Secret Garden Meeting - October

The Secret Garden is a place that is only open for bereaved parents. It is our garden, our secret place to come to. A place to remember our children with those who understand us. It is a place to just be, without worry or fear of not being accepted. May you feel safe to share your hearts here in the garden.

So this meeting we would like to talk about where you are. Where are you at in your grief. Has it been years or just weeks since you lost your baby. How are you feeling. How do you hope you will feel in the future. Have you found any peace at all?

This grief no doubt has many unexpected turns and twists. The longer I'm on this journey to hopefully healing, the more I realize the permanence of this loss. More than anger and frustration, I am being swallowed up in sadness. The guilt has been left behind for the most part, along with being angry at God or anybody else. It's just sadness right now. But I'm not even a crying mess, like I was a few weeks ago. The sadness creeps in while I'm teaching, driving, working, in conversation with someone, cleaning, sleeping, dreaming, anything really. It's always there in the back of my head, and it is the burden that weighs me down. I get to wondering if it will always be this way? 

I am in some twisted way learning to accept this fate. She's in Heaven, me still here, but even in acceptance the loss is wearisome. The sadness is derived mostly from how far time has taken me away from her life, and those moments I got to know her. Lately, it's not so much over the things I missed out on with her. Don't get me wrong, those things make me sad when I get reminded, but that's a bottomless pit of disaster every time I go there. Because there is no end to what I missed out on had I had the chance to raise her.



So this is me. Sad. Sad. Sad. Along with this sadness, there is a burning desire to cherish those moments I had with her. Even in the pregnancy, after hearing all the bad news, I still enjoyed her so much. I never let myself stay sad when I was carrying her, or watching her in the NICU. Maybe I am making up for it now? Who knows... I feel that there are never enough ways to honor her life. I strive to honor her life through mine, living in the moment, and loving life. 


I'm crazy excited about getting to start her memory garden in a few weeks. And by next summer I will be able to crack open my paints again! I want to be free again to remember my daughter and not be constrained by sadness. My loss was her gain, and I want to live like it.

So, have I found peace? Yes. I really have. The peace is ever present as I keep my eyes fixed on the One who can heal me completely one day.