Navigating the Early Days

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing, self care

I’ve had the fortune (or misfortune – depending on the lens you look through) to be consulted a few times on how to support a newly bereaved mother. By no means do I consider myself to be a professionally qualified consultant on the matter, but I do have one credential that places me in a different segmentation of the average individual. I am a bereaved mother. And so, by default, that makes me somewhat qualified to be consulted on the topic.

During the most recent ask to consult on what to say or how to help a recently bereaved mother in what I think is an impossible situation, I found myself a little lost for words at first. To be honest, swearing was the only cohesive speech I managed to share with the friend who was so dutifully asking me for my advice on the matter, admitting that she had absolutely no experience and very aware that not everything that is intentionally helpful, helpful to a newly bereaved mother.

My mind immediately raced through all of the things not to do or say – the cliches, the religious anecdotes, the “at leasts…”. But then I paused, took a deep breath in and let myself carefully drift back to those early days of grief — early hours of grief, where the shock of loosing your precious baby(ies) is still very present and you feel nothing but numbness. The early hours of grief where you stare out beyond the world, for hours, and the world stares back through you, carrying on as if nothing had happened. The sun sets, the moon rises, the traffic flows, the stars glow, the sidewalk bustles, the emails ping, the people smile, the flowers bloom, the snow falls, the clocks run, the school day ends, the tide rises and the waves crash and it all just flows through like nothing ever happened. In those early grief days, none of that matters. It’s all just swept up into the numbness and shock of the perpetual thought of “my baby(ies) just died – does nobody give a fuck?”.

So, as an innocent (and concerned) bystander, all you see is this shell of a person who you love, is maybe just stillness and silence and not responsive to the world around them and all you want to do is fix it. Take their pain away, make them smile again. See them happy. See them live. So how do you do that? What encouraging words can you offer? What actions can you take that will help them “snap out of it” and get back to life?

Before leaping into action, what you must realize and come to terms with, is this. Your loved one, didn’t JUST loose their baby(ies). They LOST their baby(ies) AND they lost THEMSELVES. So much of themselves is lost in that moment when the realization that their baby(ies) have been lost forever. Just because that newly bereaved mother is still physically alive, does not mean that she did not also die with their baby(ies). Believe me (I guess this is the qualification factor), a large part of us as individuals, vanishes when our baby(ies) die. So the best thing you can offer any newly bereaved mother is space.

Space to grief. Space to tell you about her baby(ies). Space to share her birth story. Space to cry, be angry, be resentful, be sad, be happy, be confused, be honest. Space to just be. That gift of space, can be wrapped and gifted in so many different ways. It can be wrapped up in a walk outside. A drive along the country side road. A hot cup of coffee, tea, soup broth in a quiet, private place. It can be bundled in the shape of a colouring book and colourful pencils to give her a place to rest her mind. It can be wrapped in the form of a journal with a sharp pencil or felt tip pen to give her a place to unpack her emotions and try to answer all of the unanswered questions. It can be boxed along with some bath salts, moisturizers, essential oils and soft slippers to remind her to take care of herself. It can also be just a simple stuffed animal toy to give her empty arms something to hold.

None of those things will bring her baby(ies) back. But having the space to navigate the thick grief fog, rollercoaster of emotions and process of re defining herself is a good start. There’s no timeline and no end game for the bereaved mother. Her grief will not come to a magical finish line. Her love for her baby(ies) will not end, therefore, all she is left with is the space in between – to tread the journey. Just be there. Quietly and gracefully, treading beside her.

This is Seven

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing, Parenting

Seven looks a little different. The lead up to seven has sped through our lives like a gust of wind that comes quickly and with purpose – a reminder that another season is upon us. Another year has passed. Another year of your present absence.

Seven feels like a pivotal year. One that signifies change. One that enables movement forward, although we have somehow managed to keep moving without you. It hasn’t always been forward, but it’s movement; and in grief, that’s all that counts.

For seven years, we have shared you within our world. We have openly and freely said your name. We have lived and loved unapologetically in your honour. We have continued onward with our lives as best we could – living in parallel realms, with and without you.

But seven is not enough. It’s not enough to heal. Infinity is not enough, so why would seven be? Instead seven feels like a pause in a time lapse, where we assess our vantage point and reposition before continuing to record this journey we’re on with you.

At seven, we can pause and see the light that you have shone through the cracks in our hearts out into the world. We can see the brightness that you have lit our world with. We are starting to understand the purpose of your love in our lives. Understanding is not accepting – it’s simply understanding and opening ourselves to whatever else you teach us along this journey.

Such a small number for a big lesson when you put it into perspective. With every season and every year that passes, we are reminded that your love is present and purposeful. It’s a guiding force if we surrender to it and it will continue to be until our realms once again collide and our lights are no longer pouring through the cracks, but intertwined together. Once again whole.

Until then, we love you and wish you were here everyday.

Happy 7th Birthday sweet Jude.

xo mommy

Champagne 6 on the 6

Child loss, Grief, Healing, self care, Uncategorized

I suppose champagne birthdays are only really a thing only when you’re an adult – when you can actually drink champagne! By definition, today we could have potentially be celebrating your champagne birthday. You would have been turning 6 on the 6th this year. And even though you’re not here, I’ll still raise a champagne flute to celebrate. Celebrate you. Celebrate me. Celebrate us as a collective family. Celebrate the fact that we have survived 6 years of this balancing act of grief and joy. Love and pain.

6 years in, I still hold this day sacred. And I know that in some shape or form I will continue to hold it sacred until I die. It’s the day I honour you but also honour the person that you made me. Honour the strength, the perspective and the grace that I had anticipated to be born on this day, but never did. Instead, all of those things were born much earlier, in a completely different setting, in the most unexpected way, shaping the person that I have become.

Self care is one of those phrases you hear as a bereaved parent very early on in the grief journey, but holds very little merit. It’s not much, much later in one’s grief journey that you come to recognize the critical role it plays, in not only surviving, but also living through the journey.

Today, on your would have been champagne birthday, I choose self care – even if it comes in the form of a champagne glass.

Definition of a good day

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing

Is today a good day? What constitutes as a good day? From my vantage point, today is a day. A special day. But not sure it’s a good day — but then again, what is a good day.

What I know is that today is our day. Our day to connect. To reflect on what may have been. What could have been. What should have been.

I’ve been holding this day dearly for 5 years. The entrance into this new decade starting in 2020 has abruptly reminded me that you and I have been apart for half a decade already. Half a decade. Time still flies when you’re grieving. Nothing sits still.

I claim this day every year since loosing you to honour us. To honour you, my sweet Jude on what could have been your birthday and to honour myself for surviving this journey.

I saw the words scripted in blue marker on the side of my cup as the barista handed me my comfort tea this morning and wondered if she could see through my broken exterior shell. Could she see that I need to be reminded to “have a good day”? Maybe. Maybe she was simply carrying out her perfected customer experience ritual that gets carried out with every customer.

But today, I’d like to think that message was unique to me. That it wasn’t the barista’s message at all. That the message came from you, reminding me that today is a good day. That today, is a day that we can hold in our hearts together and indulge in this non conventional love that we hold for each other in a way that only you and I understand.

Today is a good day after all.

4 minus 1

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing, Parenting

4 years. It’s been 4 years since we had to say goodbye to you physically, but to us, you’re more alive then ever. You’ve been the first thing I think about and the last thing I think about almost each and every day. You’re in my everyday, so how could I possibly forget you?

The butterfly visits, gentle wind breezes and random song playings on the radio, are all daily signs from you that bring my heart joy. These little secret messages from you are what make your love so vivid and present. Yet, my mind often plants seeds of pressure to move on, to stop honouring you, to forget. And it waters (or drowns sometimes) those seeds with expectation, either self imposed or imposed by others. But the truth is, that my heart, simply cannot comply.

The guilt that comes with the thought of not honouring or holding space for you in our lives is a reminder that my heart is not healed and I don’t think it ever will. The space that we hold in our hearts for you is what enables are hearts to be whole. Without it, they just crumble back to a million pieces. And so far it has taken us four years to glue those pieces back together to resemble our hearts.

You, Jude, have taught me so many things in these short 4 years. You have taught me how to love fiercely and unapologetically. And because of that, my heart cannot simply move forward without you. It can only move forward with you.

I have come to accept that my grief is a reflection of my love for you. I can’t expect it to ever go away, stay the same or even dissipate. That’s just not how true love works. It changes, grows, breaks apart and molds back together – each day feeling different.

My heart too has changed. It has held space for 2, then 3, then molded back to 2, then grew to hold space for 4 and it’s now changed to hold space for 4 minus 1. It’s no wonder grief feels like one step forward, two steps backward at times. It’s love. Changing, longing, growing, missing. That’s what love is.

4 years later, I continue to wonder. Maybe if it all had gone to plan my love, you would be starting school this year. I watch those markers in my life grow up so fast and find a dose of comfort in knowing that I won’t have to watch you trek off to school independently. I relish in the fact that unlike their moms, I get to keep you snuggled up in my heart for yet another year as my baby. These are the bittersweet moments of our love, sweet Jude.

There are many reasons why your birthday feels different to me this year. Amongst the blurred busyness of this year, my heart carries heavy doses of guilt for simply not mindfully being with you. I know that’s all part of the ever changing process of grief, but my mama heart finds that difficult to accept. I hope that despite everything this year, you have continued to feel my love. I know I have felt yours, my sweet boy.

Happy 4th Birthday Jude!

xo mommy

Mother’s Love Day

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing, Parenting

Since loosing our sweet Jude, there are so many mundane conversation starter questions that I simply don’t use anymore, and dread being asked them; including “do you have any children?” or “ how many children do you have?”. These questions for a bereaved mom are dreadful and grief triggering, irrespective of where in her grief journey she is.

During my subsequent pregnancy after loosing Jude, I was introduced to a whole new set of triggering questions such as “is this your first?” or “ are you excited to become a mom?”.

Since having my daughter, a new set of triggering questions have presented themselves, but the one that has been triggering me the most is, “ how are you enjoying motherhood?”.

Like all of the other aforementioned questions, they are often asked innocently and mindlessly which to most moms, is ok. But not for a bereaved mom — and here’s why.

I’m already a mom. I’m already experiencing motherhood.

Before I was a mom to my daughter, I was a mom to my son Jude. He made me a mom.

The question itself implies that I’m new to motherhood which denies the existence of my son. And that is the triggering point. Any bereaved parent will tell you that the only thing that hurts just as much as loosing your child is the thought of your child being forgotten. His memory diminished. His existence erased.

There are multiple forms, sides and dimensions to motherhood.

Motherhood is easy when your child gets to live. It’s when they die that it’s hard.

Now I know that’s a bold statement to make, but as a mom that has the privilege to mother a child amongst the stars and mother a child below the stars, I have become familiar with the multiple dimensions of motherhood and can stand behind the statement. Each dimension has its joys and sorrows. It’s good days and bad days. It’s peaks and valleys. But at the end of the day, I get to hold my daughter and kiss her goodnight everyday — something I cannot physically do with my son. Something so many other moms who hold their babies only in their heart so desperately want, but simply cannot have. And not having that simple ritual is hard. Really hard. Unbelievably hard.

But yet, we manage to move forward every day – one day at a time. Tending to our heart and our child as if they were physically present, because to us, they are so unbelievably present in our hearts, our minds and in our souls. Every. Single. Day. That dimension of motherhood is hard.

So when asked the question of how I’m enjoying motherhood, I often respond with a somewhat mundane response sprinkled with a bit more raw honesty than most new moms would, which catches the inquirer by surprise. Just imagine how surprised they would be if I answered them truthfully and said that Motherhood is easy when your child gets to live. It’s when they die that it’s hard.

So today, on Mother’s Day, look around and acknowledge and honour all moms (and dads) – whether you can physically see their children or not. Afterall, as nurturing human beings, whether we bear our own children, raise someone else’s, have them physically with us or carry them in our hearts, we are all programmed to love, teach and nurture them in our own unique way.

Wishing you a gentle happy Mother’s Love Day today.

Parenting between heaven and earth

#judedays, Child loss, Healing, Parenting

These days I find myself giving myself permission to do or not do a lot of things as it relates to my relationship with Jude and my grief. Allowing yourself permission is not an easy task. It often involves several hours (maybe days) of battles in your mind leading to countless sleepless hours before a final winner is declared. Sometimes I win, sometimes I loose.

I’m giving myself permission to temporarily excuse myself from certain elements of parenting a child you physically don’t have in order to parent the basics to a child I physically do have.

I see this as a way of making room in my heart for both of my children, which is proving to be a difficult task. Up until this point, I have only known one way of parenting – parenting with grief. I have had to find creative ways to honour and parent Jude in my heart in ways that are completely different then parenting a physical child. I have had to parent from the inside out – from deep within my heart in a way that ensures my love for Jude is somehow made visible. Grief woven parenting takes resources, physical energy and copious amounts of emotional energy.

Parenting a physical child takes mainly physical energy – except when you’re a bereaved parent. As a bereaved parent, parenting a physical child not only drains you physically, it also drains you emotionally. Largely because parenting your physical child(ren) is a constant reminder to your heart of all of the physical moments you are missing out on with the child you lost. Every milestone, every baby step, every everyday normal minute is a reminder to your heart of what should have been, what could have been, what you’ve missed. All of these trigger reminders are mentally and emotionally draining, leaving you spent, and if you’re like me, guilt ridden.

The guilt is triggered by so many elements. Guilt from not being able to physically carry out the small rituals to honour the child you loss. Guilt from not physically visiting their resting place as often as you did before. Guilt from realizing the child you lost is not occupying all of your mindfulness space. Guilt from feeling the love your physical child is bringing to you. Guilt from enjoying the tiny moments of joy with your physical child. Guilt from not being in the deepest depths of grief.

Balancing the guilt is what has made parenting between heaven and earth so challenging for me. The challenge is a result of all of these emotions, thoughts and feelings colliding at the centre of my heart and dispersing throughout, leaving me simply emotionally spent. Ironically, that same collision at the centre of my heart is what fuels the parenting I’m seeing to here on earth. It provides a source of nourishment for all of the characteristics that I know I didn’t embody before having Jude but am embodying now. My invisible parenting to Jude, has enabled me to now parent his younger sibling who is physically with me.

Jude taught me patience. He showed me how to be humble and appreciate the tiniest of moments and things. Jude taught me how to love unconditionally. He taught me kindness. All characteristics that I’m drawing on day in and day out as I parent his younger sibling.

Parenting between heaven and earth is complex, emotionally charged and beautiful. It forces emotions together in a perfectly balanced dance showing up in the most unconventional moments. Joy and sorrow, happiness and sadness, excitement and despair, all intertwined together twirling and shuffling within the borders of your heart. It does so, so swiftly that it makes you feel like you’re no longer parenting between heaven and earth – but simply parenting.

The centre of it all

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing

The weeks leading up to today tend to be the same with each year that passes. They are filled with anxiety and fear. Fear that with the passing of yet one more year, my memory of you will fade. Anxiety simply because the perfectionist in me wants to ensure that every detail of your celebration is covered off and perfect. So in the middle of the night, when I am restless and my brain races through every milestone and every event that lead me to you, I realize that even then – even in the darkness you are in the centre of it all.

But in the darkness, it’s where I see your light the brightest. It’s in the darkness that I reflect on the thoughts that filled my foggy grief mind in the early days of how I could possibly endure such sorrow. How I could possibly continue on with the heaviness that filled my heart on this day. Today, in the darkness, I relish in your brightness and think, how could I possibly not carry on bearing witness to the joy that you have brought to my life.

In the movie, Collateral Beauty, the character that portrays, ‘Love’ challenges the main character on his refusal to accept Love into his life after experiencing the loss of his child. ‘Love’ declares it’s presence by insisting that you simply cannot turn your back on love – that even in the darkness, there is a place for love. That love – your love, is what leads me through the darkness and into the morning light.

Today, as we celebrate your 3rd birthday, your love shines brighter then ever. It’s the guiding light through it all. It guides me through the fear, the anxiety, the sorrow and allows me to embrace the joy. The collateral beauty that your light shines upon leaves me in awe every single day. It’s in those tiny moments of awe that you remind me that there’s nothing to fear. That the memory of you will never fade. That you are my constant. In the light and in the dark. Much like the “Love” character in the movie, you declare your presence time and time again and assure me that you are indeed at the centre of it all. And there in the centre of my heart, is where I will forever carry you my sweet Jude.

Happy 3rd Birthday!

Xo mommy

Tonka Truck Day

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Healing

Two years ago today I woke up to the the familiar sound of my phone notifying me that the outside world was connecting with me. I glanced over at the phone laying on my night table and read the brightly lit message, ” thinking of you today”. A few minutes after that, it notified me again that the outside world was reaching out once more. And again and again until I returned it to its restful state for recharge at the end of the day. Today; two years later, my phone lays in its restful charging state – silent. No outside world reaching out – only my four month old puppy checking in to make sure I’m still here.

Today is an ordinary day to the outside world, but to me it’s meaningful. Today is the day that I hold as Jude’s true honorary birthday. Today, if all had gone according to plan, he could have been turning 2. Today was my official due date from my pregnancy with Jude.

For the last two years, I have observed the day in a way as one that is special and not ordinary. It’s a day that I honour Jude in a simple way as well as also honour myself, as a means to mark the survival of our journey together, so that it too, does not go unnoticed. I know that the odds of a person actually delivering their baby on their due date are rare, but that doesn’t stop me from often wondering if on this day I would be celebrating a birthday with my little boy. Whether the odds were in my favour or not for a successful delivery on my planned due date, it doesn’t change the fact that I would have likely been celebrating a birthday in January with Jude. And for that reason alone, I choose to continue to honour this day –– if even just with a simple balloon.

The first snowfall

#judedays, Child loss, Grief, Parenting

I don’t know why, but it always catches me by surprise. The first snowfall of the season always takes my breath away – if only for a second. It catches me off guard and lifts me into this awe and wonder – beautiful, cold snowflakes dancing all around, landing perfectly on the ground forming a white blanket.

And then it hits me. It’s the first snowfall of the season and that same white blanket of cold snowflakes is covering my sweet Jude. Instead of snow angels, snowmen and snowballs, there’s only a cold blanket of snow. The thought of my sweet boy being covered in the cold hits my heart like the ice cold breeze hitting my face and it stings. In that moment, the awe and wonder dissipates and all that’s left is sadness and the knowledge, that it’s only going to get colder from here on in.

another season without you….