My 3-Day-Old Granddaughter Died

From The Grief Blog, September 25, 2007

My granddaughter died when she was three days old. Her mother was in labor and fell which caused the placenta to tear loose from the wall. I have been dealing with the loss but my greater concern is my daughter-in-law. I love her as my own and she is not the same mother that she was to her other 2 children.  She feels that everything is ok but I really think that she needs more help.  This is a loss that has no time limit or timetable for when “we’re all better”. I just don’t want to lose her too!!! I am a nurse and feel that I should be able to help but I don’t think that’s happening!

Dear Sherry,

We are so very sorry for your loss of your granddaughter. You don’t say how long ago her death occurred but regardless of time, the wounds sound fresh and raw for both you and your daughter-in-law. She is lucky to have you with her for love and support and you are probably helping her more than you know. 

We recommend that you introduce her to The Grief Blog so she can read what other mothers have written and how their healing took place or is taking place. And we also recommend that you seek out a chapter of Compassionate Friends in your area. You can find their website at http://www.compassionatefriends.org/  With them you can find many valuable resources to help you and your daughter in law along the way. Each member has experienced the death of a child and each has survived and grieved in his or her own way. With this group neither of you have to walk this path alone. You also might want to consider recommending a professional grief counselor to her at some point if you feel she needs more support.

We invite you and your daughter-in-law to listen on Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  You might also find a number of past shows that can give you help and comfort at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/

Our blessings to you both,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Horsley

I Lost My Twin Babies

From The Grief Blog, September 28, 2007

I believe with all my heart the words of Jeremiah 29:11, where the Lord says…I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a hope and a future. It all started 3 1/2 years when I married my wonderful husband. We met at church and it wasn’t long after we met that we realized that we had mutual friends that had tried previously to get us together but it never happened and here we are going to the same church and did not even know it. We married in March 2004 and have been happy ever since. Anyhow fast forward 3 years later. We start trying to conceive and since we had been studying on faith at church we took to heart what the Lord says in his word… “ask what you will in my name and it shall be done”. So we believed the Lord for twins. Well in March 2007 we found out we were pregnant not with just one but with two. We got our twins! Well Lord since you did that we said we want a boy and a girl and in July 2007 we found out it was a boy and a girl, Collin and Cailyn are the names we gave them. Well, August 2007 at 24 weeks Collin and Cailyn came early. Collin leaves us 5 hours after he is born and Cailyn leaves 6 am the next day. We cried and hugged, asked why, cried and hugged some more. We had to make the decision of cremation or a burial. We had them cremated and have the ashes at home. I look at the urns every so often and it hurts so much sometimes. I sometimes feel guilty about moving on because Collin and Cailyn are not here with me. I know they are in heaven but I miss them so much. God has truly comforted me and given me his peace but it still hurts so much when I think of them and the pregnancy. We will try again, but to be honest I’m scared about that too, but I remember that God has not given me a spirit of fear but of love peace and a sound mind. I try to hold to his promises everyday, but sometimes I just can’t stop the tears. I know God is with us and he has a plan for me and my husband. We just rely on his strength to get us through. It’s been 7 weeks and we continue to hold on to his Word and peace as that he has given us and look to the future with God’s will for our lives in view.

Dear Bucarrui,

We are so very sorry for your loss of your twin babies. Seven weeks is a very short time and we encourage you to be gentle with yourself and take all the time you need to grieve. There are no shoulds or shouldn’ts with grief and there is no time frame. You will miss them for the rest of your life and tears will come sometimes. Tears are very healing and its all right to let them flow. And “moving on” can be very healing as well.

There is a group called Compassionate Friends who might be of help to you and your husband. Each member has lost a child and they understand what you are experiencing. You can find them at http://www.compassionatefriends.org. If groups are not for you we recommend that you reach out to your family, church, and friends for support.  We have found that the load of grief is lighter when it is not carried alone.

We invite you to listen on Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  You might also find a number of past shows that can give you help and comfort at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/

Blessings,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Horsley

My Grandson Died at Birth. How Do I Help My Daughter?

From The Grief Blog, November 1, 2007

My name is Jenn and on Oct 25th 2007 my daughter gave birth to a beautiful boy. There were complications, the cord was wrapped around his neck. They revived him and he was alive by machines until the 28th. My daughter had to hold her beautiful baby while he died. The pain I feel almost knocks me to the ground. It kills me to see her go through this but sometimes I don’t know what to say. I try to keep myself together on the outside. I don’t want her to worry about me. I think she is going to need counseling What is the best way to bring it up? She has 2 other young children and they are going to need their mom back. They don’t understand why their baby brother is not going to ever come home. Jenn

Drs. Heidi and Gloria Respond

Dear Jenn,

We are so very sorry for your loss and for what your daughter has had to endure. Losing a child is the hardest thing a parent can endure and seeing your own daughter suffer this loss brings such excruciating pain to you that we understand why you say it almost knocks you to the ground. The loss is still so new and the emotions so raw for her right now that she may have no idea what she needs or wants.

It may be that, as you say, she needs counseling or even a professional grief counselor if there is one in your area. It also could be helpful for her (and you) to seek out a chapter of The Compassionate Friends. The members of this group have each lost a child and understand what she is going through.  And there are probably also grandmothers there who can help you with your own grief and help you find ways to support your daughter. You can find them at http://www.compassionatefriends.org.  If there is no chapter of Compassionate Friends in your area you may want to contact your local Hospice for a grief group recommendation.  However, we understand that groups are not for everyone.  If groups are not for you or your daughter we recommend that you reach out to your church, and friends for support.  We have found that the load of grief is lighter when it is not carried alone. 

Perhaps your daughter could benefit from listening Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  There are a number of past shows that may be of help to your daughter, particularly the Oct. 11^th, 2007 show with Monica Novak:  Coping with Pregnancy and Infant Loss.  There might be a number of other shows as well that bring both of you help and comfort and they can be found at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/    We often read letters from the Grief Blog on the show so you might want to tune in next Thursday. 

Know that each one grieves in her own time and in her own way and there is no right or wrong way to go about it. Encourage your daughter to be gentle with herself during this most difficult time. 

Our blessings,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Horsley

Editor’s note: the following Healing the Grieving Heart radio programs recently aired and also pertain to this topic:

October 30, 2008
Miscarriage and Infant Loss
Guests: Monica Novak and Beth Seyda

January 15, 2009
Finding Help and Hope After Pregnancy Loss
Guest: Cathi Lammert

The Loss of My Child

From The Grief Blog, November 13, 2007

He passed away due to pneumonia
Born on: 12/09/00 - 01/01/01
One of the first things I did after my son’s funeral was to write it all down. My son’s
 short life. How much we wanted him. How much we loved him. What dreams we dreamed. And how, so suddenly, so horribly, he was snatched away from us. Without a scream, without a cry.

He was with us just 3 weeks , but it seemed he had been part of our lives so much longer. .
His death was so unreal, one minute a sleeping baby, the next a limp corpse. While it was happening I felt as if I were watching a bad mini-series. The story was unbelievable, so unreal.

I never got the chance to feel his slobbery kisses, never got the chance to fulfill all the dreams I had for us. Never had the chance to show him off and gloat in any compliments that came my way. I never got to feed him any solid foods. I never had the chance to see the joy he would have brought his brother & sister. I never had the chance to see his smile, to hear his laugh. I never got the chance to hear him say mommy, daddy.

I’ve told this story many times, in many different situations. If my life is a tapestry,
this is the brightest, thickest thread. Fabian’s death is so much a part of me, that sometimes I wished it could be branded in my head:  “I survived my baby’s death.” Although you may not see my pain, it is there, ever-present just under the surface. My pain is real. Our baby lived and died. I had to write it down and share it with you.

I must remember the depth of the love I had for my baby. It is impossible to talk or listen to the story without tears. So much hope in such a little package. There were some dark hours when I just wanted to curl up, rock in a corner, and disappear. There were moments when suicide made sense although I knew I would never take this path. For the first time in my life, I really understood depression. I felt as if I was in a closed box with no openings. It felt all consuming. I felt as if my life were over.

I am grateful God gave me a few weeks with him, to share in his spirit, to sleep with him, to feed him, and to hold him. I wish I had been able to see him grow, watch him as he learned to take his first steps, watch him walk as he made it to his first day of school. To be able to tuck him into bed and read him a bedtime story just like I do with his brother and sister. When I go to sleep at night , he is always in my thoughts and in my prayers.

He was sent to us as a precious gift, he was truly a radiant beautiful baby boy. We find ourselves longing for and loving him. As he resides in his heavenly place, may Jesus keep him in his constant care, while we wait for an eternal life to see him again…

Sonia,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Respond
Dear Sonia,

Thank you for your beautiful and loving story. We will post it on the blog because we know it will help and console those who read it.

We are so very sorry for the loss of your son and know that there are few words that can truly console us as parents after such a loss.

We encourage you to see if there is a group of Compassionate Friends in your area. The members of this group have each lost a child and offer you understanding and support that can rarely be found anywhere else. They can be found at http://www.compassionatefriends.org. If there is no chapter of Compassionate Friends in your area you may want to contact your local Hospice for a grief group recommendation.  However, we understand that groups are not for everyone.  If groups are not for you we recommend that you reach out to your family, church, and friends for support.  We have found that the load of grief is lighter when it is not carried alone.  There is no time limit on grieving and each of us who have lost a child need to receive and give loving support.

We also invite you to listen on Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  You might also find a number of past shows that can give you help and comfort at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/ Tomorrow’s show is Helping Families Deal With Loss and our guest is Dr. Janice Nadeau, a psychologist and marriage and family therapist. Often we will read letters to The Grief Blog on the show and we encourage you to listen tomorrow because, if we have the opportunity, we may read yours.

Our blessings,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi

I Lost My Grandson to SIDS

From The Grief Blog, November 28, 2007

I lost my grandson Braxton Tyler to SIDS when he was 7 weeks old. He passed on 12/21/03 and I still grieve to this day. I miss him just as much today and when he died. I wonder when will it get easier ?!? I don’t talk about him much because people don’t know how to handle a conversation such as a child who has passed. Most of the time I will just go to the cemetery and talk to him and cry - that seems to help me the most.

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Respond

Dear Carla,

We are so very sorry for your loss. Losing a child or a grandchild is such a huge loss and sometimes people don’t understand why you don’t “get over it” quickly. Please know that there is no time limit on grief and there is no right or wrong way to grieve. The grieving grandparent is often overlooked in our efforts to console the grieving parent. And you and other grandparents have the difficult job of consoling and comforting your child while you bear your own heavy load of grief.

Sometimes talking about it helps and we encourage you to get involved with a grief group so you can talk about it freely with those who understand. One group we recommend highly is The Compassionate Friends. (http://www.compassionatefriends.org ) If there is no chapter of Compassionate Friends in your area you may want to contact your local Hospice for a grief group recommendation or visit a counselor for a few sessions. We have found that the load of grief is lighter when it is not carried alone. 

You might find it helpful to listen on Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  You might also find a number of past shows that can give you help and comfort at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/  Specifically, you might like to listen to the show aired on May 17, 2007: Thoughts on Being a Bereaved Parent and Grandparent with Polly Moore.

Again, our sincere condolences,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Horsley

I Lost My Son, Gabriel

From The Grief Blog, January 2, 2008

I lost my son Gabriel almost 3 years ago.  He would be 3 on Feb.14th. He was 11 weeks old. My life for the last 2.5 years has been completely turned inside out, upside down, and blown totally to bits. I am thankful that I still have a little shred of my sanity left. Losing my child has been the worst thing that has and will ever happen to me. I feel like I lost my meaning and my purpose in life and kind of don’t know where to go now. The depression and nightmares that I suffer from are HORRIBLE.. I can’t even walk thru WalMart with out having issues.. I feel like this being depressed all the time is consuming my whole life…I am not the same person I was before, & probably never will be that “Person” again. The holidays make things really hard because every where I turn I see laughing children and grateful parents. I always think to myself “WHY CANT THAT BE ME?”

I am not supposed to have to live my life this way but it seems I don’t have a lot of choice right now. Even if I could have another baby I wouldn’t because I am terrified of reliving the past all over again with a new baby. I sometimes feel that I don’t have what it takes as a person to deal with all of these things. I have felt my lowest and done some pretty stupid things because I have felt there was no end in sight, and to this day I still feel that way sometimes. It’s so hard to sleep at night because of the nightmares that I have, I relive Gabriel dying over and over again in my head when I close my eyes. That part is really bad…. Things get to me more and more the more when I have these dreams. Maybe someone somewhere will see fit that they stop. I can only pray that they do before I go insane. I miss my Gabriel. I love him so much and just pray that he knows that. I think anything that can happen to a person that is bad it’s going to happen to me. Which SUX really bad…. I am so ready to finally get my life back to some kind of happy medium. I am tired of crying all the time, I a tired of not being able to enjoy a decent life around everyone else… This fake smile that I have carried for so long is starting to fade away and I can’t hide how I feel anymore. I don’t want anyone to feel like I do nor would I wish this on my worst enemy. Maybe one day things will get a little easier to handle. The 65 days that I had with him were the BEST of my life and I wish I could have that back…Maybe I am just thinking too much and need to face reality that he’s really gone. I am afraid to face reality because if I do I have to accept the fact the he’s gone and I don’t think I can handle that right now. I want to be remembered as the girl who smiles even though I hurt and my heart is broken, & the one who can brighten your day even though I can’t brighten my own.

I am praying that 2008 will be a “Better” year than this one. . I want so badly to heal the hurt and forget the pain, but I seriously doubt that will ever happen. I wish to be happy again and live a “Normal” life. WHY ME????

I miss my Gabriel so so much , so much that I can’t put into words my feelings. I feel like I am living a bad dream over and over each day. I wish someone would kick me so I would wake up…… I am running from reality and don’t know what to do. I don’t think it will ever get better. I don’t want to face reality, I am honestly refusing to right now in fear that I will lose my mind…I really feel that a billion pills can’t heal my hurt and make me forget….I want to forget sometimes. I don’t want to think anymore……Everywhere I go I see HIS face and smell his smell and die a little more on the inside. I know there are others that feel the way I do but I can’t seem to convince myself of that. WHY ME?????

I don’t want to forget the “PERFECT” memories but I can’t deal with the bad ones that come along with them…. GOD WHAT DO I DO.

Drs Gloria and Heidi Respond

Dear Amanda,

We are so very sorry for your loss. Nothing in life prepares us for the death of our child and few words can ease the pain. It is always more difficult during the holidays and you are approaching a birthday - these times are hard for each of us who has lost a child. These are days to be gentle with yourself.

You indicate that you want to move on and get your life back to some kind of happy medium. We suggest two things: 1) get counseling from a professional grief counselor if that is a possibility for you. And 2) find a Compassionate Friends Group or another grief group so you have the support you need from others who have also lost a child and understand your pain. You indicated that you are interested in The Compassionate Friends - you can find them at http://www.compassionatefriends.org and here you can look for a group in your area. We have found that the burden of grief seems lighter when you do not carry it alone and we encourage you to contact them as soon as possible so you can benefit from their love and compassion as you prepare for the upcoming birthday.

You might find it helpful to listen on Thursday mornings to the radio show Healing the Grieving Heart  You can find information about it and a link to it on the first page of http://www.thegriefblog.com  You might also find a number of past shows that can give you help and comfort at http://thegriefblog.com/grief-grieving-death-of-a-child/ 

Our blessings,

Drs. Gloria and Heidi Horsley

Helping a Friend Who Loses a Child

The Message
By Betsy Bottino Arenella -

My spiritual awakening began on December 11, 2004, with a life-altering phone call. I was walking down the front hall stairs in a bathrobe, my wet hair wrapped in a towel, when I saw my husband standing at the bottom. He was holding the telephone and looking up at me with a strange expression.

“Bad news,” my husband said. “Sophia passed away last night.” My legs buckled and I fell into a sitting position on the stairs.

Sophia was my best friend Melyné’s rosy-cheeked, active toddler. She had turned one the week before and, as far as any of us had known, she was perfectly healthy.

“What?” I heard myself say. “Are you sure? Are you sure?” I kept repeating this, positive that my husband somehow had misunderstood. How could Sophia have died? “I was just there the other day. What happened? Are you sure?”

“I’m sure, Honey,” he said. “I don’t know the details.”

I wandered around the house in a daze as my husband took care of our two young children; I had no idea what to do next. Should I drive over to Melyné’s and her husband Michael’s house? What about Melyné and Michael’s older daughter, Isabelle, age three? Was she with them? Did she know her sister had died? Did she understand?

If I made contact now, would I be intruding?

Finally, I couldn’t stand it anymore, and I dialed Melyné’s number.

“Oh, Betsy,” Melyné said, and we both started to cry. “They think it was SIDS…they think it was SIDS,” she repeated between sobs.

“What?!” I gasped. SIDS? Sudden Infant Death Syndrome? But that was only a risk for babies under age one. Sophia was a walking, talking, strong toddler, into everything, not a fragile little infant. How could this be?

The next day, I drove the five minutes to Melyné and Michael’s home. It was a bitterly cold December day, but the sun was shining and the sky was a clear, perfect blue, as if nothing had happened.
Melyné and Michael were home; Isabelle was at Melyné’s sister’s house. Melyné and I sat on the living room couch holding hands in silence, staring out the window at the ridiculously blue sky, tears streaming down our cheeks.

I kept thinking, where is Sophia? I wondered where her physical body was, but didn’t dare ask. But what about the essence of Sophia? Where there had been laughter and joy, I now sensed only a profound emptiness.

As a non-practicing Catholic, I always had approached the spiritual world with a certain degree of skepticism. But as a mother, the question struck me to the core: where had this beautiful child gone?

In the months after Sophia’s funeral, I continued to worry about Melyné and Michael. How could any parent survive such a soul-shattering loss?

It didn’t occur to me to worry about three-year-old Isabelle. She’s probably too young to understand, I told myself.

But during our daily conversations, as Melyné told me snippets of what her daughter had been saying and doing, I realized that this child was deeply grieving her sister’s death.

Isabelle, Melyné told me, had been gazing out her bedroom window at night asking for Sophia. Melyné and Michael had explained to Isabelle that Sophia’s body had stopped working and that her spirit had gone to Heaven. Crying, Isabelle said that in that case, she wanted to go to Heaven, too, so she and Sophia could be together again.

My heart broke for this little girl and her devastated family. At night I would awaken with a sick feeling in my stomach. Unable to go back to sleep, I would surf the Internet for hours until I was exhausted; then I would go back to bed, finally falling into a fitful sleep.

How to comfort this child? I felt helpless.

One day, standing in the living room pondering this question, I experienced the most extraordinary sensation. An intense wave of emotion rolled over me, accompanied by chills and goose bumps from head to toe. Thoughts, words and phrases poured into my head, accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of the purest, deepest love.

My eyes welled with tears, and my heart felt near to bursting. A complete story was in my mind:
Sophia visits Isabelle in a dream, alighting on her bed. Together, wings shimmering with the most beautiful colors of nature, the girls visit Heaven. Sophia explains that Isabelle needs to go back to earth.

But, she reassures her sister, although Isabelle can’t see her, Sophia still will be right there with her:
In the spring I’ll send a colorful butterfly to remind you of our wings. In summer I’ll whisper into a seashell and leave it on the beach where you can find it… the snowflakes falling gently on your cheeks in winter will be my kisses, and the two brightest stars in any night sky will be my eyes, shining with love for you.*

For days, I did nothing. Should I make Isabelle a book? Was I crazy to think that this story - or anything else - could comfort my friends?

But the words kept coming back to me, over and over, as I got my son ready for school, as I made dinner, as I tucked my children into bed. I’ll whisper into a seashell…

Finally I bought a blank book and started drawing with colored pencil, painstakingly filling in the sisters’ wings with multi-colored glitter glue and penciling the words at the bottom of each page. The snowflakes will be my kisses…As the glitter glue took hours to dry, and as I had my hands full with my young children, I was only able to complete about a page a day.

Tears rolled down my cheeks as I worked, but as the project progressed, a strange sense of peace came over me. The two brightest stars will be my eyes…When I woke up at night, instead of aimlessly surfing the Net with a knot in my stomach, I worked on the book.

After an hour or so, I would look at the completed, shimmering page, then go back to bed and fall into a deep sleep.

Despite the unexpected sense of calm Isabelle’s Dream had brought me, I was apprehensive about sharing it with Melyné and her family. Who was I to think that I had something to say that could comfort them?

For several months, I kept the book in a cupboard, taking it out daily to look at it.
One day Melyné mentioned that Isabelle again had been looking out her bedroom window at night and crying for Sophia. The next day, I brought Melyné the book, hidden in a white plastic grocery bag.

During the whole visit, I said nothing about the book, paralyzed with the fear that giving it to her might be the wrong thing to do. What if it upset her and her family even more?

Finally, as my daughter and I were leaving, I awkwardly handed Melyné the bag and stammered something about having made a book for Isabelle. The rest of the afternoon, as I picked my son up from preschool and ran errands around town with the kids, I wondered.

Was she reading it? What was she thinking? Had I done the right thing?

When I got home, I pressed the blinking message button on my answering machine and heard Melyné’s voice.

“Bets, I read the book this afternoon after you left. It is so beautiful.

“It’s just perfect,” she continued, her voice breaking. “The words - the pictures…Thank you so much.”

Later that week, Melyné and Michael told me that the book had affected their family deeply, and that it was the only one of the many books they had received after Sophia’s death that had given them a sense of hope. They listened in amazement as I explained how the story had come to me.

When Melyné read the book to Isabelle, she listened intently, then asked to read it two more times. At the end of the third reading, she said, “I want to go to sleep now, so I can have a dream.”

Melyné and Michael asked me to try to find a publisher so that Isabelle’s Dream could help other grieving children and families, and thus began a yearlong quest. I began submitting the manuscript to traditional publishers, sending out several proposals a week. Melyné and I reached out to anyone and everyone we could think of who might be able to help - ministers, rabbis, grief experts, friends - and their positive responses were overwhelming.

As Melyné and I pursued this project, she and her family continued on their grief journey, receiving incredible support from a national charitable organization for families who have lost children to Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood (SUDC), which is similar to SIDS but affects children after their first birthdays. Created in 2001 by the CJ Foundation for SIDS, the SUDC Program provides information, support and advocacy to affected families.

By February of 2006, a year after we had started submitting manuscripts, I had racked up 35 rejections, and Melyné and I were growing despondent over our chances of publication. But then, that month, the founder of Quality of Life Publishing, which publishes gentle grief materials for hospices and families throughout North America, informed me she wanted to publish Isabelle’s Dream. Melyné and I were overjoyed.

In November 2007, Quality of Life published Isabelle’s Dream as an interactive, 60-page fiction story and activity book for grieving children ages three to 12. The December 2007 issue of Redbook featured the book, and that month Isabelle’s Dream topped Amazon’s “Hot New Releases” sales list in the category of nonfiction children’s books about death. Just a few months after its release, the book currently is in use at children’s hospitals and hospices in 28 states.

In Sophia’s memory, all of my royalties are going to the SUDC Program and will be earmarked for research into this mysterious and devastating killer. Melyné has thanked me over and over for what she calls “an incredible gift of hope and friendship.” But in the end, I believe this powerful message’s greatest gift of all has been given to me.

© Betsy Bottino Arenella 2007. For more information about Sophia’s life and about ISABELLE’S DREAM,” visit http://www.isabellesdream.org

Grieving Fathers & Parents Create Baby Loss Memorials

By Diana Gardner-Williams -

Diana Gardner-Williams is the mother of 3 year old son, 2 early pregnancy losses and 1 stillbirth. Diana is owner and founder of Just a Cloud Away Inc. www.justacloudaway.com support website providing specialty remembrance kits, memory garden tutorials, keepsake crafts and inspirational articles and ideas to help families grieving the loss of their baby.

Remembering a Child Who Lived a Short Life

By Jenny Hander -

One of the greatest tragedies in losing a baby is that you don’t get the chance to form enough memories to carry you through a lifetime of living without them. It isn’t that you forget to remember; it is that you don’t have many memories to recall.

Though I think of my sweet daughter every day, there are some days I feel as though I created her in my own mind. I ask myself, “Was she ever really here?” I know that she was, but she was here such a short time and so much time has now passed without her, that it sometimes seems like a dream.

But every now and then, something will happen to help reaffirm to me that her short, sweet little life was real. For instance, I recently heard someone say the name “Alyssa.” I thought to myself, “Oh, how I really love that name.” And then it hit me-I had a daughter with the same name. I have a daughter named Alysa.   And today, as I read of another family who recently lost a daughter at just 6 days old, I know for sure that the life of their daughter was real. And so I am reminded again that my daughter’s life, though tragically short, did really exist.

I love the moments when I am able to realize that Alysa is real. Though she is no longer with me in the physical form, she will always be with me spiritually. Alysa is still my daughter; she just lives someplace else. Alysa lives in a more wonderful home than I could have ever prepared for her here on this Earth. She is alive and well, shining down on us from Heaven.

Jenny is the author of A Place of Peace and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in chemical engineering from Texas A&M University. She is a proud wife and a full-time mother of three. She can be reached through her website, http://www.aplaceofpeace.net/

October is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Month

By Nina Bennett -

I know all too well the devastation of pregnancy and infant loss. My precious granddaughter Maddy, after a healthy full-term pregnancy and normal labor, with no indication of fetal distress, slid still from her mother’s womb. She was a perfectly formed, beautiful baby, with every indication that she would survive delivery. But she did not. As you can imagine, our entire family was devastated.

It turns out that Maddy was one of more than one million babies in the U.S. to die in pregnancy or in the first few months of life last year. For a long time, this was a loss that was rarely talked about. Fortunately, in 2006, October 15th was officially designated Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day (H.Con.Res.222), and is marked by each year by ceremonies, memorial services, and efforts to raise money for research and education.

When Maddy died, one of my responses was to seek information and support about this kind of loss. This added yet another layer of pain.

According to the March of Dimes, stillbirths occur in about 1 in 200 pregnancies. Each year in the United States more than 26,000 babies are stillborn. That means that every day, 71 babies are stillborn, 142 mothers and fathers return home with empty arms, and 284 grandparents are devastated and often unable to comfort their grieving adult children.

The medical-care providers are left shaken and mourning as well. Up to half of all stillbirths occur in pregnancies that had seemed problem free. The International Stillbirth Alliance reports that “unexplained stillbirth in late pregnancy is the single largest cause of death in perinatal life in the Western world.” And these statistics are only for stillbirth. This may actually be an underestimate, because there are no national standards for reporting stillbirth.

Imagine my family’s distress when we found out that Maddy would not be issued a birth certificate. My son and daughter-in-law were given the paperwork for Maddy’s death certificate, but no acknowledgment was made of the baby’s life. My daughter-in-law embarked on her journey of healing by becoming an advocate for legislation that would change this additional injustice.

Arizona took a commendable step by passing legislation in 2001 to issue a Certificate of Birth Resulting in Stillbirth. Since then, 19 other states have joined Arizona. Beyond the psychological benefit to parents, which is enormous, this legislation allows for increased accuracy in tracking and reporting stillbirth.

As a society, we have made great strides in acknowledging and supporting family members bereaved by cancer, which once was an unspoken illness. It is time for our society to take action to reduce the incidence of perinatal loss and infant mortality, to speak openly about the void left by the death of a baby, and to acknowledge the large numbers of its citizens who struggle to rebuild meaning in a life challenged by the most horrific loss of all.

Nina Bennett has 4 grandchildren, one of whom was stillborn following a healthy full-term pregnancy. She has worked in reproductive health since 1976, and was a childbirth educator for nearly 10 years. A healthcare professional and frequently requested guest lecturer, Nina presents talks and workshops locally and nationally. She is the Principal Investigator of an IRB-approved research study looking at how grandparents incorporate perinatal loss into their family. Nina is the author of Forgotten Tears A Grandmother’s Journey Through Grief.  Proceeds from her book are donated to MISS Foundation/AGAST, and other agencies supporting families bereaved by the death of a baby. Reach Nina at Ninabde@aol.com.

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