Comfort in Our Loss

Today (October 15th) is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day.  It has been four years since the loss of our first baby and three years since the loss of our second (both were ectopic pregnancies).  It was a heartbreaking experience, but I feel so much peace now as I see how God has used that loss to drive us to be open to a different kind of family than we had originally pictured.  It is interesting to me that I was pregnant at the same time as two of my children’s birthmoms and without the losses we experienced it is unlikely these two precious kids would have ended up in our home.  I’m so thankful for Joel’s healthy pregnancy and birth that have helped complete the healing cycle for me.

I have been blessed to walk alongside many women who God has asked to endure the loss of their babies.  I want to share what I have learned in case it will be helpful to any of you who are put in the position of offering comfort to a sister who is experiencing this pain.

– Please acknowledge this baby as a person.  Even if the loss was very early in the pregnancy, we need to know that you understand this life mattered.

-Help us find a tangible way to memorialize that life.  After the loss of our first baby my sister gave me a necklace with the name we had chosen for the baby engraved on it and what would have been the baby’s birthstone.  With our second loss I got flowers from our church in honor of our baby.  Those acknowledgements were very healing for me and helped me feel validated in my sadness.

– Do something practical to express love.  We were so blessed by people providing meals after both of our losses.  As nice as it was to not have to cook, it was even more meaningful to know someone had thought of us enough to want to prepare a meal.  That food tasted like love.

– Give us opportunities to speak about our loss, but be respectful if we’re not ready.

– Be very mindful about offering platitudes.  We may not want to hear how we can make a new baby, or how this is God’s way of taking care of babies that have something wrong with them, or how you’re thankful it was so early in the pregnancy, or how God has a plan.  A big hug, thoughtful questions, and a reminder that you’re praying for us are the kind of comfort we’re looking for.

– Time will heal, but we appreciate you remembering.  If you can remember baby’s due date or the one year anniversary of our loss it will mean so much to us.  We can find that we have a little sadness each year at about the time of our loss and if you can offer some support during those times it may help us get through.

– Validate our sadness.  When we lost our first baby my aunt wrote me a letter talking about the pain that is unique to a mother who has lost a child.  My aunt lost her son when he was killed in a tragic car accident as a young man.  For her to equate our pain was amazingly validating.  If you have experienced your own loss, it’s okay to share about your pain if you can do it tactfully in a way that validates the sadness of the one you are comforting.

The last thing I want to offer is a passage from Job.  I read through Job right after the loss of our second baby and found so much comfort in Job’s honesty and God’s grace.  I read and reread this passage as it spoke to me about the pain of this world and the peace my children experience as they are at rest with their Lord.  If you are struggling today, I hope it brings you comfort, too.

Job 3:11-19

Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? Why were there knees to receive me and breasts that I might be nursed? For now I would be lying down in peace; I would be asleep and at rest with kings and counselors of the earth, who built for themselves places now lying in ruins, with rulers who had gold, who filled their houses with silver. Or why was I not hidden in the ground like a stillborn child, like an infant who never saw the light of day? There the wicked cease from turmoil, and there the weary are at rest. Captives also enjoy their ease; they no longer hear the slave driver’s shout. The small and the great are there, and the slave is freed from his master.