HEALING FROM SUICIDE LOSS

While the love and support of others can be a tremendous gift, I have learned that the deepest healing does not come from what is happening around us. People will offer advice, tell you to focus on the memories, or say they are in a better place, they'll tell you to give yourself time, be strong, stay busy so you can take your mind off it and to stay focused. But healing from suicide grief is not something that is done from the outside or on the outside, it is truly something that has to be done from within.

It comes from what God is doing within us.

The grief of suicide is something that has to be felt, faced, and gently worked through from the inside out. But we were never meant to do that work alone.

God meets us in the places no one else can see.

He meets us in the questions.

The anger.

The guilt.

The confusion.

The longing.

The brokenness.

And those moments when we simply cannot understand how life became this.

There are places inside of us that no amount of advice, distraction, or human effort can reach.

But God can. And He DID FOR ME and HE WILL FOR YOU!

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”

— Psalm 147:3

Healing does not mean forgetting the person we love.

It does not mean that what happened suddenly becomes okay.

It does not mean we stop missing them or that grief disappears.

Sometimes healing looks like allowing God to teach us how to carry what happened while slowly making room for life again.

It is learning to trust Him with the pieces of our hearts that we cannot put back together ourselves.

And sometimes, healing begins when we finally realize that the battle is not ours to carry alone.

“The battle is the Lord’s.”

— 1 Samuel 17:47

That truth has become such an important part of the mission of the Brett J. Morris Avenger Foundation. So many of the battles people fight are invisible.

Grief.

Depression.

Anxiety.

Guilt.

Hopelessness.

Fear.

Loneliness.

We may look strong on the outside while fighting a battle within. And that is why we continue to come back to the words of Ephesians 6:

“Put on the full armor of God.”

Not because faith means we will never hurt.

Not because wearing the armor means we will never struggle.

But because God never intended for us to enter the battle unprotected or in our own strength.

The armor reminds us where our strength truly comes from.

Putting on the armor of God does not mean pretending we are not wounded.

It means allowing God to meet us in our wounds and equip us for the battle we are facing. Sometimes the strongest thing we can do is not fight harder. Sometimes it is surrender. It may look like this:

“Lord, I cannot carry this anymore.”

“Lord, I do not understand.”

“Lord, I am angry.”

“Lord, I am exhausted.”

“Lord, fight this battle for me.”

"Lord, what goodness can come from this?"

"Lord, WHY????? Show me the purpose in my pain."

And He CAN handle that kind of honesty.

There is no perfect timeline for grief and there is no formula.

But there is a God who promises to remain near.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

— Psalm 34:18

For me, healing from the inside out meant I had to stop trying to make everything on the outside look “normal” while I was falling apart on the inside. I had to allow God into the places I had been afraid to face. I had to bring Him my grief honestly and not the polished version, not the faithful sounding version, but the real one. I took to him everything:

The questions.

The anger.

The guilt.

The shame.

The sorrow.

The fear.

The doubt.

The “Why, God?”

And even the moments when I did not have words to pray at all. Healing has looked like allowing my grief to be real and trusting that God is not afraid of it.

It has meant talking with safe people who can listen without judgment and recognizing that God often uses others to help carry us when our own strength is gone.

It has meant making space for complicated emotions. Emotions of love, anger, guilt, confusion, longing, gratitude, even moments of peace, and bringing every one of them before God.

It has meant slowly releasing the questions I may never have answers to and learning to place them into the hands of the One who sees what I cannot.

It has meant working through self-blame and reminding myself that loving someone deeply does not mean I had the power to save them. And releasing the guilt I felt others were placing on me as well.

Only God is God.

It has meant finding community with others who understand suicide loss, where we do not have to explain every layer of our grief.

It has meant continuing to speak their name, share their stories, honor their life, hold onto photographs and traditions, and trust that remembering them is not the same as refusing to heal.

It has meant writing, praying, crying, worshiping, sitting quietly before God, and sometimes simply saying:

“Lord, I do not know how to carry this today. Lord, God please oh please help me get through this day!"

It has meant accepting professional help when grief became too heavy to carry alone. God can work through therapists, counselors, pastors, support groups, friends, family, and every person He places along our path.

And it has meant allowing life to slowly expand again...

A laugh.

Coffee with a friend.

A trip.

A new experience.

A peaceful afternoon.

A moment of genuine joy.

A hope of love again.

Those moments do not mean we have forgotten. They do not mean we loved our person any less. Sometimes they are evidence that God is gently breathing life back into places grief once convinced us would never live again.

This is part of what we mean when we talk about “armoring up.”

It is not putting on a mask.

It is not pretending to be strong.

It is not hiding the battle.

It is choosing, day by day, to cover ourselves in God’s truth, faith, peace, hope, and Word while trusting Him to fight the battles we were never meant to fight alone.

That is at the heart of the Brett J. Morris Avenger Foundation.

To remind people that the battle within matters.

To create space for people to be seen.

To stand beside those who are grieving or struggling.

To point people toward hope.

To remind one another that asking for help is not weakness.

And above all, to remember where our true strength comes from.

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power. Put on the full armor of God.”

— Ephesians 6:10–11

Healing from the inside out is not about convincing the outside world that we are okay. It is about surrendering what we carry inside to God, over and over again, and allowing Him to heal what we cannot heal on our own. We do not have to “heal from” the people we love. We learn, little by little, how to live with their absence while trusting God to give our lives meaning, purpose, love, hope, and peace again.

There may always be a scar. There may always be a place in our hearts that carries them. But scars can also be evidence that a wound has been tended to. And I believe our deepest wounds are safest in the hands of Jesus.

So if you are fighting an internal battle today, remember this:

You do not have to fight it alone.

Put on the armor.

Raise your shield.

Speak truth over the lies.

Take the next step.

And when the battle feels too heavy, give it back to the One who has already promised:

The battle belongs to the Lord.

FAITH IS OUR SHIELD. HEALING IS OUR MISSION.

In Love,

Mary Morris Zufall

Founder and President, Brett J Morris Avenger Foundation