A friend sent this to me a few weeks ago, and as I watched it, and as I reflected on my own journey through infant loss, I remembered the first few weeks after we lost the boys, when I was just doing a ton of reading. For some reason, it was both cathartic and therapeutic to read through the grief journeys of others as I was starting mine. Of the many books that I read, one of the most meaningful was Hope Deferred: Heart-Healing Reflections on Reproductive Loss; I highly recommend it. It was very moving to hear how these women had dealt with their miscarriages and losses.
And they were talking about it.
For the weeks following our losses, I had many elderly women coming up to me and sharing their own stories of miscarriage and loss with me. When they went through those tragedies, it just was something you didn’t talk about, and so they never have. And each time I share some of our story with Micah and Judah in my preaching, people always either come up to me or Sarah and share a sentiment that they also had experienced some loss.
Many people just don’t have the space to talk about this.
It would be my hope that the church could be a place where people might be able to have space to talk about this, to share their stories, to be encouraged to remember, to grieve together, to experience healing together. If statistics are true, there are many, many women who have suffered miscarriages and infant loss. And there are women and men in our congregations who have stories to share, if they’re willing, and may never have been given the space to do so.
I’m intrigued by the possibilities of the church to enter into this conversation – to break the silence. How have you heard about churches breaking the silence on the issues of miscarriage, stillbirths and infant loss?
(This was also cross-posted on my blog, Dazed Dad)
