How a School Enrollment Form Reminded Me of The Blank Spaces in Our Family
When you lose a baby, there are always spaces in life that remain blank, empty. Your arms and lap. A bed, a crib. A seat at the dinner table, a place on the couch. A spot in the annual family picture. Photo albums, scrapbooks. Boxes on the calendar where birthdays…
The world continues to watch a grieving mama whale maneuver the waters of the Pacific Northwest, while carrying her dead calf for, as of the last report, the sixth day in a row. This sweet mama has captured the attention of people all over the world as they have witnessed…
I came across this image of a grieving whale and my attention was captured by the stunning display of a mother’s love. This mama whale’s calf died shortly after birth, and as I write, she has continued to carry it for three days. She holds on…
If you are grieving the loss of a baby, know that it’s okay. It’s okay to be angry. At God. At the world. At whoever. It’s okay to tear up those pregnancy announcements and baby shower invitations and birth announcements that now seem to…
There are countless boxes scattered about the house as we prepare for an out-of-state move. And as I scan each room, it’s these two boxes that stand out. Not because they are decorative boxes, prettier than the standard cardboard ones that fill the rest of the…
See that blue sky in the distance? You’re headed straight for it. And it might not be as far away as it seems. This weekend I drove hundreds of miles to meet some of the brightest women I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. The clouds…
They say the days of motherhood are long. And the nights too. For motherhood is an all-consuming job. And perhaps this is even more true for the mother who does not hold her child in her arms. Because although gone, her child’s life still consumes her, in…
Letting Go of Guilt When a Memory Brings More Joy Than Pain
There wasn’t much that I shared with the Facebook world after losing Micah because, well, my life was far from picture perfect. The doom and gloom of pregnancy loss doesn’t really interest people, and I didn’t have the energy to pretend that I thought…
Mother’s Day is just around the corner, and being that it is always on a Sunday, many of us start our Mother’s Day celebrations by heading to church. Over the past few years, I’ve paid special attention to the prayers that are spoken in…
While working to declutter my bedroom today, I came across a stack of old journals and skimmed through one of them. It was the one that was given to me at the hospital after baby Micah died, and for months, I had filled its empty pages with my heartache and…