I was speaking with someone not long ago about the layers of grief – all the aspects of life that are affected by loss which you do not – cannot – consider until you experience it. The loss of a loved one, especially a baby, I think, sets off a domino-effect that leaves few stones unturned, and that is what Amy and I have experienced.

The first layer, the dense core, is obviously the unspeakable, gut-wrenching loss itself. We went into the hospital expecting to return home a few days later with our baby girl. Amy had spent the entire previous night laboring in the bathtub with me at my post at the door, timing contractions to determine the right moment to go to the hospital. It was literally the entire night, from about 10:00 when her water broke until around 8:00 the next morning when it seemed that the contractions were a few minutes apart. Amy didn’t sleep, and neither did I. We dozed for maybe a matter of minutes here and there, so when we arrived at the hospital Amy was already exhausted – we both were. Then ensued hours of labor that stretched into the evening, culminating in an emergency C-section just before 6. Normally, the recompense, especially for the mother, after hour upon hour of labor, is holding your precious one in your arms. Of course I can’t say what a mother would feel at that point, but I’ve heard that everything she endured seems worth it. So imagine what it was like when we got into our car to return home with an empty car seat in the back, a visual representation of the hole that had just been brutally punched through our hearts.

Naturally, life does not just go on as it did before. Another layer of grief is the way our outlook of the future, our plans, and our dreams, were forever changed. The way we envision what is yet to come and the aspirations we have for the future create the trajectory of our lives and motivate us to get out of bed in the morning and keep spending ourselves to make those visions a reality. When you cannot envision your future anymore or connect with the dreams and aspirations you once had it is very painful and disconcerting. Amy and I found ourselves adrift, bleeding, lost at sea with no current and no wind to bring us in any direction. A thick fog engulfed us, obscuring any familiar feature of the landscape to orient us. Grief deluged us every time we awoke and realized that what had happened to us was not just a horrible nightmare. Who were we? Would we survive this? Would we ever be really happy again? When would this deluge of grief end? The answers to those questions were anything but certain. [Read more…]

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When it comes to grief, memory can be a two-edged sword. Memory and I are frenemies. We all experience it to a point: you’re going about your day and, out of the blue, you remember something that you wished you hadn’t. What triggered it, why you remembered it at that moment is often a mystery.

Memories of something so traumatic such as when we lost Gianna are a little different. They often come up unexpectedly, prompted at times by the littlest things. But when they do come up, or when I willingly conjure them up, the experience is very mixed. Memories are all I have of my daughter – four days of them to be exact. I cherish those memories, and at the same time they stab me in the heart. I don’t wish I hadn’t remembered, but the pain is the other side of that same coin, inextricably interwoven with the cherished thread of memory. [Read more…]

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