Yesterday, I had a meltdown. That hasn’t happened to me in a while.  It was like an anxiety attack coupled with copious amounts of tears and uncontrollable sobbing. It’s been a while since I’ve cried like that.  The timing was terrible. I was at work with a busy schedule and didn’t have privacy or time to dedicate to this. However, I didn’t have a choice; I could not stop my tears.  As I hid in the bathroom, texting my mom for support, trying to get myself together, I realized this melt down was one of those full-blown-out-of-the-blue-moments-of-grief often experienced after the loss of a child. It doesn’t matter if it was yesterday or 30 years ago. Something will trigger these feelings, and it’s overwhelming. This summer marks 6 years since we lost our precious baby, Hope Adeline, and there are days when I feel like it just happened. Other days it’s not so prevalent, but not a day goes by where I don’t think about her.

As I texted my mom, trying to put some semblance of rationale around my meltdown, I realized that deep down, I was feeling alone and sad and a little angry that it doesn’t appear that others think of me as a mother. I didn’t stop being one simply because our child’s heart stopped beating.  It also shouldn’t really matter what others think, but in this moment, it mattered very much to me.  Later, while on the phone, mom mentioned that she had thought about buying me a Mothers’ Day card, but was afraid that it would make me sad or cause me pain, so she didn’t.  My husband mentioned later that my mother in law doesn’t really know how to handle it for fear of making me sad. That’s when it hit me; others want to include us in this annual tradition, acknowledge our status, but they are afraid of causing us pain. I appreciate that sensitivity, I really do. It’s a tricky field to navigate and I can’t promise there aren’t landmines aplenty. But one of the biggest fears for a parent who has lost a child is that no one else remembers.

So buy the card and send it. Give that hug or a nice bouquet of flowers.  Just let us know you remember. Celebrate us for being a parent, no matter how brief a time, because the death of our child didn’t change that title.  Acknowledge that we have a child in heaven, even if we have living children. And while a kind gesture might seem to be opening old wounds, I promise you, it’s not as painful as pretending that our child never existed.  We may cry, we may not say much, but knowing someone else remembers our child is the kindest gift.  It will mean more to that bereaved parent than you can imagine.