October 28, 2025 • 53 mins
In this heartfelt conversation, Greg talks with Kathe Wunnenberg, founder of Hope Lifters Unlimited, about her profound journey of grief and healing. Kathe shares her personal experiences with loss, including the death of her son and multiple miscarriages, and how these experiences shaped her understanding of grief and GOD’s goodness in our suffering. They discuss the importance of community support, the unique nature of grieving a child, and the role of faith in finding hope amidst pain. Kathe emphasizes the need for individuals to give themselves permission to grieve and to seek purpose in their loss, while also highlighting the significance of honoring memories and supporting siblings who are grieving. The conversation offers practical insights and encouragement for those navigating their own grief journeys, reminding listeners that they are not alone and that healing is possible.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Well, hi, and welcome back for our latest episode.
I'm Greg Buffkin, and asalways, thank you for listening.
Joining me today is KatheWunnenberg. Kathe is the founder
and president of HopeliftersUnlimited, which is a
Christ-centered resource andtraining organization to help
(01:11):
encourage grieving, hurting, andweary women.
Kathe’s a noted speaker, aconsultant, and author of four
books.
She is well acquainted withgrief, having lost her
14-month-old son, as well ashaving had three miscarriage
losses within 14 months.
Kathe is married, has threeliving sons, and lives with her
(01:35):
family in Arizona.
I think you'll really beencouraged by this conversation.
And now here's my conversationwith Kathe.
Well, Kathe welcome to ourpodcast.
It is so good to have you asour guest today.
Speaker (01:51):
It's great to be with you, Greg.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Thank you.
Well, as with all of myguests, at the beginning of each
episode, I just ask each guestto share anything that they
would like on a personal levelthat they would like for the
listeners to know that theymight not pick up otherwise by
Googling you.
Speaker (02:12):
Well, I was raised in a small town of Missouri, so I'm
a small town girl of 300.
But I tell you what, God hasdone amazing things in my life.
So I'm you can take the girlout of the country, but you
can't take the country out ofthe girl.
So that's something you may notknow.
I'm I'm a mom of seven.
I have four babies in heaven,and I have three living sons,
(02:35):
adult, young adult sons, and onethrough the gift of adoption.
So you may not see that.
I've been married to my collegesweetheart for almost 45 years.
So that's a miracle.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Congratulations.
Speaker (02:49):
And really grateful.
And recently, in the lastcouple of years, God allowed me
to go on a new journey of lossthrough breast cancer.
So that was a journeyunexpected.
And yet, what I've found, Greg,is that all of what I've
learned through the loss of mychildren is that that helped me
(03:09):
go through another circumstancethat I was not expecting.
And I'm glad to report that,you know, my husband had a
quadruple bypass during thattime as well.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Oh, wow.
Speaker (03:20):
So talk about extremes.
And I know many of thelisteners out there probably are
in those health challenges too.
I can assure you that God meetsyou no matter where you're at.
And he did for us.
We're doing great.
We're in a healthy season andwe are celebrating all that he's
done.
So that's a little bit aboutme.
I am in the desert.
So I've lived here over 40years, and I said, God brought
(03:43):
me here.
And I said, Do I get to crossover after 40 years?
And he said, Not yet.
So I think I'm on year 42, butI am weathering the weather, but
I am grateful to be here.
And I love technology so thatwe can connect with one another
and bring hope.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Oh, absolutely.
You know, it it always isalways a double-edged sword.
You know, it can be, I thinkwhen a lot of the new technology
was being rolled out, those ofus who are in or older
generation, shall we say, mayhave been resistant to it at
some points along along the way.
(04:22):
But I think we've all learnedthat, man, it it is amazing what
God can do with this technologybecause otherwise we wouldn't
be doing what we're doing rightnow.
Speaker (04:32):
That's true.
And we can actually thank COVIDfor that.
I mean, that really got us allconnecting.
So there's always something tobe grateful for, even if we
really don't like what it is.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
Yeah.
God can bring good out of theworst.
Speaker (04:48):
He can.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
And you know, it's funny.
You were telling us that, youknow, you live in the desert.
It's God has quite a reputationfor teaching us things in the
desert, doesn't he?
Speaker (05:02):
He does.
He does.
I mean, it's like the thingsthat we have to learn.
I actually spent some timeduring last year's sabbatical,
just what are the lessons Ilearned in the desert?
And even if you physicallydon't live in a desert like I
do, we go through desert times.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Yes, we do.
Speaker (05:21):
Somewhere between what was and what's going to be.
And so we can learn a lot ofgreat lessons.
And he speaks loud and clearwhen we're in the desert.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
He does.
And if you haven't been there,just hang on, because at some
point you probably will be.
Speaker (05:37):
Life is a series of endings of what used to be the
Egypt, I call it, and then thein-between, that desert and
wilderness place, and then thenew beginning.
And let's face, let's face it,Greg, we'd like to get from what
was to what's going to be andnot do the desert or the
wilderness time the in-between.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Yeah, I I kind of prefer that too.
But we don't always get tochoose that, do we?
Speaker (06:05):
I know.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah, but fortunately, he knows better.
And as you said a minute ago,what you went through all those
years ago grieving the loss ofchildren enabled you to be able
to better weather the storm thatof breast cancer.
(06:27):
It's you know and you wouldn'thave chosen that.
Speaker (06:34):
No, I wouldn't have chosen that, but it was a
necessary part of my journey.
And what I learned, Greg, whenI lost our son and and other
babies through miscarriage, thatI could either choose to whine
and resist the desert, or Icould learn to worship and meet
God there.
(06:55):
And so I I determined that Ineeded to just surrender and
learn the lessons.
And by doing that, fast forwardthrough other life
circumstances.
How I got to know God in thosemoments, because usually people
are not with you.
Others can't go there with you,with God.
(07:16):
And who I became acquaintedwith Him and got to build our
relationship and heard from Himonly built my faith and enabled
me to know that, oh, you werefaithful then, you'll be
faithful now.
Who I got to know you manyyears ago, you will be even
(07:39):
beyond that in thiscircumstance.
So I trusted him.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Yeah, and and he rewards that.
We, I mean, you've experiencedit as well as we have.
And, you know, when when you gothrough things like that, you
know, you discover that he'she's there in that with you.
He doesn't leave you there togo through it by yourself.
And he will carry us throughthat.
(08:04):
And there are, as hard as itseems, he can, he has this
ability to bring good out of theabsolute worst imaginable
traumatic events of life.
And once we've once we've seenhis faithfulness in something as
(08:25):
traumatic as losing a child, itreally does, if we lean into
him and give him that pain andtrauma, it really does help us
the next time something presentsitself in our life, and we've
got to lean on him.
We, you know, we have to dowhatever it is by faith.
(08:46):
It's a whole lot easier totrust him in that next event.
And I know you you have foundthat.
Speaker (08:53):
Absolutely.
I mean, I relied on thecharacter of God in every one of
my devotionals.
Every devotion points to acharacter of who God is out of
my experience of being in thatwilderness or that desert.
And I could just go backthrough the pages and look at
the scriptures of who God sayshe is and know that, yeah, he is
(09:16):
faithful.
He is my strength, he is, wasmy comforter.
Well, he was, but he's gonnabe.
He is the one that sees me andhears me and picks me up and
strengthens me.
And relying on that, knowing,knowing him has gotten me
through and continues to get methrough.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Absolutely.
And you know, Kathy, we'vetalked a little bit about the, I
think by now the listenersunderstand that you have
experienced multiple uhmiscarriages, and you you guys
lost your four, I believe,14-month-old son, John.
And so you guys are really wellacquainted with grief,
unfortunately.
Speaker (09:56):
We were.
I mean, it's unfortunate, butwe we lost three babies through
miscarriage, and then with JohnSamuel, we found out in the 14th
week, and so you were rightwith the 14, the 14th week that
he had a fatal birth defect.
You know, doctors were saying,you know, you could terminate
the pregnancy, but we knew thatthis was a miracle baby, and we
(10:17):
continue to carry him the 42weeks, knowing that God was able
to heal him.
And if he chose not to on thisside of heaven, we knew he would
be healed.
So he chose not to heal himphysically, but God enabled us
to hold him when he was born andto release him when he was born
(10:40):
into eternity.
And his life continues to makean impact.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
That is the part that I think sometimes goes for
people who are living on theoutside of this and haven't
experienced it, is that seeinghow our child is able to
continue touching lives, as yousaid, years and even decades
after they after they go home toheaven.
(11:07):
And you've seen that, we wecontinue to see that, and and
that, you know, it as much as ithurts, and as much as we would
love to have the ability to holdour children again and interact
with them again, we know thatbecause of God's grace, if
(11:28):
they're infants and if later onif they are in Christ, then we
know that we're going to bereunited with them again.
And so we have that absolutehope that that this it will be
better at at some point in time,and that that the pain does
(11:52):
last.
The pain is is something thatstays with you, but you know, as
you and I talked about earlier,the acuteness of that grief
does uh does get better overtime.
You know, I want those who arelistening today, maybe who are
in a very fresh, acute season ofgrief, to understand that there
(12:16):
are no right or wrong ways togrieve because it is so personal
and because every loss is sodifferent.
However, there certainly are uhhealthy and unhealthy ways to
grieve.
And that that's a wholedifferent matter.
But as Kathy said, if you'relistening today, give yourself
(12:39):
permission to grieve and giveyourself permission to stop
feeling pressure, whether it'sself-induced or whether it's
coming from the outside, to getover it.
Because there is no gettingover it.
Speaker (12:54):
No, it's what steps can we take to embrace our loss.
And what I prayed early on,fresh in my grief, because I
knew I could not do this alone.
I just said, God, use my loss,enlarge me through it and use my
(13:16):
loss to matter.
I wanted purposeful loss andgrief.
And boy, did he ever.
So I and so those of you thatmight be really in that raw,
acute place, just know offeringeven the rawness of where you're
(13:37):
at in your pain, to just say,God, I'm hurting, and yet meet
me in this pain, show me what todo, and enlarge me through it
and make it count.
And I trust you, He will.
I've seen many people that havewritten me or talked to me, and
they said, that prayer, Kathy,of saying, God enlarge me
(14:00):
through my loss has changed mylife.
You know, they said the nextweek their neighbor lost a
child, and they were able to bethere as a comforter, even in
the raw, in the fresh place intheir grief.
They were able to reach out tosomeone else.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Yeah.
And that in itself really canhelp begin true healing in us as
we step into thoseopportunities that God provides
us to help somebody else.
A lot of times I think we endup discovering that it helped us
(14:39):
at least as much, if not more,than it did them.
Speaker (14:42):
You know, Greg, it's it's like living 2 Corinthians
1, 3 through 4.
And my paraphrase for thisverse, I'm going to read the
verse first, so it says, Praisebe to the God and the Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, theFather of compassion, and the
God of all comfort, who comfortsus in our troubles, so that we
(15:06):
can comfort those in any troubleand the comfort we ourselves
receive.
So, right there, that gives usall hope.
My paraphrase for that is we gothrough what we go through to
help others go through what wewent through.
And that's what you and I arewanting to do.
That's why we're here.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Yeah.
And it reminds me too, I thinkthat goes hand in hand with what
Romans 12, 15 says, that wethat we celebrate with the, and
I'm paraphrasing that intomodern English.
We celebrate with those who arecelebrating and we grieve with
those who grieve.
So it's a it's a matter of youknow sometimes we enter into
(15:52):
that journey with them.
We step into it and we step outof it, we step in and we step
out, depending upon theirindividual needs and depending
upon where they are on thatgrief journey.
But but it is it's a necessarything, I think, to continue to
move forward is not to allowthat to just to just kind of get
(16:16):
dammed up inside of us.
It's got to come out.
And one way of doing that is tospeak into the lives of other
people who are maybe in afresher season or a more acute
season.
Because every time we talkabout it, it helps.
It helps us to be able toprocess it.
(16:38):
And that processing helps us tobe able to better navigate
going forward.
Speaker (16:43):
It really does.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, yeah.
So, Kathy, you know, for whenyou think thinking back to those
days, those early days when youguys were in that those acute
seasons of grief.
Grief triggers all sorts ofemotions in us.
And it triggers so manyquestions, and it leaves us
(17:09):
sometimes just feeling angry andguilty, and there's this mental
confusion that sometimes wekind of equate to what COVID
brain was like, uh, where youjust you feel like you're going
crazy, and you feel like youcan't make decisions.
You don't want to makedecisions.
Everything is just hard, andyou sometimes feel almost
(17:30):
paralyzed in some respects, andit that that time frame lasts
different lengths of time fordifferent people.
So, for you guys, how were youable to begin accepting what had
happened, to start figuring outhow to process through that,
(17:55):
and then to be able to navigatethe path forward, like we talked
about earlier, not the pathover, but the path forward.
Speaker (18:02):
Well, for us, again, it's personal.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Right.
Speaker (18:06):
Our our journey of grieving and loss began at the
14th week of my pregnancy whenwe got the diagnosis on Good
Friday that your baby's gonnadie.
So, how I dealt with that is Ineeded some time alone to
process.
And that was ironically, Easterweekend.
(18:27):
So I went into my Gethsemanecloset, which was a room for the
weekend.
And I, for the first time, Ithink, understood to a new level
of what Jesus cried out when hewas in Gethsemane.
And he said, Would you takethis?
You know, if you could takethis cup of suffering, I'm
(18:49):
paraphrasing, but take it.
And I did not want to have tosuffer.
I had gone through thisdiagnosis with a friend years
earlier, which is God's grace,really, to let me be prepared.
But I had to wrestle in sorrowand in that dark night of the
soul with those questions, ifyou can take this away.
(19:10):
And finally, I got to a pointwhere those three words that
Jesus cried out is yet.
That was the turning point forme to say, yet, not my will but
thine be done.
Now I realize for somelisteners, you may be going
through a long-term illness orgone through a long-term
illness, so you understand whatI'm talking about.
(19:32):
And for others, maybe it was anunexpected loss.
So we're all going to respond.
But that was my first wrestlingis dealing with the yet, not my
will but thine.
And there were times when I wascrying unexpectedly.
There were times when I wasangry and I threw my shoes
(19:53):
against the wall.
There were times where, youknow, I was in a dark place of
depression.
And I needed to talk to othersto help me get through that.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah.
Speaker (20:06):
There were times where I thought I had surrendered my
pain.
And I thought I was doing, asothers say, Are you doing okay?
Well, I thought I was in thatmoment, only to discover that I
rounded a new bin and there wasa whole other mountain to climb.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
Yeah.
Speaker (20:24):
So I had to learn to be gentle with myself and learn to
say, I need to be where I'm at.
And of course, I would look andI do what I call the halt.
Am I hungry, angry, lonely, ortired?
They use that in 12-stepprograms, but I knew that that
mattered to me too.
How's my body doing?
(20:46):
How's my emotions doing?
And how's my spirit doing?
So I could be, you know, greatin the morning and by the
afternoon different.
So I had to give myself topermission, but I also had to be
willing to let God connect meto people or resources to be
(21:07):
willing to go there.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Yeah, it's some of that comes down to making
choices.
Uh, because uh as as we alludedto a minute ago, when you're in
the in in that early season ofgrief, you just don't want to
make any decisions.
You just want you just wantpeace, you want comfort, and you
(21:32):
want ease.
You don't want to have to dealwith anything difficult.
Uh but you have to.
You know, it it's true.
You you can't avoid it, but forso long.
And then you have we get tochoose.
I mean, you know, we eitherstep into it or we bury it.
(21:53):
And at some point, even thoughwe've tried to bury it, it it'll
resurface.
And a lot of times it's worseif we buried it, because it's
festering inside all that timeanyway.
Speaker (22:07):
It's true.
And there are times when wecan't, but he can.
Yes.
But are we willing to let him?
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah.
Speaker (22:17):
Sometimes that means saying, I can't function today
and I don't know what to do.
And having someone to talk to,it may be a grief share group.
That's a wonderful program.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
That yeah, they are.
Speaker (22:32):
It's it's everywhere.
It may be going to one and justsaying, and you find out you're
not alone.
It may be going to a doctor ora counselor, it may be talking
to a friend or a family memberor spouse to say, I just can't
function.
And it may be allowing othersto do things for you for a time.
(22:54):
Yes.
To receive.
And I know we both have had tolearn the lesson of receiving
because it's so much easier togive and be in control.
And it sometimes feels weakwhen we allow ourselves to
receive help from others inthose times when we can't think
or we can't do.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah.
Well, you just you nailed it.
And when you said you can't bein control, we all like to be in
control.
And when you lose a child, yourealize that that perception
that you had of being incontrol, you know, you it may,
(23:36):
it's I don't mean that you'reyou can you're a control freak,
but we all like to think that weare in some respect controlling
how our lives are going or howwe're going to go.
But you realize when thathappens that it was just an
illusion.
Speaker (23:55):
It was.
And surrender is so important.
One funny thing, and those ofyou that are listening, you
could do this right now.
Everybody just put your handsup in the air.
Put your hands up in the air.
That is the universal symbolaround the world with all of the
armed forces for surrender.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Yes.
Speaker (24:14):
So what's beautiful about that is as I lost our son
and then went on to have birthtwo healthy children who really
never knew all of the grief I'dgone through, they would see me
walking around the house,throwing my hands up in the air.
And one day, one ass, theysaid, Mom, what are you doing?
(24:35):
I said, Well, I'm surrendering.
In that moment, I sensed griefbeing triggered or something
surfacing that I needed torelease to God.
But the beautiful part is whenyou throw it up to him, you're
actually reaching up to him.
And he's reaching down to you.
And I began just calling on whoI needed him to be.
(24:56):
If I was really angry, God,would you just, I'm releasing my
anger.
Would you just be the calm inmy storm?
Or God, I am so sad.
And I would release that.
And God, would you be the joythat strengthens me?
(25:18):
So that became and still does.
Now, when I was going throughbreast cancer, I couldn't raise
my arms for a while.
So it was a little tricky.
But yeah, but I did it in myheart.
And when I could raise my arms,that was something.
But that's something that is atangible, practical way that you
can offer it to God and ask himto be who you need him to be.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Yeah, and there is an awful lot of of peace and
release in that when you canchoose to do that, when you can
choose to surrender, give it tohim, realizing that you don't
have what you need, but he does.
And it is amazing thedifference that it could make
(26:07):
and will make.
You know, I something you saida minute ago triggered this
thought, and that is, you know,I I suspect if you and your
husband are like most couples,you're probably opposites in a
lot of ways.
Understatement?
Speaker (26:25):
He's an engineer, and yes.
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Introvert, extrovert.
Say no more.
So how did you how did you guysgrieve together as a couple,
but give yourselves the freedomto grieve independently as two
very different individuals?
What did that look like fory'all?
Speaker (26:46):
Well, I I have phrased it that men are like hardware
stores and women are like coffeeshops.
Okay.
That now, and and for us, thatwas the way it was.
You know, for my husband,really, Home Depot was a place
he went.
And he got busy.
I called him missing in action.
(27:07):
He was always busy, went rightback to work, got right back
into the zone because his way ofdealing with it was to be busy.
Where I, on the other hand, Idid go to coffee shops.
I would have my photos, and Ifeel sorry for a lot of the
people that I never knew,strangers, showing them pictures
of my baby.
(27:28):
I then began talking to friendsat coffee shops, but we did
have to give ourselvespermission to grieve
differently.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Right.
Speaker (27:39):
And there were times when we did come together, we
shared tears, we shared fears,we shared frustrations with I
expected him to be something hecouldn't be for me at that time
because he was hurting.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Right.
Speaker (27:58):
And I found that you know, there's a book that says
hurt people, hurt people.
We were both grieving, andsometimes we weren't the best
for each other to encourage inthe way that we needed.
So we had to learn when we wereable to, and we we weren't, we
(28:18):
had to learn to communicatehonestly.
Yeah.
And if I needed conversation,he'd look at me and he says, I
can't be that.
Why don't you grab a friend andgo to the coffee shop?
And I could look at him andsay, It's a time for a Home
Depot run.
So that was the way that we gotthrough that.
(28:39):
And of course, we were askingGod to help us and we were
asking people to pray for us,but we had to give ourselves
permission to personally bewhere we were in our journeys.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Yeah, that's a good word because I think it's I
think sometimes throughconversations I've had with with
others, it's very easy,unfortunately, because as we've
talked about a number of timesalready, that individuals grieve
differently.
But sometimes when you're in amarriage relationship and you
(29:12):
see your mate grievingdifferently than you do.
And I think a lot of times it'smore so with the moms feeling
like their husband, who maybehe's an engineer like your
husband, and he's veryintroverted and quiet, or
whether he's an extrovert.
He's gonna deal with itdifferently.
(29:34):
And sometimes it doesn't looklike, from all appearances, that
he's really grieving at thelevel that you are.
And sometimes I think thatcauses tension and arguments and
resentment.
But what you were just sayingis so important because we have
(29:56):
to give each other that freedomand permission to grieve like
only we grieve.
Speaker (30:04):
Absolutely.
I I've made mistakes withpeople because my personality is
let's talk about it, let's beexpressive.
And when someone had a lossthat I was reaching out to, I
early on would respond the way Ineeded.
That was not how, andfortunately, that person was
(30:27):
honest and said, this was not asmeaningful to me as it would be
for you.
So I learned that I need tothink about what's their love
language, what's who are they?
And I just began praying, God,show me how to help this person,
show me how to help my husband.
I began asking God because Ifigure he knows more than I do.
(30:49):
And that was a turning pointfor me to start asking him.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yeah, that's good.
And I think in some respectswhat it's saying is we have to
meet people where they areinstead of wanting them to be
the way we want them to be orthe way that we are, we have to
accept and honor and respectthat they are who they are.
(31:15):
And that's okay.
There is not a thing in theworld wrong with those two,
those two aspects of grief beingso different.
Speaker (31:24):
And I discovered that with our little child.
Our little boy was six when helost his baby brother.
And he needed to grieve and heneeded permission to grieve.
And I remember them the nursescautioning us to bring him to
the hospital to see this babythat, you know, by the world
standards, we put a little haton him, but he didn't look as
(31:47):
normal as other babies.
Speaker 1 (31:49):
Sure.
Speaker (31:49):
And I said this is important for him to hold this
baby that he prayed for and heplayed Hot Wheels with as the
baby would kick.
He needed to have that.
And over the few the next fewmonths he said to me Mom, I want
a picture of John Samuel andme.
So I, and he wanted it right onhis wall.
(32:09):
So that's what he needed.
And he wanted to go to the tothe graveside and have Taco Bell
picnics.
So we did.
Now other people might thinkwell that's a little crazy.
Of course my engineer husbandkind of rolled his eyes but
that's what our little six yearold son needed.
And in first grade he drewpictures of his brother in
(32:33):
heaven.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
Yeah.
Speaker (32:34):
And that was important to recognize it's not just
adults agree, but it's childrenand others.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
I'm so glad you brought that up Kathy because
unfortunately siblings you knowyou and I both know who have
lost a brother or sister areknown as the Forgotten Mourners.
And there are obvious reasonsfor that.
But it is important as parentseven in your own grief to to try
(33:06):
to to recognize that that thatbrother or sister younger or
older is grieving.
They may not be sharing it asmuch may not be talking about it
as much with particularly withyou as the parent because
particularly if they're olderthey probably don't want to put
(33:28):
any more on you than you alreadyhave.
And so therefore they have atendency to keep a lot of it to
themselves and hopefullyeventually we'll find some kind
of community to share it withwhether it be the counselor, the
the physician or just somebodyan another significant person in
(33:49):
their life.
But we do need to recognizethat that it's not just the
parents so thank you for forbringing that up and that's one
of the things that we that wepurposed to do when we started
the empty chair endeavor was tofocus both on the the parents
but also on those those grievingsiblings.
(34:10):
Kathy I think there areprobably for listeners today
that are maybe in that earlyseason of grief and and of
course it applies to people likeus too but I think in the early
season of grief you know whenthere's so much acute pain and
you get hit a lot by those whatwe call tidal waves of grief
(34:34):
that just kind of hit us fromout of nowhere.
It's kind of like gettingT-boned you know going down the
highway.
And there you know then there'sthose more subtle ones.
I call them the little thelittle ambushes where you just
you don't see it coming it couldbe a song it could be a a scent
that you associated with yourchild or an article of clothing
(34:55):
you open a drawer and oh goshthere it is and you're so
suddenly brought back to tothose early moments.
For somebody who's feeling thatway today like is this the way
my life is going to be for therest of my life is it going to
always hurt like this and is itgoing to always deep this messy
(35:16):
what would you say to them?
Speaker (35:18):
Well I would say it's kind of like a rainbow.
It takes both sunshine andtears to make a rainbow you know
both rain and sunshine but I'velearned got over time I think
God has changed my perspectivewhen I have a a moment where
like a a fragrance or a piece ofclothing or just a setting will
(35:41):
trigger or remind me I pauseand I realize okay it's all
right to feel and then I thankGod for remind for not
forgetting my child because whatI don't want to do is ever
forget that John Samuel livedthat my children had a purpose
(36:06):
and in unique ways God usesthose moments to say I see you I
remember it's okay to feel andyet even if there's tears I can
have a smile knowing that mychild will never be forgotten.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
No your child will not you certainly won't forget I
think that's impossible for aparent to do.
But I think it also brings upanother really important point
for those of us who are on agrief journey we do fear that
other people will forget ourchild and that they will you
(36:53):
know within a few months or afew years it'll be as though
they they never lived and so Ithink you hopefully I don't
think there's any doubt youwould agree with this if you uh
if you have somebody in yourlife who's grieving the loss of
a child don't be afraid to speakthat child's name in their
(37:14):
presence don't be afraid to askabout them or sh or even share
with them something that youexperienced with that child,
whether it be you know you wenton some sort of a trip together,
you know, you're a funny storyabout your child.
And you can just ask would itbe okay if I shared a story
(37:34):
about John?
Would it be okay if I told youabout what happened this this
particular time because it'slike music to our ears, isn't
it?
When somebody else uses theirname.
Speaker (37:47):
It is and when people do something to honor your child
I remember early on I went tothe cemetery and there was a
gift on the grave and there andthere was not a note but it was
so amazing.
And so that prompted me tothink and to pray and say God
(38:08):
how can I remember other peoplemaybe I don't know them but how
can so I did a cemeterysurprise.
So on Mother's Day I put Ziplocbags and I put little Bibles
and I put all kinds of fun giftsand I put mylar balloons that
said Happy Mother's Day all overthe newbies.
You could go around the gravesand you knew who the newbies
(38:30):
were the the the fresh flowersthat you know the fresh and so
my husband amazingly did it withme.
So we were able to withoutsaying their names but yet we
could I could say their namesbecause I knew so I wrote them a
note I know you're rememberingMary today and we are and I
(38:52):
didn't let them know it was me.
It was just an anonymous gift.
And so when people do somethingto honor you or your child or
say their name or do somethingour our six year old son said
hey mom what are we going to dofor his birthday and you know I
hadn't thought about it.
So the one year anniversary sowe decided that the shoebox
(39:15):
ministry was timely so we did ashoebox with a child that age.
So every year we began doingsomething unique because it
honored him and our son who isnow a young adult male continues
to do things to honor others inhis brother's name.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
Oh that is that is so amazing and you know I those
those folks that you've donethat for they may not know that
it was you Kathy but they willnever ever ever forget that and
you know it it is a way when weyou know when we stop and think
that as Christians we areJesus's representatives in the
(40:02):
world that we touch.
And so when you do when we dothings like that even if it's
anonymously and I think maybeeven more importantly if we do
it anonymously maybe God getsall the credit and maybe that
individual is thinking oh mygosh God did this for me today
(40:24):
through somebody else like you.
Yeah.
Speaker (40:27):
And yeah I mean it it is amazing and it brings me so
much joy when I hear someone whohas lost a child or a loved one
I could just say God what's mypart you know you might read it
in the newspaper see it onlinehear it on the news and the year
that Columbine happened Godreally prompted me.
(40:50):
He said I want you to write apersonal note to each of them on
the year anniversary and I wantyou to send them a copy of your
book grieving the loss of aloved one so I did.
Got all their names I wrote Idon't expect thank you cards but
I did because I asked Godwhat's my part and it we all
(41:12):
have a part and somehow when wedo that it validates our child
yeah and it validates our griefand it transforms it into
something very purposeful.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
Yes absolutely Kathy before I get you to tell us a
little bit more about yourministry Hopelifters Unlimited I
do want to ask you anotherquestion that because this is I
guess known as a grief podcastwhat we I think hopefully people
(41:46):
what people are hearing is thatthe focus is not death.
Yes that's a that's a part ofour stories but somewhere along
our journey we in order to beable to be healthy people again
to be able to move forward aswe've talked about and to find
(42:06):
to to rediscover purpose andmeaning and hope in their lives
again that focus has totransition or needs to
transition from our child'sdeath to life who our child is
the memories that our child leftus the impact that our child
(42:28):
made on our lives and the impactthat our child is continuing to
make particularly through us ifwe are engaged in some way in
trying to help others for you asyou think back through those
seasons was there can youremember anything any points in
(42:49):
time or anything that kind oftriggered you feeling like gosh
maybe I've kind of turned thecorner and it's like you feel
you can experience joy again youcan laugh again without feeling
guilty.
You know what I mean?
(43:09):
Does that does that questionmake sense?
Speaker (43:12):
It does you know I it was there one particular one I
can't recall just one but therehave been a number of them and
one happened a week after whichis amazing but it was I was in a
deep place of recoveringphysically but also grieving
deeply the you know the secondgrief I call it the actual
(43:35):
physical loss and burial of ourson.
Right.
And and I got a call fromsomebody that said I saw this
woman in a newspaper in anotherstate and she has the exact same
diagnosis that your son hadwould you reach out to her well
my first thought is well no I'mgrieving I'm in this you know I
don't I don't have it in me.
(43:56):
And I just remembered God'slittle reminder to me that I had
cried out enlarge me through myloss and I had to make a choice
am I going to stay among thedead or am I going to choose to
step forward to be among theliving so I chose forward to
reach out to that woman notknowing but I did.
So that gave me the momentwhere I chose to allow God to
(44:22):
use my hurt and make it intohope.
Right and other opportunitiesthat have fast forwarded where
one day I just sensed that hewanted me to take a a group of
grieving moms away on a bustrip.
And that was pivotal becauseI'd never done anything like
that.
I'd done you know small thingswhich anything we do is big in
(44:45):
God's so we don't want tocompare.
Don't want to compare whatyou're doing and I'm doing do
and be who you are.
But I stepped forward in faithto be obedient and took about
four years but four years laterI chartered a bus and I took a
group of grieving moms away andwe've done 12 since getting on
the bus and realizing that therewere a group that were where I
(45:10):
was in that dark place in thedeath mode and then across the
aisle were those I call themhope lifters.
They'd gone through it and theywant to help you go through it.
They reached across the aisleand now all of those that were
on the one side are now on myteam and that brings me so much
joy to know that it just camewith a little thought from God
(45:35):
but just really from Him tooffer myself.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah and sometimes those opportunities do require
that we step out of our comfortzone sometimes because as you
said a minute ago when you'regrieving everything is pretty
much an effort there's nothingnothing seems easy but when we
step into those opportunitiesrealizing that you know we don't
(46:03):
have to have all the answers orwe don't have to have it
figured out we don't have toknow all the how-tos and what
ifs and the whys and all that ifwe just step into it and offer
ourselves it is amazing how Godcan use that not just to bless
us but more so to bless otherpeople and and it and everybody
(46:24):
is encouraged and helped andfinds hope in the process they
do.
Speaker (46:31):
Another thing in the verse John 146 really helps me
and I think it will helplisteners it says you are the
way the truth and the lifeabsolutely and you know Jesus is
saying those words you know Iam the way the truth and the
life and so I'm saying to him ifyou're the way and you're the
(46:52):
truth and you're the life I needto follow you.
Would you help me through this?
Because we don't have to bealone he is with us.
He will never leave us andthose of us our children you
know I like to picture mychildren are with him.
This is a pause for me.
This is just a comma it's notthe end I'm one day closer to
(47:14):
that amazing celebration butuntil then I want every moment
to count.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yeah I agree I feel the same way.
Thank you for what you're doingand you you've been doing
you've been doing things to helpother grieving particularly
moms for a long time you knownot just those those bus tours
that you talked about you'vealso written I think what four
books?
Yes and two of those I thinkmore specific to parents who've
(47:46):
lost children.
Yes so why don't you take aminute tell us about those Kathy
and how people can get them butalso if there's anything that
you would like to share in inmore detail about your ministry
hopelifters just take the youknow take the the microphone and
(48:06):
take it away.
Speaker (48:07):
Okay.
Well I have written four booksand ironically each grief
devotional I was writing I waspregnant with a living a child
that did live.
So the first one was grievingthe loss of a loved one and that
is a 60 day devotional foranyone who has lost any loved
one and it will point you to whoGod is not only scripture a
(48:30):
short story a metaphor and aplace to journal.
I fought for the journal pagesbecause sometimes we just need
to write the second book isgrieving the child I never knew
and that's for anyone who's lostan unborn, newborn stillborn uh
an infant and that helps themspecifically specifically again
(48:50):
look at who God is a a devotiona place to journal this one also
has discussion guides becausewe're finding that a lot of the
the women who have lost unbornbabies there's not a place for
them or for infants to reallyconnect.
So Hope lifter is my one of mysignature books and that is a
(49:11):
bringing creative ways to spreadhope when life hurts and
there's a hundred recipes of howdo I help somebody in any life
circumstance.
And then there is a bookLonging for a child which is
going through the season ofinfertility and that's a
devotional the grieving the lossof loved one and the grieving
the child and hopelifter you canget on Amazon or Faith Gateway
(49:31):
or I think Barnes and Noble hasit.
And the Longing for a child youneed to contact me because that
one we're revamping some thingsso that's one if you're going
through infertility you cancontact me.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
And how can people do that Kathy?
Speaker (49:45):
How can they contact you directly probably the best
way is just my email which isKathy K-A-T-A-G at hopelifters
dot com.
So it's hopelifters dot com.
They can just send me an emailI always will respond within a
few days and I can work it outwith you to get you the the
(50:05):
longing book if that'ssomething.
As far as where I'm at withhope lifters I'm getting ready
to take a sabbatical I do thatevery year and going to really
hear God what do you want me todo now?
How do you want me to stewardthe roles including my grieving
mom role?
That's a role that I have howdo you want me to steward that
and we'll see where he takes itright now.
(50:26):
I am mentoring women across thecountry and locally here in
Arizona but there are a lot ofleaders that are coming to me.
And so if you're out there andwe all have people we influence
that is a heartbeat for me and Isense that during the
sabbatical God's going to makeit clear.
So 2026 stay tuned I do have awebsite that's in process of
(50:47):
being revamped hopelifters.combut 2026 we may be offering some
things for leaders and I loveto connect so again send me an
email.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
And I'll provide links both to your email and to
your or I'll include your emailand provide a link to
Hopelifters so that it'll makeit a little bit easier and
that'll be in the podcastepisode description.
So take a look there if youwould like Kathy thank you so
very very much for sharing yourheart today and for being so
(51:22):
transparent about what you'veexperienced because I think that
I think that your story and theencouragement that people heard
today is going to go a long wayto give grieving parents some
hope and to know that they'rethey will if they'll just lean
into God and give him their painand their loss then he will
(51:48):
bring you to a place where youwill discover rediscover meaning
and purpose in your life againand be able to help other
people.
Speaker (51:59):
Yes.
Well thank you Greg for havingme and I just pray for all of
the listeners that God will doimmeasurably more according to
his power.
Just offer what you have andhe'll multiply hope.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Absolutely thank you so much Kathy and for for those
of you who are listening if thisconversation meant something to
you if it provided some hopeand encouragement please let us
know there's a play there's alink in the episode description
where you can click and leave amessage you can go to Apple
(52:35):
Podcast.
You can also leave a messageyou can leave a review or or a
rating we love to hear from ourlisteners.
And as always thank you so muchfor listening and we look
forward to having you back intwo weeks.
Well, hi, and welcome back for our latest episode.
I'm Greg Buffkin, and asalways, thank you for listening.
Joining me today is KatheWunnenberg. Kathe is the founder
and president of HopeliftersUnlimited, which is a
Christ-centered resource andtraining organization to help
(01:11):
encourage grieving, hurting, andweary women.
Kathe’s a noted speaker, aconsultant, and author of four
books.
She is well acquainted withgrief, having lost her
14-month-old son, as well ashaving had three miscarriage
losses within 14 months.
Kathe is married, has threeliving sons, and lives with her
(01:35):
family in Arizona.
I think you'll really beencouraged by this conversation.
And now here's my conversationwith Kathe.
Well, Kathe welcome to ourpodcast.
It is so good to have you asour guest today.
Speaker (01:51):
It's great to be with you, Greg.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Thank you.
Well, as with all of myguests, at the beginning of each
episode, I just ask each guestto share anything that they
would like on a personal levelthat they would like for the
listeners to know that theymight not pick up otherwise by
Googling you.
Speaker (02:12):
Well, I was raised in a small town of Missouri, so I'm
a small town girl of 300.
But I tell you what, God hasdone amazing things in my life.
So I'm you can take the girlout of the country, but you
can't take the country out ofthe girl.
So that's something you may notknow.
I'm I'm a mom of seven.
I have four babies in heaven,and I have three living sons,
(02:35):
adult, young adult sons, and onethrough the gift of adoption.
So you may not see that.
I've been married to my collegesweetheart for almost 45 years.
So that's a miracle.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Congratulations.
Speaker (02:49):
And really grateful.
And recently, in the lastcouple of years, God allowed me
to go on a new journey of lossthrough breast cancer.
So that was a journeyunexpected.
And yet, what I've found, Greg,is that all of what I've
learned through the loss of mychildren is that that helped me
(03:09):
go through another circumstancethat I was not expecting.
And I'm glad to report that,you know, my husband had a
quadruple bypass during thattime as well.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Oh, wow.
Speaker (03:20):
So talk about extremes.
And I know many of thelisteners out there probably are
in those health challenges too.
I can assure you that God meetsyou no matter where you're at.
And he did for us.
We're doing great.
We're in a healthy season andwe are celebrating all that he's
done.
So that's a little bit aboutme.
I am in the desert.
So I've lived here over 40years, and I said, God brought
(03:43):
me here.
And I said, Do I get to crossover after 40 years?
And he said, Not yet.
So I think I'm on year 42, butI am weathering the weather, but
I am grateful to be here.
And I love technology so thatwe can connect with one another
and bring hope.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Oh, absolutely.
You know, it it always isalways a double-edged sword.
You know, it can be, I thinkwhen a lot of the new technology
was being rolled out, those ofus who are in or older
generation, shall we say, mayhave been resistant to it at
some points along along the way.
(04:22):
But I think we've all learnedthat, man, it it is amazing what
God can do with this technologybecause otherwise we wouldn't
be doing what we're doing rightnow.
Speaker (04:32):
That's true.
And we can actually thank COVIDfor that.
I mean, that really got us allconnecting.
So there's always something tobe grateful for, even if we
really don't like what it is.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
Yeah.
God can bring good out of theworst.
Speaker (04:48):
He can.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
And you know, it's funny.
You were telling us that, youknow, you live in the desert.
It's God has quite a reputationfor teaching us things in the
desert, doesn't he?
Speaker (05:02):
He does.
He does.
I mean, it's like the thingsthat we have to learn.
I actually spent some timeduring last year's sabbatical,
just what are the lessons Ilearned in the desert?
And even if you physicallydon't live in a desert like I
do, we go through desert times.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Yes, we do.
Speaker (05:21):
Somewhere between what was and what's going to be.
And so we can learn a lot ofgreat lessons.
And he speaks loud and clearwhen we're in the desert.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
He does.
And if you haven't been there,just hang on, because at some
point you probably will be.
Speaker (05:37):
Life is a series of endings of what used to be the
Egypt, I call it, and then thein-between, that desert and
wilderness place, and then thenew beginning.
And let's face, let's face it,Greg, we'd like to get from what
was to what's going to be andnot do the desert or the
wilderness time the in-between.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Yeah, I I kind of prefer that too.
But we don't always get tochoose that, do we?
Speaker (06:05):
I know.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah, but fortunately, he knows better.
And as you said a minute ago,what you went through all those
years ago grieving the loss ofchildren enabled you to be able
to better weather the storm thatof breast cancer.
(06:27):
It's you know and you wouldn'thave chosen that.
Speaker (06:34):
No, I wouldn't have chosen that, but it was a
necessary part of my journey.
And what I learned, Greg, whenI lost our son and and other
babies through miscarriage, thatI could either choose to whine
and resist the desert, or Icould learn to worship and meet
God there.
(06:55):
And so I I determined that Ineeded to just surrender and
learn the lessons.
And by doing that, fast forwardthrough other life
circumstances.
How I got to know God in thosemoments, because usually people
are not with you.
Others can't go there with you,with God.
(07:16):
And who I became acquaintedwith Him and got to build our
relationship and heard from Himonly built my faith and enabled
me to know that, oh, you werefaithful then, you'll be
faithful now.
Who I got to know you manyyears ago, you will be even
(07:39):
beyond that in thiscircumstance.
So I trusted him.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Yeah, and and he rewards that.
We, I mean, you've experiencedit as well as we have.
And, you know, when when you gothrough things like that, you
know, you discover that he'she's there in that with you.
He doesn't leave you there togo through it by yourself.
And he will carry us throughthat.
(08:04):
And there are, as hard as itseems, he can, he has this
ability to bring good out of theabsolute worst imaginable
traumatic events of life.
And once we've once we've seenhis faithfulness in something as
(08:25):
traumatic as losing a child, itreally does, if we lean into
him and give him that pain andtrauma, it really does help us
the next time something presentsitself in our life, and we've
got to lean on him.
We, you know, we have to dowhatever it is by faith.
(08:46):
It's a whole lot easier totrust him in that next event.
And I know you you have foundthat.
Speaker (08:53):
Absolutely.
I mean, I relied on thecharacter of God in every one of
my devotionals.
Every devotion points to acharacter of who God is out of
my experience of being in thatwilderness or that desert.
And I could just go backthrough the pages and look at
the scriptures of who God sayshe is and know that, yeah, he is
(09:16):
faithful.
He is my strength, he is, wasmy comforter.
Well, he was, but he's gonnabe.
He is the one that sees me andhears me and picks me up and
strengthens me.
And relying on that, knowing,knowing him has gotten me
through and continues to get methrough.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Absolutely.
And you know, Kathy, we'vetalked a little bit about the, I
think by now the listenersunderstand that you have
experienced multiple uhmiscarriages, and you you guys
lost your four, I believe,14-month-old son, John.
And so you guys are really wellacquainted with grief,
unfortunately.
Speaker (09:56):
We were.
I mean, it's unfortunate, butwe we lost three babies through
miscarriage, and then with JohnSamuel, we found out in the 14th
week, and so you were rightwith the 14, the 14th week that
he had a fatal birth defect.
You know, doctors were saying,you know, you could terminate
the pregnancy, but we knew thatthis was a miracle baby, and we
(10:17):
continue to carry him the 42weeks, knowing that God was able
to heal him.
And if he chose not to on thisside of heaven, we knew he would
be healed.
So he chose not to heal himphysically, but God enabled us
to hold him when he was born andto release him when he was born
(10:40):
into eternity.
And his life continues to makean impact.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
That is the part that I think sometimes goes for
people who are living on theoutside of this and haven't
experienced it, is that seeinghow our child is able to
continue touching lives, as yousaid, years and even decades
after they after they go home toheaven.
(11:07):
And you've seen that, we wecontinue to see that, and and
that, you know, it as much as ithurts, and as much as we would
love to have the ability to holdour children again and interact
with them again, we know thatbecause of God's grace, if
(11:28):
they're infants and if later onif they are in Christ, then we
know that we're going to bereunited with them again.
And so we have that absolutehope that that this it will be
better at at some point in time,and that that the pain does
(11:52):
last.
The pain is is something thatstays with you, but you know, as
you and I talked about earlier,the acuteness of that grief
does uh does get better overtime.
You know, I want those who arelistening today, maybe who are
in a very fresh, acute season ofgrief, to understand that there
(12:16):
are no right or wrong ways togrieve because it is so personal
and because every loss is sodifferent.
However, there certainly are uhhealthy and unhealthy ways to
grieve.
And that that's a wholedifferent matter.
But as Kathy said, if you'relistening today, give yourself
(12:39):
permission to grieve and giveyourself permission to stop
feeling pressure, whether it'sself-induced or whether it's
coming from the outside, to getover it.
Because there is no gettingover it.
Speaker (12:54):
No, it's what steps can we take to embrace our loss.
And what I prayed early on,fresh in my grief, because I
knew I could not do this alone.
I just said, God, use my loss,enlarge me through it and use my
(13:16):
loss to matter.
I wanted purposeful loss andgrief.
And boy, did he ever.
So I and so those of you thatmight be really in that raw,
acute place, just know offeringeven the rawness of where you're
(13:37):
at in your pain, to just say,God, I'm hurting, and yet meet
me in this pain, show me what todo, and enlarge me through it
and make it count.
And I trust you, He will.
I've seen many people that havewritten me or talked to me, and
they said, that prayer, Kathy,of saying, God enlarge me
(14:00):
through my loss has changed mylife.
You know, they said the nextweek their neighbor lost a
child, and they were able to bethere as a comforter, even in
the raw, in the fresh place intheir grief.
They were able to reach out tosomeone else.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Yeah.
And that in itself really canhelp begin true healing in us as
we step into thoseopportunities that God provides
us to help somebody else.
A lot of times I think we endup discovering that it helped us
(14:39):
at least as much, if not more,than it did them.
Speaker (14:42):
You know, Greg, it's it's like living 2 Corinthians
1, 3 through 4.
And my paraphrase for thisverse, I'm going to read the
verse first, so it says, Praisebe to the God and the Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, theFather of compassion, and the
God of all comfort, who comfortsus in our troubles, so that we
(15:06):
can comfort those in any troubleand the comfort we ourselves
receive.
So, right there, that gives usall hope.
My paraphrase for that is we gothrough what we go through to
help others go through what wewent through.
And that's what you and I arewanting to do.
That's why we're here.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Yeah.
And it reminds me too, I thinkthat goes hand in hand with what
Romans 12, 15 says, that wethat we celebrate with the, and
I'm paraphrasing that intomodern English.
We celebrate with those who arecelebrating and we grieve with
those who grieve.
So it's a it's a matter of youknow sometimes we enter into
(15:52):
that journey with them.
We step into it and we step outof it, we step in and we step
out, depending upon theirindividual needs and depending
upon where they are on thatgrief journey.
But but it is it's a necessarything, I think, to continue to
move forward is not to allowthat to just to just kind of get
(16:16):
dammed up inside of us.
It's got to come out.
And one way of doing that is tospeak into the lives of other
people who are maybe in afresher season or a more acute
season.
Because every time we talkabout it, it helps.
It helps us to be able toprocess it.
(16:38):
And that processing helps us tobe able to better navigate
going forward.
Speaker (16:43):
It really does.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, yeah.
So, Kathy, you know, for whenyou think thinking back to those
days, those early days when youguys were in that those acute
seasons of grief.
Grief triggers all sorts ofemotions in us.
And it triggers so manyquestions, and it leaves us
(17:09):
sometimes just feeling angry andguilty, and there's this mental
confusion that sometimes wekind of equate to what COVID
brain was like, uh, where youjust you feel like you're going
crazy, and you feel like youcan't make decisions.
You don't want to makedecisions.
Everything is just hard, andyou sometimes feel almost
(17:30):
paralyzed in some respects, andit that that time frame lasts
different lengths of time fordifferent people.
So, for you guys, how were youable to begin accepting what had
happened, to start figuring outhow to process through that,
(17:55):
and then to be able to navigatethe path forward, like we talked
about earlier, not the pathover, but the path forward.
Speaker (18:02):
Well, for us, again, it's personal.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Right.
Speaker (18:06):
Our our journey of grieving and loss began at the
14th week of my pregnancy whenwe got the diagnosis on Good
Friday that your baby's gonnadie.
So, how I dealt with that is Ineeded some time alone to
process.
And that was ironically, Easterweekend.
(18:27):
So I went into my Gethsemanecloset, which was a room for the
weekend.
And I, for the first time, Ithink, understood to a new level
of what Jesus cried out when hewas in Gethsemane.
And he said, Would you takethis?
You know, if you could takethis cup of suffering, I'm
(18:49):
paraphrasing, but take it.
And I did not want to have tosuffer.
I had gone through thisdiagnosis with a friend years
earlier, which is God's grace,really, to let me be prepared.
But I had to wrestle in sorrowand in that dark night of the
soul with those questions, ifyou can take this away.
(19:10):
And finally, I got to a pointwhere those three words that
Jesus cried out is yet.
That was the turning point forme to say, yet, not my will but
thine be done.
Now I realize for somelisteners, you may be going
through a long-term illness orgone through a long-term
illness, so you understand whatI'm talking about.
(19:32):
And for others, maybe it was anunexpected loss.
So we're all going to respond.
But that was my first wrestlingis dealing with the yet, not my
will but thine.
And there were times when I wascrying unexpectedly.
There were times when I wasangry and I threw my shoes
(19:53):
against the wall.
There were times where, youknow, I was in a dark place of
depression.
And I needed to talk to othersto help me get through that.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Yeah.
Speaker (20:06):
There were times where I thought I had surrendered my
pain.
And I thought I was doing, asothers say, Are you doing okay?
Well, I thought I was in thatmoment, only to discover that I
rounded a new bin and there wasa whole other mountain to climb.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
Yeah.
Speaker (20:24):
So I had to learn to be gentle with myself and learn to
say, I need to be where I'm at.
And of course, I would look andI do what I call the halt.
Am I hungry, angry, lonely, ortired?
They use that in 12-stepprograms, but I knew that that
mattered to me too.
How's my body doing?
(20:46):
How's my emotions doing?
And how's my spirit doing?
So I could be, you know, greatin the morning and by the
afternoon different.
So I had to give myself topermission, but I also had to be
willing to let God connect meto people or resources to be
(21:07):
willing to go there.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Yeah, it's some of that comes down to making
choices.
Uh, because uh as as we alludedto a minute ago, when you're in
the in in that early season ofgrief, you just don't want to
make any decisions.
You just want you just wantpeace, you want comfort, and you
(21:32):
want ease.
You don't want to have to dealwith anything difficult.
Uh but you have to.
You know, it it's true.
You you can't avoid it, but forso long.
And then you have we get tochoose.
I mean, you know, we eitherstep into it or we bury it.
(21:53):
And at some point, even thoughwe've tried to bury it, it it'll
resurface.
And a lot of times it's worseif we buried it, because it's
festering inside all that timeanyway.
Speaker (22:07):
It's true.
And there are times when wecan't, but he can.
Yes.
But are we willing to let him?
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah.
Speaker (22:17):
Sometimes that means saying, I can't function today
and I don't know what to do.
And having someone to talk to,it may be a grief share group.
That's a wonderful program.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
That yeah, they are.
Speaker (22:32):
It's it's everywhere.
It may be going to one and justsaying, and you find out you're
not alone.
It may be going to a doctor ora counselor, it may be talking
to a friend or a family memberor spouse to say, I just can't
function.
And it may be allowing othersto do things for you for a time.
(22:54):
Yes.
To receive.
And I know we both have had tolearn the lesson of receiving
because it's so much easier togive and be in control.
And it sometimes feels weakwhen we allow ourselves to
receive help from others inthose times when we can't think
or we can't do.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah.
Well, you just you nailed it.
And when you said you can't bein control, we all like to be in
control.
And when you lose a child, yourealize that that perception
that you had of being incontrol, you know, you it may,
(23:36):
it's I don't mean that you'reyou can you're a control freak,
but we all like to think that weare in some respect controlling
how our lives are going or howwe're going to go.
But you realize when thathappens that it was just an
illusion.
Speaker (23:55):
It was.
And surrender is so important.
One funny thing, and those ofyou that are listening, you
could do this right now.
Everybody just put your handsup in the air.
Put your hands up in the air.
That is the universal symbolaround the world with all of the
armed forces for surrender.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Yes.
Speaker (24:14):
So what's beautiful about that is as I lost our son
and then went on to have birthtwo healthy children who really
never knew all of the grief I'dgone through, they would see me
walking around the house,throwing my hands up in the air.
And one day, one ass, theysaid, Mom, what are you doing?
(24:35):
I said, Well, I'm surrendering.
In that moment, I sensed griefbeing triggered or something
surfacing that I needed torelease to God.
But the beautiful part is whenyou throw it up to him, you're
actually reaching up to him.
And he's reaching down to you.
And I began just calling on whoI needed him to be.
(24:56):
If I was really angry, God,would you just, I'm releasing my
anger.
Would you just be the calm inmy storm?
Or God, I am so sad.
And I would release that.
And God, would you be the joythat strengthens me?
(25:18):
So that became and still does.
Now, when I was going throughbreast cancer, I couldn't raise
my arms for a while.
So it was a little tricky.
But yeah, but I did it in myheart.
And when I could raise my arms,that was something.
But that's something that is atangible, practical way that you
can offer it to God and ask himto be who you need him to be.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Yeah, and there is an awful lot of of peace and
release in that when you canchoose to do that, when you can
choose to surrender, give it tohim, realizing that you don't
have what you need, but he does.
And it is amazing thedifference that it could make
(26:07):
and will make.
You know, I something you saida minute ago triggered this
thought, and that is, you know,I I suspect if you and your
husband are like most couples,you're probably opposites in a
lot of ways.
Understatement?
Speaker (26:25):
He's an engineer, and yes.
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Introvert, extrovert.
Say no more.
So how did you how did you guysgrieve together as a couple,
but give yourselves the freedomto grieve independently as two
very different individuals?
What did that look like fory'all?
Speaker (26:46):
Well, I I have phrased it that men are like hardware
stores and women are like coffeeshops.
Okay.
That now, and and for us, thatwas the way it was.
You know, for my husband,really, Home Depot was a place
he went.
And he got busy.
I called him missing in action.
(27:07):
He was always busy, went rightback to work, got right back
into the zone because his way ofdealing with it was to be busy.
Where I, on the other hand, Idid go to coffee shops.
I would have my photos, and Ifeel sorry for a lot of the
people that I never knew,strangers, showing them pictures
of my baby.
(27:28):
I then began talking to friendsat coffee shops, but we did
have to give ourselvespermission to grieve
differently.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Right.
Speaker (27:39):
And there were times when we did come together, we
shared tears, we shared fears,we shared frustrations with I
expected him to be something hecouldn't be for me at that time
because he was hurting.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Right.
Speaker (27:58):
And I found that you know, there's a book that says
hurt people, hurt people.
We were both grieving, andsometimes we weren't the best
for each other to encourage inthe way that we needed.
So we had to learn when we wereable to, and we we weren't, we
(28:18):
had to learn to communicatehonestly.
Yeah.
And if I needed conversation,he'd look at me and he says, I
can't be that.
Why don't you grab a friend andgo to the coffee shop?
And I could look at him andsay, It's a time for a Home
Depot run.
So that was the way that we gotthrough that.
(28:39):
And of course, we were askingGod to help us and we were
asking people to pray for us,but we had to give ourselves
permission to personally bewhere we were in our journeys.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Yeah, that's a good word because I think it's I
think sometimes throughconversations I've had with with
others, it's very easy,unfortunately, because as we've
talked about a number of timesalready, that individuals grieve
differently.
But sometimes when you're in amarriage relationship and you
(29:12):
see your mate grievingdifferently than you do.
And I think a lot of times it'smore so with the moms feeling
like their husband, who maybehe's an engineer like your
husband, and he's veryintroverted and quiet, or
whether he's an extrovert.
He's gonna deal with itdifferently.
(29:34):
And sometimes it doesn't looklike, from all appearances, that
he's really grieving at thelevel that you are.
And sometimes I think thatcauses tension and arguments and
resentment.
But what you were just sayingis so important because we have
(29:56):
to give each other that freedomand permission to grieve like
only we grieve.
Speaker (30:04):
Absolutely.
I I've made mistakes withpeople because my personality is
let's talk about it, let's beexpressive.
And when someone had a lossthat I was reaching out to, I
early on would respond the way Ineeded.
That was not how, andfortunately, that person was
(30:27):
honest and said, this was not asmeaningful to me as it would be
for you.
So I learned that I need tothink about what's their love
language, what's who are they?
And I just began praying, God,show me how to help this person,
show me how to help my husband.
I began asking God because Ifigure he knows more than I do.
(30:49):
And that was a turning pointfor me to start asking him.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yeah, that's good.
And I think in some respectswhat it's saying is we have to
meet people where they areinstead of wanting them to be
the way we want them to be orthe way that we are, we have to
accept and honor and respectthat they are who they are.
(31:15):
And that's okay.
There is not a thing in theworld wrong with those two,
those two aspects of grief beingso different.
Speaker (31:24):
And I discovered that with our little child.
Our little boy was six when helost his baby brother.
And he needed to grieve and heneeded permission to grieve.
And I remember them the nursescautioning us to bring him to
the hospital to see this babythat, you know, by the world
standards, we put a little haton him, but he didn't look as
(31:47):
normal as other babies.
Speaker 1 (31:49):
Sure.
Speaker (31:49):
And I said this is important for him to hold this
baby that he prayed for and heplayed Hot Wheels with as the
baby would kick.
He needed to have that.
And over the few the next fewmonths he said to me Mom, I want
a picture of John Samuel andme.
So I, and he wanted it right onhis wall.
(32:09):
So that's what he needed.
And he wanted to go to the tothe graveside and have Taco Bell
picnics.
So we did.
Now other people might thinkwell that's a little crazy.
Of course my engineer husbandkind of rolled his eyes but
that's what our little six yearold son needed.
And in first grade he drewpictures of his brother in
(32:33):
heaven.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
Yeah.
Speaker (32:34):
And that was important to recognize it's not just
adults agree, but it's childrenand others.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
I'm so glad you brought that up Kathy because
unfortunately siblings you knowyou and I both know who have
lost a brother or sister areknown as the Forgotten Mourners.
And there are obvious reasonsfor that.
But it is important as parentseven in your own grief to to try
(33:06):
to to recognize that that thatbrother or sister younger or
older is grieving.
They may not be sharing it asmuch may not be talking about it
as much with particularly withyou as the parent because
particularly if they're olderthey probably don't want to put
(33:28):
any more on you than you alreadyhave.
And so therefore they have atendency to keep a lot of it to
themselves and hopefullyeventually we'll find some kind
of community to share it withwhether it be the counselor, the
the physician or just somebodyan another significant person in
(33:49):
their life.
But we do need to recognizethat that it's not just the
parents so thank you for forbringing that up and that's one
of the things that we that wepurposed to do when we started
the empty chair endeavor was tofocus both on the the parents
but also on those those grievingsiblings.
(34:10):
Kathy I think there areprobably for listeners today
that are maybe in that earlyseason of grief and and of
course it applies to people likeus too but I think in the early
season of grief you know whenthere's so much acute pain and
you get hit a lot by those whatwe call tidal waves of grief
(34:34):
that just kind of hit us fromout of nowhere.
It's kind of like gettingT-boned you know going down the
highway.
And there you know then there'sthose more subtle ones.
I call them the little thelittle ambushes where you just
you don't see it coming it couldbe a song it could be a a scent
that you associated with yourchild or an article of clothing
(34:55):
you open a drawer and oh goshthere it is and you're so
suddenly brought back to tothose early moments.
For somebody who's feeling thatway today like is this the way
my life is going to be for therest of my life is it going to
always hurt like this and is itgoing to always deep this messy
(35:16):
what would you say to them?
Speaker (35:18):
Well I would say it's kind of like a rainbow.
It takes both sunshine andtears to make a rainbow you know
both rain and sunshine but I'velearned got over time I think
God has changed my perspectivewhen I have a a moment where
like a a fragrance or a piece ofclothing or just a setting will
(35:41):
trigger or remind me I pauseand I realize okay it's all
right to feel and then I thankGod for remind for not
forgetting my child because whatI don't want to do is ever
forget that John Samuel livedthat my children had a purpose
(36:06):
and in unique ways God usesthose moments to say I see you I
remember it's okay to feel andyet even if there's tears I can
have a smile knowing that mychild will never be forgotten.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
No your child will not you certainly won't forget I
think that's impossible for aparent to do.
But I think it also brings upanother really important point
for those of us who are on agrief journey we do fear that
other people will forget ourchild and that they will you
(36:53):
know within a few months or afew years it'll be as though
they they never lived and so Ithink you hopefully I don't
think there's any doubt youwould agree with this if you uh
if you have somebody in yourlife who's grieving the loss of
a child don't be afraid to speakthat child's name in their
(37:14):
presence don't be afraid to askabout them or sh or even share
with them something that youexperienced with that child,
whether it be you know you wenton some sort of a trip together,
you know, you're a funny storyabout your child.
And you can just ask would itbe okay if I shared a story
(37:34):
about John?
Would it be okay if I told youabout what happened this this
particular time because it'slike music to our ears, isn't
it?
When somebody else uses theirname.
Speaker (37:47):
It is and when people do something to honor your child
I remember early on I went tothe cemetery and there was a
gift on the grave and there andthere was not a note but it was
so amazing.
And so that prompted me tothink and to pray and say God
(38:08):
how can I remember other peoplemaybe I don't know them but how
can so I did a cemeterysurprise.
So on Mother's Day I put Ziplocbags and I put little Bibles
and I put all kinds of fun giftsand I put mylar balloons that
said Happy Mother's Day all overthe newbies.
You could go around the gravesand you knew who the newbies
(38:30):
were the the the fresh flowersthat you know the fresh and so
my husband amazingly did it withme.
So we were able to withoutsaying their names but yet we
could I could say their namesbecause I knew so I wrote them a
note I know you're rememberingMary today and we are and I
(38:52):
didn't let them know it was me.
It was just an anonymous gift.
And so when people do somethingto honor you or your child or
say their name or do somethingour our six year old son said
hey mom what are we going to dofor his birthday and you know I
hadn't thought about it.
So the one year anniversary sowe decided that the shoebox
(39:15):
ministry was timely so we did ashoebox with a child that age.
So every year we began doingsomething unique because it
honored him and our son who isnow a young adult male continues
to do things to honor others inhis brother's name.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
Oh that is that is so amazing and you know I those
those folks that you've donethat for they may not know that
it was you Kathy but they willnever ever ever forget that and
you know it it is a way when weyou know when we stop and think
that as Christians we areJesus's representatives in the
(40:02):
world that we touch.
And so when you do when we dothings like that even if it's
anonymously and I think maybeeven more importantly if we do
it anonymously maybe God getsall the credit and maybe that
individual is thinking oh mygosh God did this for me today
(40:24):
through somebody else like you.
Yeah.
Speaker (40:27):
And yeah I mean it it is amazing and it brings me so
much joy when I hear someone whohas lost a child or a loved one
I could just say God what's mypart you know you might read it
in the newspaper see it onlinehear it on the news and the year
that Columbine happened Godreally prompted me.
(40:50):
He said I want you to write apersonal note to each of them on
the year anniversary and I wantyou to send them a copy of your
book grieving the loss of aloved one so I did.
Got all their names I wrote Idon't expect thank you cards but
I did because I asked Godwhat's my part and it we all
(41:12):
have a part and somehow when wedo that it validates our child
yeah and it validates our griefand it transforms it into
something very purposeful.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
Yes absolutely Kathy before I get you to tell us a
little bit more about yourministry Hopelifters Unlimited I
do want to ask you anotherquestion that because this is I
guess known as a grief podcastwhat we I think hopefully people
(41:46):
what people are hearing is thatthe focus is not death.
Yes that's a that's a part ofour stories but somewhere along
our journey we in order to beable to be healthy people again
to be able to move forward aswe've talked about and to find
(42:06):
to to rediscover purpose andmeaning and hope in their lives
again that focus has totransition or needs to
transition from our child'sdeath to life who our child is
the memories that our child leftus the impact that our child
(42:28):
made on our lives and the impactthat our child is continuing to
make particularly through us ifwe are engaged in some way in
trying to help others for you asyou think back through those
seasons was there can youremember anything any points in
(42:49):
time or anything that kind oftriggered you feeling like gosh
maybe I've kind of turned thecorner and it's like you feel
you can experience joy again youcan laugh again without feeling
guilty.
You know what I mean?
(43:09):
Does that does that questionmake sense?
Speaker (43:12):
It does you know I it was there one particular one I
can't recall just one but therehave been a number of them and
one happened a week after whichis amazing but it was I was in a
deep place of recoveringphysically but also grieving
deeply the you know the secondgrief I call it the actual
(43:35):
physical loss and burial of ourson.
Right.
And and I got a call fromsomebody that said I saw this
woman in a newspaper in anotherstate and she has the exact same
diagnosis that your son hadwould you reach out to her well
my first thought is well no I'mgrieving I'm in this you know I
don't I don't have it in me.
(43:56):
And I just remembered God'slittle reminder to me that I had
cried out enlarge me through myloss and I had to make a choice
am I going to stay among thedead or am I going to choose to
step forward to be among theliving so I chose forward to
reach out to that woman notknowing but I did.
So that gave me the momentwhere I chose to allow God to
(44:22):
use my hurt and make it intohope.
Right and other opportunitiesthat have fast forwarded where
one day I just sensed that hewanted me to take a a group of
grieving moms away on a bustrip.
And that was pivotal becauseI'd never done anything like
that.
I'd done you know small thingswhich anything we do is big in
(44:45):
God's so we don't want tocompare.
Don't want to compare whatyou're doing and I'm doing do
and be who you are.
But I stepped forward in faithto be obedient and took about
four years but four years laterI chartered a bus and I took a
group of grieving moms away andwe've done 12 since getting on
the bus and realizing that therewere a group that were where I
(45:10):
was in that dark place in thedeath mode and then across the
aisle were those I call themhope lifters.
They'd gone through it and theywant to help you go through it.
They reached across the aisleand now all of those that were
on the one side are now on myteam and that brings me so much
joy to know that it just camewith a little thought from God
(45:35):
but just really from Him tooffer myself.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah and sometimes those opportunities do require
that we step out of our comfortzone sometimes because as you
said a minute ago when you'regrieving everything is pretty
much an effort there's nothingnothing seems easy but when we
step into those opportunitiesrealizing that you know we don't
(46:03):
have to have all the answers orwe don't have to have it
figured out we don't have toknow all the how-tos and what
ifs and the whys and all that ifwe just step into it and offer
ourselves it is amazing how Godcan use that not just to bless
us but more so to bless otherpeople and and it and everybody
(46:24):
is encouraged and helped andfinds hope in the process they
do.
Speaker (46:31):
Another thing in the verse John 146 really helps me
and I think it will helplisteners it says you are the
way the truth and the lifeabsolutely and you know Jesus is
saying those words you know Iam the way the truth and the
life and so I'm saying to him ifyou're the way and you're the
(46:52):
truth and you're the life I needto follow you.
Would you help me through this?
Because we don't have to bealone he is with us.
He will never leave us andthose of us our children you
know I like to picture mychildren are with him.
This is a pause for me.
This is just a comma it's notthe end I'm one day closer to
(47:14):
that amazing celebration butuntil then I want every moment
to count.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yeah I agree I feel the same way.
Thank you for what you're doingand you you've been doing
you've been doing things to helpother grieving particularly
moms for a long time you knownot just those those bus tours
that you talked about you'vealso written I think what four
books?
Yes and two of those I thinkmore specific to parents who've
(47:46):
lost children.
Yes so why don't you take aminute tell us about those Kathy
and how people can get them butalso if there's anything that
you would like to share in inmore detail about your ministry
hopelifters just take the youknow take the the microphone and
(48:06):
take it away.
Speaker (48:07):
Okay.
Well I have written four booksand ironically each grief
devotional I was writing I waspregnant with a living a child
that did live.
So the first one was grievingthe loss of a loved one and that
is a 60 day devotional foranyone who has lost any loved
one and it will point you to whoGod is not only scripture a
(48:30):
short story a metaphor and aplace to journal.
I fought for the journal pagesbecause sometimes we just need
to write the second book isgrieving the child I never knew
and that's for anyone who's lostan unborn, newborn stillborn uh
an infant and that helps themspecifically specifically again
(48:50):
look at who God is a a devotiona place to journal this one also
has discussion guides becausewe're finding that a lot of the
the women who have lost unbornbabies there's not a place for
them or for infants to reallyconnect.
So Hope lifter is my one of mysignature books and that is a
(49:11):
bringing creative ways to spreadhope when life hurts and
there's a hundred recipes of howdo I help somebody in any life
circumstance.
And then there is a bookLonging for a child which is
going through the season ofinfertility and that's a
devotional the grieving the lossof loved one and the grieving
the child and hopelifter you canget on Amazon or Faith Gateway
(49:31):
or I think Barnes and Noble hasit.
And the Longing for a child youneed to contact me because that
one we're revamping some thingsso that's one if you're going
through infertility you cancontact me.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
And how can people do that Kathy?
Speaker (49:45):
How can they contact you directly probably the best
way is just my email which isKathy K-A-T-A-G at hopelifters
dot com.
So it's hopelifters dot com.
They can just send me an emailI always will respond within a
few days and I can work it outwith you to get you the the
(50:05):
longing book if that'ssomething.
As far as where I'm at withhope lifters I'm getting ready
to take a sabbatical I do thatevery year and going to really
hear God what do you want me todo now?
How do you want me to stewardthe roles including my grieving
mom role?
That's a role that I have howdo you want me to steward that
and we'll see where he takes itright now.
(50:26):
I am mentoring women across thecountry and locally here in
Arizona but there are a lot ofleaders that are coming to me.
And so if you're out there andwe all have people we influence
that is a heartbeat for me and Isense that during the
sabbatical God's going to makeit clear.
So 2026 stay tuned I do have awebsite that's in process of
(50:47):
being revamped hopelifters.combut 2026 we may be offering some
things for leaders and I loveto connect so again send me an
email.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
And I'll provide links both to your email and to
your or I'll include your emailand provide a link to
Hopelifters so that it'll makeit a little bit easier and
that'll be in the podcastepisode description.
So take a look there if youwould like Kathy thank you so
very very much for sharing yourheart today and for being so
(51:22):
transparent about what you'veexperienced because I think that
I think that your story and theencouragement that people heard
today is going to go a long wayto give grieving parents some
hope and to know that they'rethey will if they'll just lean
into God and give him their painand their loss then he will
(51:48):
bring you to a place where youwill discover rediscover meaning
and purpose in your life againand be able to help other
people.
Speaker (51:59):
Yes.
Well thank you Greg for havingme and I just pray for all of
the listeners that God will doimmeasurably more according to
his power.
Just offer what you have andhe'll multiply hope.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Absolutely thank you so much Kathy and for for those
of you who are listening if thisconversation meant something to
you if it provided some hopeand encouragement please let us
know there's a play there's alink in the episode description
where you can click and leave amessage you can go to Apple
(52:35):
Podcast.
You can also leave a messageyou can leave a review or or a
rating we love to hear from ourlisteners.
And as always thank you so muchfor listening and we look
forward to having you back intwo weeks.
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