That got me thinking about the child we lost to a miscarriage years ago. I remember a few years ago when someone said to Natasha that we had three kids. Later while she was alone with me, she said defiantly we don't have three kids, we have four.
Between Anna and Deborah, our first and second children we had another pregnancy. All seemed well at first, then came the bleeding and we went to the hospital. Now everyone at the hospital was nice, and I am sure that everyone meant well, but our experience did not go as well as it should have.
The hospital took Natasha up for a sonogram which by the end of that process she thought she had lost our baby. We were shown to a room to await our tests results. While we were waiting a chaplain came in to console us for our loss. The only problem is the doctor had not yet come in to tell us about our loss as of yet. When the chaplain realized his mistake he apologized and left. Shortly after that the doctor came in and revealed to us the news, obviously no real revelation to us at this point. The chaplain came back in to help us with our .loss. He also gave us a handful of literature to help us deal with our loss.
I want to share a couple of things that I read in the material and how that affected me. First of all, regardless of mistakes I want to make it clear that my wife and I have complete respect for everyone at the hospital and believe that their intentions could not be better. That being said, some of their material seemed not quite right to me. One piece, for instance, said that if you are trying to console someone, never try to give them answers because there are no answers. Don't try to say that it's all apart of God's plan because this puts God in the role of the bad guy, and the parents could start to resent God. First of all, in my worldview, that does not put God in some sort of villainous role. Second, that belief, that God has a plan and is in charge, was the primary thing that kept my wife and I going and would have been the best thing for anyone to say to me. I have heard similar. Now I am not saying that you should always try to comfort some in this manner. Sometimes it really would cause more harm than good. I just feel that each one of these grief situations are different and not one solution will work for everyone. So what should you say? Well, I am no expert but in my personal layman's opinion you take your own knowledge about the person and whatever feelings you are getting from the Spirit and make a decision based on your relationship with the person experiencing grief and not what some pamphlet writer is saying.
Another thing that bothered me was a flyer addressed to the dads. It explained how us as men are often detached from our feelings and as a result often don't respond in the same way as our wives. It said that we need to be extra caring and understanding if our wife is struggling with her grief and not to try to make her move on too fast. Just because we are not as deeply effected by it as they are, does not mean that their pain isn't legitimate. Some fathers may have needed that advice, I don't know about that, but I sure did not. I read that when I was hurting and confused. Before I read that I wanted to punch something and then scream and shout. After I read that I wanted to punch whoever wrote that pamphlet. A lot of the information in the literature the provided was great and helpful, but that pamphlet I personally found insulting and hurtful. Remember I read it just a few minutes after finding out my wife had lost our second child.
The loss hit me so hard I found myself unable to say the word miscarriage for about two years. If I tried I would just start bawling like a baby. I felt like a baby too, but that is what happened. For the next two of three years I could say the word, but I would still get emotional. Now I can actually say the word like I used to. The hospital has a plot where they bury all early remains and that is where Timothy lies now. We don't actually know if it was a boy, but from the moment Natasha found out she was pregnant she thought he was a boy, and we knew his name would be Timothy. Every year on the anniversary my wife gets a bit moody. I know she is remembering. The hospital has a memorial near the mass grave site, for those like us. I would like to visit it the next time we travel through the area.
I have never shared my thoughts in this detail to anyone before. Not in person or in writing or in any other way. I could not have done this eight or nine years ago. If someone is still struggling with grief like this the one thing I would say to you, is it is not easy but it does get better, slowly