Open Wound

About three Sundays ago, I was sitting in church waiting for the service to start when I realized I had forgotten to get a bulletin from the usher. So I went to the back of the church to get a bulletin when one of the parishioners, Joe, had just walked in. Joe greeted me with a smile, along with the ushers who were handing out the bulletins. I took my bulletin and went back to my seat.

I was there for about thirty seconds when I burst out in tears. I excused myself and went to the back of the church again, but this time, continuing out the door. One of my friends from church followed me out and gave me a hug. She asked me if I was OK, and "What happened?"

It was Joe. Joe is a very nice, approximately 80-year-old man who has been attending our church for years. Joe's wife had just passed away about a month before that, and that was the first time I had ran into him since his wife died. All I could think of was how lonely he must be, since I am going through the same thing. The pain was horrible, like I was losing Bobby again. My friend, who was comforting me said, "It must be like a wound with a scab on it, and the scab just got torn off again." What a great simile! I hadn't thought of it that way.

The following Friday, I was on Facebook and there was a post from a high school classmate of mine who is my age and had just lost her husband. From out of nowhere, I burst out in tears. I knew her pain, only too well, and even though I was crying for her, I felt that familiar hurt all over again. Again, that scab had been torn off, and here I was crying all over again, as if I had just lost Bobby - again.

My question is this...is that wound ever going to heal? Will it always have a scab on it, that can be torn off at any unexpected moment in a split second? And if it does heal, how big of a scar will it leave?