Dealing with believes...

As many of you have noticed, people that just experienced a loss not only is entitled to deal with the dark emotions resulting from the 'loss' but also with the emotions peoples' comments can produce when trying to give support. I like to believe these comments are always well intended, however many times they are not effective and sometimes are hopeless and even harmful.

Grievers usually rely on their personal believes to work through their grief and move on to accept their loss. However personal believes can vary tremendously among people. While there is people who like to think that death matters are God's will, their is also people that supports the idea that God would never apart a baby from her parents or even that God doesn't exist. Given that humans have different views towards life and death is reasonable to hear now and then disturbing comments about your loss. Most of the people express to grievers their own views and fears towards life and death as if grievers were in search of a new code of believes, which is not necessarily the case.

It feels so hopeless when people tell me that a parent can never overcome the loss of a child, so they mean that the worst has happened to me. The first thing that comes to me after I hear such statement is that unfortunately they are WRONG. I can still lose more because I have more. That comment instead of making me feel like a hero makes me feel hopeless. I don't like pity. Please people don't say that because it is more cruel than empathic. People who have in fact lost their children do not agree with such statement. At least not the ones I have talked to.

Another comment I dislike is when they tell me that I am lucky to have a living child. “You are so lucky to have Isabel, she is beautiful and amazing” or “Thanks God this wasn't your first one”. Loosing a baby is ALWAYS a big deal. It doesn't matter if it was the first or the tenth one. Since every relation is unique and develops in a particular context, every loss has its specific complication. It is more naive than wise to conclude that loosing a first child is always worst. For example, if it is the first one you can fill that maybe you will never get to parent a child and for sure that feeling is tough and can produce a significant amount of anxiety. However, when you have a living child you have to deal with your child’s grieving since she lost a sibling. You also feel anxiety because maybe you will never be able to provide a living sibling to your living child. Or maybe you will have that sibling but maybe years later so they won't be close enough in age.

The other attitude I personally don’t like is the people who think that because you are a griever you are in search of a transformation of your life and they insist you to follow the steps or believes they practice, specially the religious type of persons. They always feel that you are far from God. I might be far from YOUR IDEA OF GOD. These people do not offer sincere love and support and sometimes they are disrespectful and even cruel. They add a stress factor to a very stressful situation. If they really want to help they should first LISTEN and then think in which way they could offer REAL help. Not every solution fits everyone. If you live in ‘fantasyland’ and you can’t understand the diversity factor, then keep yourself away from grievers. Helping grievers is more about listening than talking.

Every loss has its own particular impact, because is the result of a twist is a particular history. Every mind is a world itself. We never know the true feelings and specific expectations parents had to burry after the loss of their baby: People don’t assume grievers see life as you see it.

I loved my life before Ines died. I was one these lucky persons that never had a really bad experience. I really had the dream life. My life was pink, happy and full of joyful experiences. I was born in a family of six. I grew up with loving parents and siblings. I married a wonderful man. I have never had any trouble in getting pregnant, no miscarriages. I have a truly loving 4 year old daughter that has brought plenty of joyful moments to my life. I have a great job: I love what I do and I get paid for doing it. I live in a beautiful house. I have traveled and enjoyed friends. I enjoy a healthy life. The most important is that I truly enjoy being the person I am. I do not want to be someone new, transformed myself or changed my believes. Ines death doesn't say my believes were wrong. I want to rescue the way I use to enjoy life. That is it. I want to be as happy as before and I know that eventually it will happen, if I rely properly on personal effort.

I strongly believe that God provided us humans with immense powers, such as personal effort. Relying on personal effort is relying on God, because God gave us such capacity. When we loose someone we learn that in this life there are many things out of our control. But the state of our minds is one of the things we can control, if we rely on personal effort. Sadness and happiness are states of mind because they are a ‘product of our mind’ and they exist within our mind. Sadness and happiness do not have an inherent existence; they exist in our inner world. We produce them. In a way, we ‘decide’ how we feel with what happens to us. Many times we don’t choose what happens to us but we always choose how we feel with what happens to us. This means that the same experience can produce different states of minds in two people. Loosing the same child can be a dramatically different experience for each parent. It all depends on the state of our mind.

So people, I know in what to believe. Two months ago my daughter died and I am broken heart. But I am not empty because I do have in what to rely on. If you want to help, you can offer to listen, an arm to cry, a big hug, time to chat, in few words, just offer your company. I know who I am and what I need. If you see me different is because I am broken heart, that is it. But I do practice my own believes (not yours) to heal.