3

The unfortunate truth is exactly what everyone else here wrote, you will continue to get those thoughtless, careless and well meaning but seriously insensitive comments from all directions, Christian and non-Christian alike. Just because you believe that the Lord is walking through the valley with you doesn't mean that the pain isn't there, and that you still need to grieve.

I'm feeling like the progress I've made over teh last 6 months is slowly unraveling in the face of my various life situations. Such as : my sister is due to have her 1st child, a girl, in less than 2 weeks. My daughter was delivered stillborn a little over 6 months ago. My mother told me she had to 'think about' carrying a picture of my daughter in her wallet, and that her picture would be displayed in her bedroom (heaven forbid the living room!).

O wish I could tell people I know in RL who are 'thinking of me' (but who haven't called, sent a card, or anything else), that thinking of me provides me no comfort whatsoever. At least PRAY for me or Abby, and if you're not the praying sort, then call me or send me a quick e-mail or a short note. Thinking of me and nothing else feels cowardly, selfish and lazy.
...

I actually have a relative who persists in asking me, 3 1/2 years on, why this all happened. What the meaning was behind Kai's death, behind Chip's. What I was meant to learn. And, 3 1/2 years on, it is all I can do to answer her calmly, to say that it doesn't work that way, when what I really want to do is smack her.

Judaism didn't do much for me after we lost either of our babies- no explanations, no healing rituals. In fact, they were considered never to have been alive in the Jewish tradition, so technically there were no deaths to mourn. I do, however, light candles and say kaddish for them at Yom Kippur and on the anniversaries of their deaths (but on the secular calendar, not the Jewish one.) I found out recently that my mother does, too, and although we have done all our grieving separately, I am touched that this is one place in which we have come together.

The things that tend to get me hot under the collar are the demands made on grieving parents - to grieve in a certain way, to behave in a certain way (whether that is more or less sad), to make it easier for others.

Hey, folks who put up this billboard of big blue eyed baby grinning toothlessly at us with big bold words saying "GOD IS PROLIFE!" - you need to Stop. And. THINK. about what you are saying.

I get what you intend.

But it doesn't feel very good to hear that God apparently is prolife unless it's MY babies. That apparently, according to your published worldview, God wants my babies to die (otherwise, they'd live, wouldn't they? Seeing's how God is all for life! Woooo!).

i continue to be jealous of those who come from a background that offers ritual. i have wished i were hindu or catholic, burmese or chicana... but i am 3/4 white protestant and 1/4 cultural jew and not practicing either religion - so i'm floating out here in the secular world. before this loss i had a lot of my own rituals for grounding and meditation and selfcare and prayer. but tjheir flimsiness was revealed pretty quickly when the sh*t went down, and i haven't gone back to them.

I haven't worked out what to do with Halloween. We never celebrated it as a kitsch holiday with bowls of treats and witches hats - we still don't. And I haven't worked out any rituals for this date. Possibly because I'm from a Protestant tradition that seems to be about stiff upper lip and glossing over death. My church have never really known what to do with me, since Emma died. I LOVE, love all the rituals you have created for Dia de los Muertos but Idon't have the same connection to this date.

Thank you so much for posting this! I've found it hard being non religious, I've felt almost jealous of those who could at least be comforted by their faith, and angry at those who try to comfort me with religious words. It's just nice to feel that I'm not alone xxx