Category: grief education

Where Ministry Intersects Real Life: Lighting the Path for Other Bereaved Parents

Earlier this week I participated in a “retreat” with Our Hearts Are Home-a ministry to bereaved parents and their families.

On the Zoom call were individuals active in their own communities and own ministries who also lend their time and talents to this one. Together we represent a cadre of bereaved parents who have chosen to come back with a torch to light the way of those still walking in the early days, weeks, months, YEARS of child loss.

It’s a privilege to work and walk beside them.

What I wanted to share today was this: Every one of these individuals is carrying their own burden of grief and loss, every one of them has a life outside ministry that includes family commitments, aging parents, growing children and grandchildren, work, church attendance and committee positions and just the everyday chores of living.

We are contacted via DM and text by newly bereaved parents all the time.

We have nonbereaved friends and family experiencing challenging life events. We have to negotiate holidays and family gatherings while respecting various people’s schedules and preferences.

We are administrators of closed Facebook groups and host book studies and write blogs.

We field phone calls and try to squeeze in workouts or walks, cooking and cleaning.

So when you are thinking about people to pray for, our “cause” may not be dramatic or life-threatening but our work is life giving and light sharing.

Consider adding us to your prayer list.

We’d be oh, so grateful!

**** If you’d like to learn more about the work I do at Heartache and Hope ministry, The Life I Didn’t Choose blog or partner with me through financial support, you can find out more through these links: http://heartacheandhope.org; http://thelifeididntchoose.com; http://square.link/u/cNen14Q1 ****

Child Loss is Truly Relentless

There have been a number of posts from different parents in our closed groups recently remarking on how difficult this journey continues to be even decades down the road.

From the outside looking in, folks think, “Well, they’ve had plenty of time to adapt”.

But what they don’t understand is that for a parent, it’s not only what we HAD that is missing, it’s what we thought we WOULD HAVE that we miss too.

So every Christmas, every New Year, every birthday, holiday and family celebration our child isn’t present is another “not there” we have to process and accept.

This grief truly is relentless.

❤ Melanie

re·lent·less

adjective

opressively constant; incessant.

Synonyms:  persistent, continuing, nonstop, never-ending, unabating, interminable, incessant, unceasing, endless, unremitting, unrelenting, unrelieved.

please be aware i am trying

Surviving the Unthinkable: Grief and Self-Care

My first instinct as a mother and a shepherd is always, “How can I help?”

I routinely set aside my own needs for the needs of others.  Not because I’m so selfless but because that’s how I’m made-I’ve always had the heart of a caretaker.

That’s not a bad thing, most of the time.

But if taking care of others means NOT taking care of myself, then in the end, I’m of no use to anyone.  When I allow every bit of energy-emotional, physical, psychological and spiritual-to drain away until there’s nothing left, I am unable to meet my most basic needs, much less the needs of others.

Read the rest here: Grief and Self-Care: Surviving the Unthinkable

The Power and Peril of Story

I went to see The Greatest Showman a few years ago with my daughter.  It was an amazing film-I was drawn into the story and my heart longed to see where it was going and how it would end.

greatest showman movie wide

I highly recommend it for two hours of uplifting entertainment.

But it got me thinking.

So I did a little digging into P.T. Barnum’s REAL life story.

As you might imagine, several liberties were taken with actual history in order to create what I saw on the screen.  That’s really just fine.  I knew what I was getting into when I plunked my money down for the ticket.  I had no illusion that I was walking into a history lecture- I understood I was there to be entertained.

When I compared the actual Barnum life story to the tidy, beautiful, uplifting and wonderfully scored musical I had seen in the theater, I found gaping holes.

And most of the holes involved the hard and ugly parts of his story-the parts people don’t like to talk about, much less live through.

While leaving them out or glossing them over with a moment or two of wistful glances for the movie is exactly what I expect from Hollywood, it can condition hearts to expect the same kind of thing in real life.

But real life stories don’t skip over the hard parts.

Real people have to live through the ugly and the painful and the devastating and the doubt and the sorrow.  We don’t get to hop right to the happy ending (if there even IS a happy ending) nor do we get to whitewash the dark truths that inform our experience.

And because we prefer tidy (and happy) endings, bright and sunny days, encouraging and uplifting stories, when we are face to face with a challenging and difficult reality, we often turn away.

If we don’t hear it, it doesn’t matter. 

If we don’t look, it didn’t happen. 

If we wait long enough in our safe cocoon, someone else will deal with it.

Sometimes those of us in the middle of hard stories try to ignore it.  But busyness and distraction do not make bad times better.  Maybe for a moment, but not in the long run.

We’ve got to learn to experience it all, tell it all, be honest about how dark the path, how difficult the journey.

And those who are on the sunny side of the street need to learn to lean into friendship, cross over and offer compassionate companionship to those who are struggling.

Because sooner or later, it will be all of us.

we will all struggle and fall brene brown

Our Hearts are Home Spring Conference: Won’t You Join Me?

It took me a long time before I wanted to gather in a room with other bereaved parents. 

My son’s death had undone me and I had no capacity for other people’s raw grief where I might not have an escape.

I wish I hadn’t been so reluctant and waited so long because what I found when I finally walked into the in-person community of other moms and dads who shared my loss, it was life giving, uplifting and utterly amazing. 

So I want to extend an invitation to fellow broken hearts who hope for hope: 

WHO? Bereaved parent & grandparents, and anyone who wants to better know how to comfort a grieving friend

WHAT? Our Hearts Are Home Spring Conference

WHEN? April 25-26, 2025

WHERE? Online or In Person

(If you can’t come on those days, you’ll receive all of the session recordings that remain available for two weeks following the conference.)

Read the session details and register at: https://ourheartsarehome.org/spring-conference

I’ll be sharing in a main sessions and participating in breakout sessions. AND there will be many opportunities to chat informally around meals and other unstructured times.

This is NOT your typical “Christian Conference” where what’s shared is memorized and rehashed in city after city. This is a unique opportunity to interact with parents who are walking the same broken road as you and are willing to reveal the ups and downs, ins and outs of navigating child loss. (My husband will be there too, bereaved dads!)

The cost is minimal although I know travel expenses may make attending in person out of the question for some of y’all. (Online option available!)

I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to meet (in the flesh!) anyone who has joined me here online. 

You have no idea how often your words of encouragement have helped me hold onto hope. 

So if you can, join us. 

You may be nervous up to the very minute you show up or log on but I PROMISE you will not regret it. 

See you there!

Christmas 2024: How Transparent Should I Be When Sharing?

For the most part, I’m pretty transparent.  Because secrets don’t serve anyone well.  

If I pretend to be stronger than I really am, I hide the truth that it is Christ in me that gives me strength.

If I don’t admit that certain words or actions hurt my heart, I enable thoughtless behavior.

If I only parrot “Sunday School” answers when someone asks about my faith in relation to my loss, then I silence other hearts wrestling with questions and pain in light of God’s sovereignty and love.

If I hide my tears, my pain, the missing then I minimize this great loss, And I will not make losing Dominic small.

Read the rest here: How Transparent Should I Be When Sharing?

Christmas 2024: Good Answers to Hard (Sensitive, Inappropriate) Questions

The holiday season is full of opportunities to gather with folks we don’t see all that often. 

It’s also an invitation for those same friends and family to ask all the questions they’ve thought about on the other 364 days of they year but couldn’t ask. 

And sometimes those questions are difficult, or insensitive or inappropriate. 

What to do? What to say?

Here are some great answers from other bereaved parents.

❤ Melanie

I was utterly amazed at the questions people plied me with not long after Dominic’s accident.

They ranged from digging for details about what happened (when we ourselves were still unsure) to ridiculous requests for when I’d be returning to my previous responsibilities in a local ministry.

Since then, many of my bereaved parent friends have shared even more questions that have been lobbed at them across tables, across rooms and in the grocery store.

Recently there was a post in our group that generated so many excellent answers to these kinds of questions, I asked permission to reprint them here (without names, of course!).

So here they are, good answers to hard (or inappropriate or just plain ridiculous) questions:

Read the rest here: Good Answers to Hard (Insensitive, Inappropriate) Questions

Christmas 2024: Child Loss DOES Define Me

It’s popular in books, self-help articles and even in some grief groups for people to declare , “Child loss does not (will not, should not) define me”.

And while I will defend to the end another parent’s right to walk this path however seems best and most healing to him or her,  to that statement I say, “Bah! Humbug!”

Child loss DOES define me.

It defines me in the same way that motherhood and marriage define me. 

Read the rest here: Child Loss DOES Define Me

Christmas 2024: Surviving Siblings and Christmas

I first shared this post in 2016 when we had muddled through the first two holiday seasons after Dominic left us and were headed for a third.

Now facing our eleventh, there are some things that have changed a lot (adding grandchildren and losing my mama) and some things that remain the same (the ongoing struggle to balance everyone’s needs and expectations with the reality of sorrow).

I still find the principles I outlined years ago to be the best way to approach the season. We certainly don’t always get it right but we continue to strive to honor one another, to honor the true meaning of Christmas and to honor Dominic.

❤ Melanie

How do I honor the child for whom memories are all I have and love well the children with whom I am still making memories?

That’s a question I ask myself often.

And it is especially difficult to answer for celebrations and holidays, special events and birthdays.

Read the rest here: Surviving Siblings and Christmas

Christmas 2024: Inviting Grief to the Table-Holiday Host Etiquette

Spending holidays with friends and family while grieving is hard. No one is really comfortable-neither the bereaved nor those hosting them.

But there are ways to welcome grief to your table, to pave the way for the broken and bruised to join you, if they are able.

Here’s something that’s been going around social media circles this holiday season and offers advice on hosting the bereaved this Christmas.

❤ Melanie

Holiday Host Etiquette by Sarah Nannen

(Emphasis and paragraphs added)

“If you’re inviting someone to your home and they’re grieving, be sure you’re inviting their grief to attend, too. It will be there, anyway.

Read the rest here: Inviting Grief to the Table: Holiday Host Etiquette