Been waiting for this moment, not anxiously hoping for it to come, but knowing it someday would come. The moment that someone asked me how they could help a couple whose child died shortly after birth. It's been over 2.5 years, and we really haven't been asked this question yet. It surprised me. I thought that it would happen much earlier on. I hear of lost babies, but usually not so directly. This was a personal request, from someone close to us, one of our parents, actually. It was delivered via email with the subject line "graveside service". A little description of what happened to this poor couple, their daughter gone 4 days after a premature birth. A request for help. No mention of our daughter. No mention of the pain this request could cause us. Just a request to dive back into the deepest pain of our lives and provide resources for other hurting souls in a similar predicament.
I guess that I should clarify: I'm not unhappy with the request for help. I always thought my phone would ring much earlier (figuratively speaking). I'm happy to put this pain to use if it could possibly help another. But for one of our parents to be so oblivious to our feelings, it does bother me. Maybe if he had mentioned her name, or acknowledged this might be hard for us, gave us an out, honored his own granddaughter? I don't know. This particular parent always seems to get it wrong anyway, when the stakes are far lower. How could be expected to navigate these treacherous waters?
In any case, I'm digging around, trying to comply a list of resources, and crying, crying, crying. So often now, the days go by and she is present, her loss the first thing I think of every day, but there are not these tears, it is not hard to breathe. Today though, I sob, I keen, I pull at my chest, I moan. I am a mother whose baby has died, and my heart is still broken.
I have been asked to do this, a few times since B.W. died back in 2006. Each time, it was tremendously difficult. Because you want to do a good and gentle job of helping them begin to navigate..., but knowing it is pure misery. There was one time in particular, where I was going through a real rough patch of grief, and I simply could not do it. I could not help the newly bereaved family. I didn't even know them, but I felt guilty about it for months.
ReplyDeleteUnmet expectations for family are so hard, because despite the continued failures and omissions, we always hope that they will surprise us.
What a beautiful thing you are doing for this family. I'm sorry you have to.
Nothing I can say to ease your pain but I'm sorry. ((hugs))
ReplyDeleteThe hugest hugs to you sweet momma. You know, I was trying to have a conversation about this with my husband the other day.... I am tired of people looking through what I have been through with a clinical lens. People think of my miscarriages and losses from a scientific "how did this happen to you?" perspective. When what I am craving most from those around me is the simplest acknowledgment of my losses as a mother.
ReplyDeleteYou are a wonderful woman and know that we are sobbing with you for Chiara.