For the past few days I’ve been looking at the numbers on the calendar, growing more and more introspective as we inched closer to August 6. It was 27 years ago today that I learned the baby I was carrying, my second baby, had died 11 weeks into my pregnancy.

With a mother’s intuition, I had known something was wrong during that pregnancy from a couple of weeks before. The day Dennis and I — with Noah in tow — went to the midwife for my regular check up, I didn’t even take the little tape recorder with me to capture the sound of baby’s heartbeat, so convinced was I that I would hear only silence. I went back for the recorder only after Dennis insisted. But somehow I knew. Because when you are a mother sometimes you just know things about your children, even when there is no logical reason you should, even when they are still growing inside you.

When we went for the ultrasound to confirm the miscarriage, we saw the perfect form of our baby up on the screen. I remember Dennis looking so happy, thinking everything was okay after all, and me pointing out that the heart was still. No blinking blip. No more life.

With that same mother’s intuition, no matter how busy or stressed I am, no matter how many other things I seem to forget as I race through my life at breakneck speed, I never forget this anniversary. It is imprinted on my heart. As the date nears, I feel a stillness settling in, a quiet place amid the chaos, a space reserved just for this baby, the one I never to got hold, the one I call Grace.

In the past, I have talked about the ways Grace shaped our family by her absence rather than her presence, and that truth remains with me. I am very much aware of the fact that life would be very different had she lived. She managed to leave her mark on us, even without taking a breath. She lingers here, not only in my heart but around the edges of our lives — especially the lives of our two girls who followed her. I know them because I did not know Grace. What a sorrowful and yet beautiful impact she had on us.

So thank you, baby, for all that you were and all that you have given us without ever setting foot on this earth. The power of one small life.

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For the past few days I’ve been looking at the numbers on the calendar, growing more and more introspective as we inched closer to August 6. It was 26 years ago today that I learned the baby I was carrying, my second baby, had died 11 weeks into my pregnancy.

With a mother’s intuition, I had known something was wrong during that pregnancy from a couple of weeks before. The day Dennis and I — with Noah in tow — went to the midwife for my regular check up, I didn’t even take the little tape recorder with me to capture the sound of baby’s heartbeat, so convinced was I that I would hear only silence. I went back for the recorder only after Dennis insisted. But somehow I knew. Because when you are a mother sometimes you just know things about your children, even when there is no logical reason you should, even when they are still growing inside you.

When we went for the ultrasound to confirm the miscarriage, we saw the perfect form of our baby up on the screen. I remember Dennis looking so happy, thinking everything was okay after all, and me pointing out that the heart was still. No blinking blip. No more life.

With that same mother’s intuition, no matter how busy or stressed I am, no matter how many other things I seem to forget as I race through my life at breakneck speed, I never forget this anniversary. It is imprinted on my heart. As the date nears, I feel a stillness settling in, a quiet place amid the chaos, a space reserved just for this baby, the one I never to got hold, the one I call Grace.

In the past, I have talked about the ways Grace shaped our family by her absence rather than her presence, and that truth remains with me. I am very much aware of the fact that life would be very different had she lived. She managed to leave her mark on us, even without taking a breath. She lingers here, not only in my heart but around the edges of our lives — especially the lives of our two girls who followed her. I know them because I did not know Grace. What a sorrowful and yet beautiful impact she had on us.

So thank you, baby, for all that you were and all that you have given us without ever setting foot on this earth. The power of one small life.

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For more Life Lines episodes, click HERE.

The post Life Lines podcast: grief and grace appeared first on Not Strictly Spiritual.

For the past few days I’ve been looking at the numbers on the calendar, growing more and more introspective as we inched closer to August 6. It was 22 years ago today that I learned the baby I was carrying, my second baby, had died 11 weeks into my pregnancy.

With a mother’s intuition, I had known something was wrong during that pregnancy from a couple of weeks before. The day Dennis and I — with Noah in tow — went to the midwife for my regular check up, I didn’t even take the little tape recorder with me to capture the sound of baby’s heartbeat, so convinced was I that I would hear only silence. I went back for the recorder only after Dennis insisted. But somehow I knew. Because when you are a mother sometimes you just know things about your children, even when there is no logical reason you should, even when they are still growing inside you.

When we went for the ultrasound to confirm the miscarriage, we saw the perfect form of our baby up on the screen. I remember Dennis looking so happy, thinking everything was okay after all, and me pointing out that the heart was still. No blinking blip. No more life.

With that same mother’s intuition, no matter how busy or stressed I am, no matter how many other things I seem to forget as I race through my life at breakneck speed, I never forget this anniversary. It is imprinted on my heart. As the date nears, I feel a stillness settling in, a quiet place amid the chaos, a space reserved just for this baby, the one I never to got hold, the one I call Grace.

In the past, I have talked about the ways Grace shaped our family by her absence rather than her presence, and that truth remains with me. I am very much aware of the fact that life would be very different had she lived. She managed to leave her mark on us, even without taking a breath. She lingers here, not only in my heart but around the edges of our lives — especially the lives of our two girls who followed her. I know them because I did not know Grace. What a sorrowful and yet beautiful impact she had on us.

So thank you, baby, for all that you were and all that you have given us without ever setting foot on this earth. The power of one small life.

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It’s amazing to me how this baby I never met, whose little heart was there but had stopped beating before I had the chance to hear it, still has such a powerful presence on my psyche and on my heart. Grief starts with such sorrow and pain, but, in this case, over time, it has blossomed into a blessing and the connection to a completely untarnished little soul who prays for me and her father and siblings from the other side. Grace was definitely the right name.

And now, here is the annual post I run in remembrance of baby Grace:

For the past few days I’ve been looking at the numbers on the calendar, growing more and more introspective as we inched closer to August 6. It was 18 years ago today that I learned the baby I was carrying, my second baby, had died 11 weeks into my pregnancy.

With a mother’s intuition, I had known something was wrong during that pregnancy from a couple of weeks before. The day Dennis and I — with Noah in tow — went to the midwife for my regular check up, I didn’t even take the little tape recorder with me to capture the sound of baby’s heartbeat, so convinced was I that I would hear only silence. I went back for the recorder only after Dennis insisted. But somehow I knew. Because when you are a mother sometimes you just know things about your children, even when there is no logical reason you should, even when they are still growing inside you.

When we went for the ultrasound to confirm the miscarriage, we saw the perfect form of our baby up on the screen. I remember Dennis looking so happy, thinking everything was okay after all, and me pointing out that the heart was still. No blinking blip. No more life.

With that same mother’s intuition, no matter how busy or stressed I am, no matter how many other things I seem to forget as I drive my other three children to and fro, I never forget this anniversary. It is imprinted on my heart. As the date nears, I feel a stillness settling in, a quiet place amid the chaos, a space reserved just for this baby, the one I never to got hold, the one I call Grace.

In the past, I have talked about the ways Grace shaped our family by her absence rather than her presence, and that truth remains with me. I am very much aware of the fact that life would be very different had she lived. She managed to leave her mark on us, even without taking a breath. She lingers here, not only in my heart but around the edges of our lives — especially the lives of our two girls who followed her. I know them because I did not know Grace. What a sorrowful and yet beautiful impact she had on us.

So thank you, baby, for all that you were and all that you have given us without ever setting foot on this earth. The power of one small life.

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If you missed the show, you can catch up here. And if you go to Allison’s website, you can catch an entire week of shows devoted to my books — Everyday Divine on Tuesday, Parenting a Grieving Child on Wednesday, and Walking Together on Thursday. Here’s the show:

The post Talking everyday prayer, grief, friendship and more appeared first on Not Strictly Spiritual.

For the past few days I’ve been looking at the numbers on the calendar, growing more and more introspective as we inched closer to August 6. It was 17 years ago today that I learned the baby I was carrying, my second baby, had died 11 weeks into my pregnancy.

With a mother’s intuition, I had known something was wrong during that pregnancy from a couple of weeks before. The day Dennis and I — with Noah in tow — went to the midwife for my regular check up, I didn’t even take the little tape recorder with me to capture the sound of baby’s heartbeat, so convinced was I that I would hear only silence. I went back for the recorder only after Dennis insisted. But somehow I knew. Because when you are a mother sometimes you just know things about your children, even when there is no logical reason you should, even when they are still growing inside you.

When we went for the ultrasound to confirm the miscarriage, we saw the perfect form of our baby up on the screen. I remember Dennis looking so happy, thinking everything was okay after all, and me pointing out that the heart was still. No blinking blip. No more life.

With that same mother’s intuition, no matter how busy or stressed I am, no matter how many other things I seem to forget as I drive my other three children to and fro, I never forget this anniversary. It is imprinted on my heart. As the date nears, I feel a stillness settling in, a quiet place amid the chaos, a space reserved just for this baby, the one I never to got hold, the one I call Grace.

In the past, I have talked about the ways Grace shaped our family by her absence rather than her presence, and that truth remains with me. I am very much aware of the fact that life would be very different had she lived. She managed to leave her mark on us, even without taking a breath. She lingers here, not only in my heart but around the edges of our lives — especially the lives of our two girls who followed her. I know them because I did not know Grace. What a sorrowful and yet beautiful impact she had on us.

So thank you, baby, for all that you were and all that you have given us without ever setting foot on this earth. The power of one small life.

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Maybe it was a perfect storm, a combination of stress over work, unhappiness over physical stuff, craziness with the kids’ schedules, dryness in the spiritual realm, and then, the icing on the cake, the death of my grandmother in the midst of the holiday season. So perhaps there is a reason for the darkness, but, even so, it shouldn’t be quite so lights-out dark over here. Really. I can recognize that objectively, but, boy, is it hard to shake it off from where I’m standing.

I told someone yesterday that if you were ask people who know me (or think they know me) how I am, they’d probably offer you a fairly upbeat litany: very chatty, mostly smiley, sometimes funny, usually sarcastic, often goofy, but overall happy. That is the armor I put on to go out into the world, whether it’s at a school meeting, in the coffee shop, over the phone, or on Facebook. But what lives under the armor here in the basement office is an entirely different scenario. And I know I’m not alone, so I thought it was time to talk about it, put it all out there, because this place, this blog, is totally worthless if it’s not completely honest. But, as the song says, “Honesty is such a lonely word.” And a hard word, and a hard practice, because being honest means being vulnerable and being vulnerable means allowing your heart to be broken or at least a little scarred and your ego to be buffeted and your sense of self to be hung out to dry, depending on the reaction.

At just about this point in writing my blog post today, I signed onto Facebook and found another friend writing a similar post but with a different twist over at The Glass House Retreat. Some of it sounded so familiar I felt like she must have been taking transcription, right from my brain to her hands. She wrote:

For me, I cope with humor. I cope with eating entirely too much of the “wrong” foods. I cope with hiding in my basement for hours on end. I cope with sleeping. I cope with writing. I cope with meditation. I cope with yoga. I cope with the help of a gifted therapist. I cope with the help of not one, but two psychics. I cope with my dearest of friends who get me and don’t judge me. I cope with listening to same song on repeat for as long as it takes.

We ALL put on award worthy performances for the public. We smile, though our heart is breaking. We get dressed and put one foot in front of the other even when the very last thing we want to do is leave the cocoon of our blankets. We put on mascara, even though we will cry. We go out for meals with friends. We toast each other because we have gotten through another day.

Yes, much of life is a performance. Dare I say almost ALL of Facebook is a performance, not just for me but for everyone out there. Best foot — photo, video, life news, vacation — forward almost all the time, with only rare glimpses into our pain and struggle. Sometimes I verge on leaving Facebook for that very reason, too much surface and not enough depth, too much pizazz and not enough honesty. I like deep. I like honest. I like real. But I stay because of the virtual connections that have given me real friends — like Maggie, the blogger I mentioned above, whom I’ve never met but feel like I know — or have renewed old friendships with people who are so dear to me that I can’t imagine not seeing their smiling faces scrolling across my computer screen each day.

On dark days, sometimes those little blips of light flashing from my laptop are enough to chase away the shadows. Of course, on other days, some comments on my thread — even if they are painfully honest, or maybe because they are painfully honest — are enough to kick me right back down into the pit. So I think there has to be balance and awareness. Know when to hold ’em; know when to fold ’em, I guess. I’m holding ’em for now, although I always keep the possibility of folding and disappearing for a while as a back-up plan. And that’s okay. Sometimes we all need to disappear for a while. Well, at least those of us cut from this particular cloth.

When I commented over on Maggie’s post today, I said this:

I have not been able to write because I have been frozen by a grief that really has no direct or obvious source. That’s why my blog has been dry for a while. I usually cope through writing, so to find myself without words is a grief all of its own.

Honestly. I have been aching to write here, to share with you, but if I can’t be totally honest, I’d rather not be here at all. So there you have it. I can’t write, can’t pray, can’t do yoga, can’t eat right, can’t sleep, can’t laugh, can’t anything, and yet life requires me to find a way to do all those things in spite of myself. Maybe showing up here again is a first step in doing just that, a leap toward the light even when I can’t see the other side.

And now, here is the song, which I especially love because it is a raspier, rougher, realer version than the original:
http://youtu.be/rWu0N0qPeME

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Chiara (who is 3): Why did Jesus have to die?

Mom: Well, he died for all of us, to save us. (Quizzical look from Chiara.) But he rose from the dead and made everything good for all of us.

Chiara: What good things did he do for us?

Mom: Well, now we can go to heaven one day, like Grandma Irene.

Chiara: I’m never going to heaven.

Mom: One day, hopefully when you’re very, very old, you will go to heaven.

Chiara: E-ma’s too old.

Mom: Yes, she is. We’re very lucky that E-ma is as old as she is. (She’s 96.)

Chiara: E-ma is never going to die.

Mom: Well, yes, she is. Hopefully not any time soon, but one day, and we will all be very sad, but E-ma has had a long life, longer than most people could ever hope for.

Chiara: But you’re not too old, and Daddy and Noah and Olivia aren’t too old, right?

At that point, she pretty much tired of this topic and moved on, but it didn’t fade from my memory that quickly. Back when I was out talking about my first book, Parenting a Grieving Child: Helping Children Find Faith, Hope and Healing After the Loss of a Loved One, I would try to emphasize that no matter how young the child, death does not escape them. In their own ways, on their own levels, they try to process it. They turn it over in their little heads, trying to figure out what we mean when we say heaven, what we mean when we talk about Jesus dying, what we mean when we say prayers that raise more questions than they answer for little preschoolers (and maybe for all of us).

I am huge proponent of being honest with children — not in a scary way but in a way that gives them enough real information without overloading them with things that will just make them anxious. My little episode with Chiara just confirmed everything that I knew from my research and writing about children and grief. Be open to your children when they ask about death, and be willing to answer their questions when a family member or friend dies. If you don’t, they’ll be working it out on their own without you, and that’s never a good thing.

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