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Taking a Sad Song, Making it Better

~ Discovering joy amid pain

Taking a Sad Song, Making it Better

Tag Archives: Grieving

On Miscarriage, Sharing your Grief, and your Right to Remember

03 Monday Oct 2016

Posted by purdywords in Love, Memories, Miscarriage, Motherhood, National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Month, Past, Peace, Personal Challenges

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Challenges, Grief, Grieving, Love, Memories, Miscarriage, National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Month, Peace, Personal growth, Perspective

Sweet little flower of heavenly birth, you were too fair to bloom on earth. ~ Author Unknown

 

Miscarriage is quite a unique type of death experience. It haunts your mind and heart in ways that are difficult to put aside. Not only are you losing a child and the dream of that little person, but you often never know what went wrong to cause the child’s life to end so soon. The grief process after a miscarriage can be a lonely, arduous time.

Although you might feel like hiding away, try to share the truth of your pain with those closest to you. Reach out and be honest, raw, and open about what it is like to lose a child so suddenly. What I have learned over the years is that no one truly understands what you are going through—especially the incredible strength miscarriage and baby loss asks and takes from you—unless the person has experienced the same type of trauma, themselves. You can still try, though. It is worthwhile to include your loved ones in your grieving process, if only to honor the life of the child you grieve for so desperately.

At first, the well-meaning friends and family you open up to might be uncomfortable with the level and intensity of your sadness as you grieve for the child you will never see, hold, nurse, nor raise. They may try to comfort you with what feels like unsympathetic comments such as:

“Maybe it wasn’t meant to be.” (Sorry, but this life I carried inside, actually did mean something to us. It was our child.)

“It wasn’t really a baby yet, anyway.” (As if a pregnancy test and a beating heart on a screen one day, but gone the next, can be denied.)

“Don’t worry, you’ll get pregnant again soon!” (As if they know this for certain—they don’t. And even if you do become pregnant soon after your loss, the next child will never replace the love and dream you had for the child that never lived.)

Feel free to tell your loved ones the truth—that you are grieving because you just lost a child. Explain that the heartache you feel is over all the hope and dreams you had, but have gone away. Gently inform that just because the baby hadn’t been born at an age when they had a fighting chance to live, his life still had meaning.

Invite your family and friends to join you on your grievous journey so they can reach a clearer understanding of miscarriage and baby loss. Allowing these loved ones to hold your hand along the way will open up their eyes and minds to the right and privilege that is yours alone to honor and cherish your miscarried babies in any compelling way, and how you’ll forever carry their memory imprinted on your heart.

 

How have your family and friends helped or hindered your ability to grieve a miscarriage? 

Why My Forehead is Clear of Ashes Today

18 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by purdywords in Ash Wednesday, Change, Glorifying God, Lent, Tough days

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Anxiety, Ash Wednesday, Change, Due Date, Grieving, Healing, Hope, Lent 2015, Life and loss, Love, Parenting, Personal Sacrifices, Priorities, Tough days

“Although the life of a person is in a land full of thorns and weeds, there is always a space in which the good seed can grow. You have to trust God.”

~ Pope Francis

Today is Ash Wednesday. The Christian’s forty days of Lent has begun as it does each and every year. As Catholics, wearing the mark of a cross of ashes on one’s forehead represents the start of our most sacred time of year, preparing ourselves for Easter, and moving ourselves personally from darkness to light.

Today, I had good intentions of attending Mass with my son and his first grade class at our home parish. Instead, he is with Baby Girl and me, resting and fighting off a chest cold. To be quite honest, I’m not fasting today, either. At 35 weeks pregnant with another son, I’m finding it difficult to do much of anything these days but eat, rest, repeat. I’m making my sacrifices in other ways, however. Such as giving up social media, praying more whenever my anxiety levels kick in, going to bed earlier rather than staying up late to watch a show or read a novel.

This Lent, I’m slowing it down and taking each day as it comes. During the first six weeks of 2015, God has thrown my family quite the curveball and we’ve been carrying a heavy cross upon our hearts and shoulders ever since. In moving towards acceptance of some horrific realities as of late, I’m trying to leave the future in His hands, trying to let go of the guilt I feel, and trying to embrace this new normal for our lives. In my heart, I pray that the isolation we’re feeling is only temporary—no matter how long a time we must endure the pain.

The days have been long, tedious, heart-wrenching, and unimaginable–much like the beating, gripping, wretched journey Christ, himself, traveled. Even though it feels like our family is being pulled apart in too many directions, that we’re unraveling at the seams, I know God has a plan for our lives—and especially for the lives of our family members experiencing the most pain, facing the greatest challenges, carrying the heaviest crosses of their lives.

This Lent, I’m taking the advice of Pope Francis, quoted above, and trusting more in God. I must. I see no other way.

Lamenting the meaning of this day

23 Friday Aug 2013

Posted by purdywords in Birthdays, Miscarriage, Motherhood, Tough days

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Tags

Due Date, Grieving, Love Letters, Miscarriage, Motherhood stories

God is closest to those with broken hearts. ~Jewish Saying

Let your tears come. Let them water your soul. ~Eileen Mayhew

Dear John Victor,

Today would have been your birthday. But, God had other plans. This has taken quite some time getting used to as I loved you from the very moment I knew I was carrying you inside. Today, on this due date that should have brought such miraculous joy, I can’t help but grieve all that has vanished in losing you. Your pregnancy was a welcomed surprise and an anniversary gift to your father and me. Your life—no matter how small or short-lived—was a blessing and a joy to us and to those with whom we shared the news.

Lately, insomnia keeps me awake and all I think about is you. Alone with my thoughts and heartbreak, I dream about how much better today would be if I was holding you instead of reliving the painful memory of miscarrying you. Sure, having you here now means that my abdomen would have to be sliced apart then sewn back together again—a horrific scene I would endure time and again just to bring you safely into this world. You would have been worth it all. I’d withstand anything—more cuts and scars, the nausea and six weeks of post-surgery healing—in order to see your angelic face, nurse you to health, sing you to sleep. I’d give anything to replace the pain in my heart brought on by your absence—a void that nothing seems to fill.

Somehow, you were made for greater things—for holiness and grace—but, I suppose, not for a life lived on earth. It’s a beautiful image, really, thinking of you dwelling in Heaven among angels and saints—as perfect as can be. Most days, it brings me comfort and peace knowing that you never had to feel or witness the pains and injustices of this world below. The not knowing you in the flesh business has me wishing at this precise moment—stemming only from my own selfish intentions that you could be here with me today— that you had the chance to know your father and co-creator, to live among your three siblings who’d love you to pieces, to be a part of our family and the life that we’re left to live without you.

in-heaven_l

However incredible it is to think that you are in Heaven along with my other four angels who went before you, I lament. Lamentations that instead of being prepped for a cesarean section surgery this morning to birth you into the world, I remain desolate and nurse the pains of an empty womb. Sadness and loss about my wounded heart surround me today. Despair lives in not knowing how to quench the thirst of this void that remains which nothing seems to satisfy since my body failed in growing you.

They say time is a great healer, and well, I’m not always so sad—not every day, at least. So, please don’t worry about me.  Your dad takes wonderful care of me and he and your siblings make life joyful and complete. You would have enhanced the joy and completion of our family life immeasurably.  

My arms feel emptier today. My heart aches a little more for all that was lost six months ago. The separation is hard now, but I know it won’t always be so. My faith tells me that there is hope in the afterlife and that one day, if I’m lucky enough, my arms won’t feel so empty, nor my heart so heavy. Until that time comes, August 23rd will always be your day.  

Thank you for opening my eyes, heart, and womb once again to such a miracle—life. This time, for a short time, yours. Sweet son of mine, I promise I will never forget you. How could I?

With love,

Your Mom

(“In Heaven” Photo credit: Daniel Pascoal / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND)

  • purdywords
    • 30 Days of Thanks, November 2020
    • How to Give Without Giving Yourself Away
    • Raising Awareness About Miscarriage & Pregnancy Loss

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