This article was posted on the loss board. I thought it was wonderful, I sat at my desk at work reading it, trying so hard not to cry. I wanted to share it here as I think it needs to be shared, but also because I need it in an accessible place so I can read it often and try to believe it. I mean, I do believe it....but then I somehow feel like I am failing as a mother to say "Ok, I acknowledge it wasn't my fault, I've washed my hands of guilt". I don't know if that makes any sense, but I'll work on it.
I have to tell you this. You didn't fail. Not even a little.
You are not a horrible mother.
You did not chose this. You didn't want this to happen. You didn't do anything wrong. It just happened. To you. Despite your begging, pleading, praying, hoping against all hope that it would not. Even though everything within you was screaming no no no no no no no no no!!!!!!
God didn't do this to punish you, smite you, or to "teach you a lesson". That is not God's way. You could not have prevented this if you: tried harder, prayed harder, or if you were a "better" person. Nor if you ate better, loved harder, yoga-ed more, did x, y, z to the nth degree or any other way you tried to fill-in-the-blank. You could not have prevented this even if you could have predicted the future like no one can.
Even if you did nothing more, you are already the best mom there is because you would have done absolutely anything to keep your child alive. To breathe your last breath to save theirs. To choose the pain all over again just to spend one more minute with them. That, is the ultimate kind of love. You are the ultimate kind of mother.
So wash your hands of any naysayers, backstabbers, or anyone who sprinted the other direction when you need them the most. Wash your hands of the people who may have falsely judged you, ostracized you, or stigmatized you because of what happened to you. Wash your hands of anyone who has made you feel less than by questioning everything you did or didn't do. Those whose words or looks have implied that this was somehow your fault.
This was not your fault. This will never be your fault, no matter how many different ways someone tries to tell you it is.
And especially if that someone happens to be you. Sometimes it's not what others are saying that keeps us shackled in shame. Sometimes we adopt others' misguided opinions and assumptions about our situation as our own. Sometimes it's our own inner voice that shoves us into the darkest corners of despair, like an abuser, telling us over and over and over again that we failed as mothers. That if only this and what if that, it would never have happened. That you woulda, shoulda, done this so your child would not have died. This is a lie of the sickest kind. Do not believe it, not even for a second. Do not let it sink into your bones. Do not let is smother that beautiful, beautiful light of yours.
Instead, breathe in this truth with every part of yourself. You are the best damn mother in the entire world.
The kind of mother people write books about. The kind that inspires the world.
No one else could do what you do. No one else could ever be your child's mother as well as you can, as well as you are. No one else could let your child's love and light shine through them the way you do. No one else could mother their dead child as well as you do. No one else could carry this unrelenting burden as courageously. It is the heaviest, most torturous burden there is.
You have within you a sacred strength. You are the mother of all mothers. There is no one, no one, no one that could ever, ever replace you. No one. You were chosen to be their mother. Yes-chosen. And no one could parent them better in life or in death than you do.
So breathe mama, keep breathing. Believe mama, keep believing. Fight mama, keep fighting, for this truth to uproot the lies in your heart-you didn't fail. You are not a failure. Not even a little.
For whatever it's worth, I see you. I hear you guttural sobs. I feel your ache deep inside my bones. And it doesn't make me uncomfortable to put my fingers as a makeshift baind-aid over the gaping hole in your heart until the scabs come, when and if they do.
It takes invincible strength to mother a child you can no longer hold, see, touch, or hear. You are a superhero mama. I see you fall down and get up, fall down and get up, over and over again. I notice the grits and guts it takes to pry yourself out of bed every single day and force your bloodied feet to stand up and keep walking. I see you walking this path of life you've been given where every breath and step apart from your child is a physical, emotional, and spiritual battleground- a fight for your own survival - a fight to quiet the insidious lies.
You are the mother of all mothers.
Truly the most inspiring, courageous, loving mother there is- a warrior mama through and through.
For even in their death you lovingly mother them still.
- June 26th, 2013 by Angela Miller
And....today is July 1st. I enter another month, further and further from the last time I held my baby, the last time I looked at my baby, the last time I felt her inside me, the last time I was truly happy. It also begins what was supposed to be her birth month. The month I had looked forward to since November, and the month I have dreaded since March. In 26 days I should be just then meeting her, she should be looking back into my eyes, she should be wiggling and crying and be ready to go home. Instead she's in Heaven, and I'm here. It's just not fair.
No comments:
Post a Comment