October 15 – Pregnancy and Infant Loss Day
Most people are touched by loss – pregnancy and infant loss – to some degree.
It’s painful and it’s hard to just move on.
I don’t want to get into particulars, but I’ve been touched by it very profoundly through someone very close to me. It never stops hurting my heart to see the space where that very wanted child should have been when our children play.
Loss is hard. It happens. There is no way to pretend it doesn’t. October 15 is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Day. I guess for some it’s a day to remember, a day to celebrate that life that was cut short or to embrace the reality that, with that loss there was also the loss of a family’s hopes and dreams for the future that had grown with the expectation of the child’s arrival.
It should be a day for awareness, too.
Loss shouldn’t make us look away or shy away or change the conversation abruptly. Often we don’t know what to say, how to handle it. We try to make it better with words, but that can often just make it worse.
Each of us handles grief differently, and each family that suffers a loss manages that grief their own way. And just like any other loss, it’s not for us to judge, justify, try to cheer up, compare our own losses or even create context. The best that we can do for those who have suffered a loss is to offer kindness, compassion and support.
If you’ve suffered a loss, don’t feel you should have to keep it bottled up. If you need help, make sure you ask.
Loss is never easy, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be discussed.
xx
