Grief, day two
Today was my day off. It didn't go so well. I basically cried all day while pretending to be a functioning member of society.
I went to the hospital to see my IUFD mom
to finalize paperwork, give them the memory box and offer again for them to see the baby (guiltily, and selfishly, I always secretly hope they say, "No.") They said, "Yes", then they asked me the hardest question I've had in my minuscule time as a nurse.
The father asks me while looking right into my eyes, with hope and trust, "Do you think we should let our three year old daughter see the baby?"Oh God, how did I get to be the authority that these people are placing their hopes for healing on??? I would love to say that I had a good education to fall back on, but how would they teach us to answer that? Plus I have no memory and I'm just not a fast thinker...I am an instinctual one though. "What has your daughter expressed to you? What does she want?" The mother relays that daughter wants to take care of mommy and the baby. Mom thinks she should see it, dad strongly disagrees. I'll spare you our conversation and say that they tell her that God took the baby to heaven because it was too sweet and He wanted him there with Him, and they don't let her see him when I do bring him up.
I think I would have told my own child that the body knows how to take care of some things even when we don't understand how. Maybe there was something beginning to go wrong with the growing baby or mom's body is kinda sick right now and the body wanted to fix it by starting over.
I give them some time and me some time and I go to a class I've been excitedly anticipating called Death, Dying and Grief. I don't get excited about death, but I do about learning, and this is a topic I take very seriously.
For the first time ever, I researched the speaker, I brought my copy of the book I knew she was grounding her information on and I looked forward to the moment when I would introduce her star student after the class and ask about opportunities in the pastoral counseling department. It didn't happen that way.
I cried through the whole hour. I didn't openly weep until she began speaking of our own personal grief that we carry from things past- called complicated grief.
Yes, as T always says, "It's complicated.
"There were three pastors in that room and they offered chapel services to the clearly openly wounded crying girl, posing as a nurse.
And I actually went.
I'm almost done and this is the miraculous part, keep reading. The chapel was shockingly small, and it was just myself and the pastor I knew the least well; the one that seemed to quickly excuse himself when I said that I was Pagan at our earlier meeting. Several things happened in that little room; he had me call and respond scripture which I did not appreciate nor understand. But then he dropped the minister gig, probably because I was crying again, and told me about hiking up to a beautiful waterfall. He told me how to get there and I intend to go. He encouraged healing time in nature (what intuitive Pagan-friendly advice) with the person that I long to understand better. He said it will facilitate peace and bonding conversation.
The last and most important thing happened technically after I left. A big book caught my eye on the way out the door. So I went back to see what it was; knowing I've never been disappointed following my curiosities. It was a prayer book. People write down who they would like the church to pray for. The last entry, listed three familiar names plus "unborn baby". I immediately began to sob, realizing that I had come here to find peace and release for my grief for the family that lost a child, as my eyes fell on the first line- "Today we lost our child, my son."
That big, rough exteriored father, with his scarred face, black fingernails and huge frame donned in head to toe camouflage, had come to ask God for healing. In this impersonal place he bared his soul like he could not do in front of his beloved wife or caregiver. His plea was such a brokenhearted tender prayer, and I cried harder and harder touching his script. I realized part of my pain for this family was acutely for him. By his own admission, with tears about to spill, but never doing so, he spoke of his inability to look upon the body of his son, of needing to be the strong one, and move his family forward, of being incapable of grieving.
I learned about the burden men carry from this poor, traumatized man.
And that came full circle, reminding me to be more compassionate and understanding of my own man and why he shuts me out when hurting.
Later, when I took the baby back down, for the last time, after mom had said her tearful goodbyes, I brought back a little baby sized vest for them to keep. I found one in the piles of donated clothing, in camouflage design.
I know that every time something brings me to tears there is a possibility they won't stop until I'm broken and nonfunctional. I have 'complicated grief'- multiple wounds not yet healed, just under the surface, that I ignore, in order to operate daily in society.
Heh, don't we all.
I went to the hospital to see my IUFD mom
to finalize paperwork, give them the memory box and offer again for them to see the baby (guiltily, and selfishly, I always secretly hope they say, "No.") They said, "Yes", then they asked me the hardest question I've had in my minuscule time as a nurse.
The father asks me while looking right into my eyes, with hope and trust, "Do you think we should let our three year old daughter see the baby?"Oh God, how did I get to be the authority that these people are placing their hopes for healing on??? I would love to say that I had a good education to fall back on, but how would they teach us to answer that? Plus I have no memory and I'm just not a fast thinker...I am an instinctual one though. "What has your daughter expressed to you? What does she want?" The mother relays that daughter wants to take care of mommy and the baby. Mom thinks she should see it, dad strongly disagrees. I'll spare you our conversation and say that they tell her that God took the baby to heaven because it was too sweet and He wanted him there with Him, and they don't let her see him when I do bring him up.
I think I would have told my own child that the body knows how to take care of some things even when we don't understand how. Maybe there was something beginning to go wrong with the growing baby or mom's body is kinda sick right now and the body wanted to fix it by starting over.
I give them some time and me some time and I go to a class I've been excitedly anticipating called Death, Dying and Grief. I don't get excited about death, but I do about learning, and this is a topic I take very seriously.
For the first time ever, I researched the speaker, I brought my copy of the book I knew she was grounding her information on and I looked forward to the moment when I would introduce her star student after the class and ask about opportunities in the pastoral counseling department. It didn't happen that way.
I cried through the whole hour. I didn't openly weep until she began speaking of our own personal grief that we carry from things past- called complicated grief.
Yes, as T always says, "It's complicated.
"There were three pastors in that room and they offered chapel services to the clearly openly wounded crying girl, posing as a nurse.
And I actually went.
I'm almost done and this is the miraculous part, keep reading. The chapel was shockingly small, and it was just myself and the pastor I knew the least well; the one that seemed to quickly excuse himself when I said that I was Pagan at our earlier meeting. Several things happened in that little room; he had me call and respond scripture which I did not appreciate nor understand. But then he dropped the minister gig, probably because I was crying again, and told me about hiking up to a beautiful waterfall. He told me how to get there and I intend to go. He encouraged healing time in nature (what intuitive Pagan-friendly advice) with the person that I long to understand better. He said it will facilitate peace and bonding conversation.
The last and most important thing happened technically after I left. A big book caught my eye on the way out the door. So I went back to see what it was; knowing I've never been disappointed following my curiosities. It was a prayer book. People write down who they would like the church to pray for. The last entry, listed three familiar names plus "unborn baby". I immediately began to sob, realizing that I had come here to find peace and release for my grief for the family that lost a child, as my eyes fell on the first line- "Today we lost our child, my son."
That big, rough exteriored father, with his scarred face, black fingernails and huge frame donned in head to toe camouflage, had come to ask God for healing. In this impersonal place he bared his soul like he could not do in front of his beloved wife or caregiver. His plea was such a brokenhearted tender prayer, and I cried harder and harder touching his script. I realized part of my pain for this family was acutely for him. By his own admission, with tears about to spill, but never doing so, he spoke of his inability to look upon the body of his son, of needing to be the strong one, and move his family forward, of being incapable of grieving.
I learned about the burden men carry from this poor, traumatized man.
And that came full circle, reminding me to be more compassionate and understanding of my own man and why he shuts me out when hurting.
Later, when I took the baby back down, for the last time, after mom had said her tearful goodbyes, I brought back a little baby sized vest for them to keep. I found one in the piles of donated clothing, in camouflage design.
I know that every time something brings me to tears there is a possibility they won't stop until I'm broken and nonfunctional. I have 'complicated grief'- multiple wounds not yet healed, just under the surface, that I ignore, in order to operate daily in society.
Heh, don't we all.