would like for them to have the opportunity to participate in. I still want for them to have the space to get together with the person giving the eulogy to share stories.

When I was a minister I tried to block out a large block of time often separate from the logistical anxieties of a death so that they could tell me stories about their loved one.

Of course, I wanted to hear their stories to prepare the most personal eulogy possible, but there was an equal if not more important reason to get together.

Remembering our loved ones re-members us. In other words, sitting and telling stories after a loss, helps put us back together again.

I remember being with families over and over during these story telling moments, and the conversation often moved to holy ground.

I could often visibly see stress turn to sharp focus on the family members faces. Hands stopped ringing and deep sighs were released. If there were conflicts in the family they usually at least dissipated during this holy conversation.

The conversation would often gain energy as it went. One family member would tell a story and then another member would join in with “That’s right. I haven’t thought of that in years. Do you remember the time when…”

Tears would flow but also big hugs, and the best belly laughs.

It’s also so interesting. The holy part of the conversation usually came from nothing on my part, but just in the telling of the story itself.

By the way, storytelling is a holy act around all kinds of death.

Are you dying from the inside out because of some secret story you have never shared that has made you ashamed, fearful, anxiety-ridden, or filled with resentment?

Or, maybe you are dying from the outside in, because of the relationship that is falling apart, or the daily alcohol consumption, or you were on one road and in an instant you got dropped into a wilderness with no clear path ahead.

Maybe it’s just that the outside world is shooting arrows at you from so many different directions and you no longer have any defense left inside of you. You are “raise the white flag,” literally exhausted.

Have you ever told anybody about any of these stories?

In life and in death, remember to tell your stories.

They will help put you back together again.