A HEARTFELT NOTE
to you...
To My Reader
I can assume why you are here with me right now, and I am so very sorry. Either you’ve lost your sweet baby or babies in the cruelest, most unfair way, or you’re here trying to learn how you can support your loved one whose experienced the worst kind of loss there is, losing your child. I want to be clear; my goal is not to try and take you or your loved one’s pain away right now or ever. Nothing I say or suggest can ever do that, nor do either of us really want that for you.
The truest thing I’ve ever been told since losing our daughter is that our grief equates to the amount in which we love our children, and that is why it hurts too much to even speak of at times. It is why the pain is so blinding and physical at other times that your whole body actually aches … because you love them that much. Therefore, I don’t wish your pain or grief away, I only wish for you to know, YOU ARE NOT ALONE here.
When I first lost MaryKate, I remember sitting in the hospital bed, feeling so isolated and humiliated and heartbroken, and it wasn’t until one of the nurses came in and shared her story of loss that was so similar to our own that I was able to take a break from the intrusive thoughts telling me I was never going to survive without my baby.
I realized then, hearing from others who knew this loss and therefore pain would be the only thing that would bring us any sort of real “comfort” or “hope” if you will, especially those first few days, maybe even weeks, since losing our daughter. I would learn we weren’t the only people on Earth in this very position, far from it actually, no matter how much my mind told me otherwise. I needed to know this and so do you and/or your loved one.
​
Which is why I will continue to share our story and any resources provided to us in our darkest days to anyone I can in hopes that it keeps you going, gives you the courage to keep living, even when everything in your body and mind tells you not to.
Because as long as you are living, so is your child, through your love for them. My final pieces of advice, if all you can do right now is get out of bed to eat or go to the bathroom, you are doing ENOUGH. One day at a time, sometimes one minute at a time is all we can do and that is OKAY.
IT WON'T ALWAYS FEEL LIKE THIS, I swear to you, but I know that’s not what you want to hear right now. Grief looks different for us all. Don’t let anyone try and put yours in a box or on a timeline. I do not believe that everything happens for a reason, and although I do believe they are in a better place now, I don’t believe it is ever appropriate for someone to say that to us. There is no reason a child should have to die. Ever. And they deserve to be here, alive in our arms, not without us and before us in Heaven.
Feel free to gently remind anyone, even a loved one, who tries to tell you otherwise. Please allow yourself to feel everything as it comes to you. Sadness, aching, rage, jealously to everyone with a baby or still pregnant … Acknowledge it all and don’t try and suppress it or run from it, it only makes your healing more painful and prolonged.
Everything you’re feeling is VALIDATED. And finally, remember to love yourself when you can. Give yourself as much grace as possible. You’re an excellent mother or father and you did nothing wrong. If only our love could save them, our children would live forever
Be the first to know
Subscribe to our newsletter to receive news and updates.