I hate mirrors. Not because I’m ashamed of my wrinkles or my fat hips. But because the face staring back at me now is not one I recognize.
I see someone who’s supposed to be me and can’t quite place her.
There’s a vague resemblance to the person that used to look me in the eye while I was brushing my teeth or fixing my hair.
But now, she is “other”, unfamiliar, strange in a “slightly off” kind of way.
Read the rest here: No Mirrors, Please!
I’ve written before about anxiety and child loss here. No matter the cause of death, the FACT of a child’s death seems to create the perfect conditions for a parent’s body and mind to experience anxiety, dis-ease, fear and often a sense of impending doom.
My world was rocked to its foundation the moment I heard the words, “He was killed in a motorcycle accident”.
The worst thing I could imagine had come true.
There was no protection from it happening again, no guarantee that THIS unbearable pain would be the ONLY unbearable pain I would have to carry.
I think my body chemistry was instantly transformed that morning to include rapid heartbeats, shallow breathing and a horrible creepy tension that climbs my spine and clenches its claws tightly at the base of my skull.
Before Dominic left us for Heaven I was not an anxious person.
Read the rest here: Anxiety is Awful!
I’m a kinder, gentler person than I was before Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.
It’s a high price to pay to learn to walk more grace-filled through this life.
I’ve come to find out that every heart has a story. Every heart is carrying a burden.-perhaps not the same as mine, but a burden nonetheless.
And what causes the most pain in this life (next to the burden itself) is when another person runs over my heart without thinking about the burden it may hold inside.
So I have purposed not to do that to other people.
Read the rest here: Refuse to Cause Pain
When I first began sharing in this space I had absolutely NO IDEA that my words could reach so many hearts in so many places.
I was simply being as transparent as possible in the hopes that others who were walking this road would feel seen, heard and understood.
That was almost nine years ago!
To date, over four million people have visited the site and viewed at least one post.
I’ve gotten message after message from broken hearts who say essentially:
Thank you for telling the truth about child loss. Thank you for speaking honestly about your struggle with faith. Thank you for assuring me that light CAN shine again in darkness.
Sometime in January of this year, I felt the Lord was asking me to step out in faith and expand the ministry. I began prayerfully exploring what it might look like to form a non-profit corporation and seek 501(c)3 status so others could join me in blessing bereaved parents.
With fear and trembling, I filled out the paperwork and sent it into the ether, praying that every jot and tittle was correct.
To my joy and great surprise, I received notification that Heartache and Hope was a really, truly recognized ministry. What I’d been doing for almost a decade was now official!
So what doors are opening in this new chapter?
I’ll be hosting monthly in-person bereaved parent gatherings at my sweet little home church in rural Bibb County, Alabama. It’s an underserved community on every level and when Dominic ran ahead to Heaven there wasn’t a single resource within thirty miles. Too often bereaved parents convince themselves they are alone in their pain. I want to change that for those in my area.
I’m hosting and facilitating some small, intimate retreats for bereaved mothers at our family’s homestead in the Florida Panhandle. The first one is in October and is filled. I’ll be announcing others soon when the website is up. I hope to do these four times a year.
I am already scheduled to share in some other in-person bereaved parent groups in January. If you’d like me to come share in yours, let me know and we can get it on the calendar. (The donations received make it possible for me to do this without asking for travel funds.)
A couple of podcasts have contacted me to set up on-air chats that should be available in the next few months.
I’m working on editing and publishing some of the blog material into booklets that are easy to read and helpful as handouts for the newly bereaved and the not-so-newly bereaved. I will be able to provide these at minimal cost or for a small donation.
I would love the opportunity to speak to pastor groups, healthcare providers, hospice workers, social workers and others who are likely to be the first folks who interact with parents after loss. Please contact me if you know of such a group or can facilitate a gathering.
I will continue to partner with other ministries like Our Hearts are Home by facilitating online book studies and speaking at yearly conferences.
I plan to keep writing.
I am, and will always be, devoted to sharing honestly about my journey and encouraging other hearts along the way.
*If you would like to donate, you may click on the following link:https://square.link/u/cNen14Q1
I had a tearful day last week.
At more than ten years into this journey they don’t happen very often and when they do, it takes me by surprise-though it shouldn’t.
I finally had to simply go to bed, choose to call it a day, close my eyes and let sleep claim the sadness and grant blessed peace.❤
You’d think I’d know how valuable tears are by now.
But sometimes I forget.
Read the rest here: I Would Not Cease Your Weeping
I was recently told by someone that my world was tiny.
It hurt my heart.
Not because it is factually inaccurate but because the person who said it implied that distance traveled from my front door equaled responsibility and influence. If I don’t wander hither and yon, then I’m inferior. If I don’t have paid employment then whatever I do doesn’t “really” count.
I know many bereaved parents have been forced to scale back commitments, maybe change jobs or retire early, and, like me, lead a smaller life than before.
I’m here to tell you that’s perfectly OK.
Read the rest here: It’s Alright To Be Little Bitty
Since sharing this for the first time years ago, I HAVE expanded my ministry a bit. I’ve established a federally recognized non-profit and will be able to offer my time and resources free of charge to bereaved parents and those who want to support them
If you would like to join with me in ministry to bereaved parents and their families, you can make a tax-deductible donation using this link:
https://square.link/u/cNen14Q1
You know that scene in Forrest Gump where he starts running and just can’t stop?
I thought that was a funny way to deal with grief when I first saw the movie.
But now I understand it perfectly.
If I could have started running, walking or even crawling away from the heartache in those first days and weeks I would have.
Truth is, though, you can’t.
Read the rest here: Can’t Run Away
When your scale of awful is off the charts, there’s a tendency to dismiss anything less as merely inconvenient or inconsequential.
But that’s just not how our hearts work.
You can be shattered by child loss and still feel the slings and arrows of everyday losses, disappointments, discomfort and sadness.
It’s OK to mourn the things that don’t measure up to the pain and despair of burying a child.
Read the rest here: You Are Absolutely Allowed To Mourn *Smaller* Losses
One of the things I’m learning this side of burying my precious child is that there is no upper limit to the sorrow and pain I may have to carry in this life. And it’s no use comparing my burden to that of another-begging God to consider the differing weights and to make adjustments to lighten my load because it is heavier than that of another.
I do not get a pass on daily stress and strain.
I’m not guaranteed physical health.
I am just as likely as anyone else to get the grumpy cashier, to drop a dish or lose my keys. Or worse.
Read the rest here: Life is Absolutely NOT Fair
Here is a post that accompanies the video presentation on GRIEF WORK I shared yesterday.
If you missed that post, you can find it here: Grief Work: A Video.
If you haven’t watched the video and plan to, this outline can help you make the most of your time.
If you’ve already watched it and were overwhelmed with the amount of information shared, you can use the outline to organize your own thoughts as you reflect on the content.❤ Melanie
Child loss is not simply an event that happens at a moment in time.
It is an ongoing, devastating experience that shatters our hearts, our relationships and our worldview. It impacts the remotest corners of life in ways we certainly don’t understand nor anticipate in the first hours, days and weeks. Processing child loss demands time, energy just when we have the least of those resources to expend on anything.
That’s why I call it “work”.
How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart you begin to understand… there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep, that have taken hold.
Frodo, Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien
I use “grief work” to mean all the ways I (and others) must actively seek to identify, face, process, and ultimately incorporate the feelings, trauma and changes loss force upon us. ways.
It is exhausting.
It DOES get better though. I promise.
It gets manageable faster when broken hearts don’t try to run away, numb or distract themselves from the challenge. Grief will not be ignored or stuffed forever. It leaks out somewhere.
When we refuse to do the work grief requires, we delay healing.
Grief Work can be understood best when we consider it within the context of relationship:
And I believe the work is best done when we set aside time, designate space and give ourselves and others grace in the process.
RELATIONSHIP WITH SELF
Nonbereaved parents (maybe us in the BEFORE) sometimes joke that their only job is to keep their kid alive. Even if we’ve never said so aloud, many of us had days when we counted it joy that we came to bedtime and had successfully navigated potentially harmful obstacles with our children.
It’s a horrifying shock to our core identity as a parent when one day that’s no longer true. We begin to doubt all kinds of things about who we thought we were. It takes great effort, courage, energy and lots and lots of time to examine and ultimately integrate these changes.
I find it useful to think about the process in several stages that often occur simultaneously and repeatedly:
RELATIONSHIP WITH OTHERS
So much of life revolves around our relationships with other people-family, friends, coworkers, people we go to church with and even the cashier in the grocery store. A day can be made better or made awful because of stray words, intentional or unintentional conflict, smiles, frowns and kind gestures or funny stories.
There are so many ways child loss affects how we walk in the world and it absolutely impacts our relationships to those we love as well as those we simply bump into.
Perhaps most dramatically, it challenges and changes how we relate to our child in Heaven.
What kind of work is required to move forward in this new reality as a spouse, parent, child, employee and member of the community?
RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD
It is common for Jesus following bereaved parents to identify with Christ’s words on the cross, “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!”. Or David’s cry, “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?”.
Some describe their feelings (especially early into this journey) as anger. Others say they felt deserted. I say I was disappointed.
We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.
~C.S. Lewis, A GRIEF OBSERVED
Learning to hold the truth that this life is painful and the truth that God is sovereign and loving in the same heart is probably the most difficult work I’ve done in this journey.
It required me to do four things:
CONCLUSION
Much of this process is organic and different tasks, challenges and seasons present themselves as a natural outgrowth of time and experience.
It’s definitely not something you can rush.
I’ve always said that time does NOT heal all wounds. But there is no substitute for TIME.
That’s why you must set aside time to do this work.
It may be stolen moments for those of you with busy households and demanding jobs. It may be quiet mornings or silent evenings for those who have more margin in daily life. It might be a weekly getaway if you live with lots of people and have a difficult time turning down the noise of electronics or incessant “to do” lists in your head. But you MUST find time to sit with yourself, to listen to your heart and to hear from God.
You will have to carve out or find safe spaces and find safe people.
Sometimes it means seeking professional help from a counselor or therapist.
Sometimes it’s a friend or two who choose to walk compassionately alongside and who withhold comment and judgement about things they don’t really understand. They are a valuable sounding board for the stories we need to tell over and over and over as we strive mightily to make sense again of a world turned upside down.
Online and in person bereaved parent support groups are wonderful! That is where I learned the language of loss. It’s where my experience was validated and I was assured that everything I was feeling was absolutely, positively NORMAL!
Seek them out.
Finally, this journey requires SO. MUCH. GRACE! For yourself and for others.
I call grace the grease for the wheels of relationship. You are definitely going to disappoint and frustrate yourself and folks you come in contact with. They, in turn, are going to step on your toes and on your feelings.
This is uncharted territory for all but the previously initiated and it’s rough going, my friend.
Try to always assume the best and practice compassion.
If you can’t muster it, then choose retreat until you are stronger and more equipped to have that difficult conversation or encounter. But don’t stop communicating. At least say, “Hey, I am not in a place to talk about this right now. I’ll let you know when I’m able.”
No one knows what’s in your heart and mind but you and Jesus. Give the folks around you a break.
I am more whole, more at peace and more capable of participating in the life I have while acknowledging and integrating the life I didn’t choose than I was even two years ago.
My faith is intact.
My family is learning, loving and living together.
I don’t fall so deeply into the well of despair as I once did and when I do I can scramble back out again.
I am not unique or special. God loves you too. He will, if you allow Him, bring hope and healing to your heart as well.
When we dream with God, our dreams-even in burial-are not lost; they are planted. God never forgets the ‘kernel of wheat [that] falls to the ground and dies’ (John 12:24).
What grows from that painful planting is God’s business. But sowing in faith is ours and, like the early disciples, our faithfulness is never sown in vain.
~Alicia Britt Chole, 40 DAYS OF DECREASE
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