Grief Project - 11 Ways To Remember Your Child

Some people might say that by creating physical tokens or gestures of love to our deceased children,  we are having trouble "letting go" or "holding on." Thus, resulting in unresolved or unhealthy grief.

But research has shown that creating ways to remember loved ones through memorials or rituals helps us move through grief and integrate our loss.  By creating memorials we are not just preserving the memory of our children, but also creating new memories and developing a new relationship through these activities.

For parents who have lost children before or soon after birth, they have little memories to carry with them. Creating new ones through writing, scrapbooking, gardening, and other activities allows us to maintain a connection to our babies and continue the emotional bond by integrating them into our life through these acts of love. 

In The Five Ways We Grieve, when speaking of the 'memorialist type', clinical social worker and author, Susan Berger, reassures us that,

"If the bereaved live happy, loving, and productive lives, if they acknowledge that their relationship with the loved one has changed, and that they have changed, continual healthy growth and adaptation do occur.  Incorporating the lost loved one into their lives as memorialists do, is an appropriate and health way to grieve."

And the Harvard Mental Health Letter from December 2011 in their Guide to Getting Through Grief, mentions that commemorating a loved one can sometimes help shape the meaning from the loss and keep the memory of your loved one alive.

Who wouldn't want both of those things to happen as we heal our grief?  So today, here is a list of suggested Ways to Remember your child that I have used during the last six months to help me move through grief.  

Ways To Remember Your Child

1. Mementos:  I have a necklace I wear with Nora's actual foot print in it.  It's called a Thumbies and they can be order through Meadow Hill Memorial Jewelry.

Nick has a key chain I bought him through an etsy shop.  But here is a really cool etsy shop that does some baby loss remembrance jewelry, JamiesCreativeSpot. 

2. Gardens & Bird Houses: If you follow my blog you know that my mom, who is Memorialist type, finds a lot of healing in her garden she has created for Nora.  Nick and I have started one too that we put our hammock up in and spend time in its beauty.  We also created s bird house with her name on it that's in her garden and a mama finch is creating a nest in it now.

3. Tattoos: I don't have one yet, but my father has one for Nora. I think this is a great idea.  Some do suggest waiting at least a year if you are questionable about it or if you are new to the tattoo world, just to see if you still want it.

4. Create a Scrapbook: My scrapbook is of the year leading up to her birth.  Capturing all the exciting moments of expecting we had with her and then of course pictures of her after she was born sleeping, are something we treasure.

5. Journal: My Letters to Nora section originated out of my personal journal I kept to have conversations with her when I felt lonely. Keeping a journal is a great healing technique and way to remember your child.

6. Her Name Everywhere: We write her name everywhere special we go, like in France or up at the lake. If you want your child's name written in the sand under a sunset there is always The Seashore of Remembrance by CarlyMarie that is famous.  But there are also some other wonderful bereaved mothers who offer similar services like Catherine does at The Sacred Seashore or in her Gabriel's Garden.  I was also recently sent a beautiful remembrance photo with Nora's name from BabiiLove Graphicz.

7. An Online Memorial and/or Blog: I just posted my first online memorial to Nora on Still Standing Remembrance Wall.  I know that lots of moms and dads like me also start blogs as a tribute to our children.

8. Pictures: We keep pictures of her by our bed, up in our living room, and of course on my iphone.  I am really grateful that we listened to the nurses at the hospital the day she was born and had Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep take pictures of us with her.  Best decision we made.

9. Love Locks: If you ever make it to a love lock bridge, I recommend hanging your own lock for your child.  I know these bridges are usually for couples but Nick and I made one for our family when we visited a Love Lock Bridge in Paris.

10: White Signs of Grief: White Signs of Grief is always a good way to send a message to your child about your grief.  Send us a message of love for your child that you want the world to see.

11. Memory Boxes: These are always a wonderful way to remember your baby.  I am still trying to do mine but I don't think I'm ready.  Again, CarlyMarie has a great tutorial on how to create a memory box on her website.



How do you remember your child?

Did I Make Her Death Real with a Thought?

The first time I got married was in 12th grade to Jeffery M. A sweet young man who looked more like my brother with our matching read hair and pale skin. I have to admit it was an arranged marriage of sorts because it was only for a semester in Economics class for a household budget project.

Jeff is a treasured friend from my youth and it's been 12 years.  And I'll just say this without sounding conceited (hopefully)...he had the hots for me.  So knowing I had the upper hand in our marriage, when it came time to kill off one of our family members for the will portion of the project (I know, morbid right), I choose his mother and he reluctantly agreed. (I do have to admit he advocated pretty hard to save his mother from her freak and unfortunate hot air balloon accident. It was our first, last, and only marital disagreement.)

But when we were both trying to figure out how she would die we sat there and had an hour-long discussion to come up with the most ridiculous and impossible way for it to happen.  I think we chose the hot air balloon accident because Jeff knew she was afraid of heights and never would get in one. This scenario was improbable. 

My point being even at 18 I, and even Jeff, had an uncomfortable time talking about the pretend (like our marriage) possibility of one of our loved ones dying.  It was if putting it out there - in the ether, the place where thoughts become words and words become reality - would then make her death come true.

I see this with clients all the time in therapy, a thought, a truth, a fear, an intuition is on the tip of their tongue. It's in the air. I can hear it before its said, but they resist, hold back from saying it in fear that saying the words will make it happen.  Make it real.

So I sometimes wonder, did I make her death real with a thought?  I know it was my greatest fear.  I know I was told many stories in the three weeks before she was delivered about babies dying right before the joyous moment or right after.  I know in the last couple days of her pregnancy I read the words STILLBIRTH on BabyCenter boards that I followed religiously saying that stillbirths happen at an increased rate after 40 weeks pregnant, which I was. I even know that Nick had a dream about it, but we both reassured each other it was from nervousness of becoming a parent.  

So could my thought make it true?  I don't know the answer. But I really wish I would have thought more about winning the lottery and less about my fears...

I wish I would have enjoyed my pregnancy innocence while I still had it.

I wish I would have never had those thoughts. 

Sample Funeral Ceremony, Death Announcement, and Facebook Message for Death of A Baby

Today I am writing a post that NEEDS to be written, as opposed to one I want to write.  I believe it would have been helpful to find a sample baby funeral ceremony, death announcement, and even Facebook message after Nora had died.  I was lucky to find the book Planning a Precious Goodbye, which is what a majority of these samples are based on.  

So today's post is for those in the early days of loss.  Those who might need a resource to help plan their baby's funeral. To those of you in this situation, I hope you find this if you need it, but oh how I wish you didn't.  


Sample Facebook Message

The exciting moments of pregnancy have turned to sorrow and heartfelt loss with the death of our baby girl, Nora Norine-Kelly Henke on December 30, 2012.

We would like to invite our friends and family to join us for a memorial service in her honor. The service will be held at the Cremation Society of Minnesota’s Edina Chapel on Saturday, January 5th 2013 starting with a short ceremony at 5:30 p.m. followed by reception. 


In lieu of gifts or flowers we would appreciate a donation in her honor be made to “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep” (https://www.nowilaymedowntosleep.org/donate/). This organization provides free professional photography to parents in situations such as ours which will provide comfort and memories for years to come.


Sample Death Announcement


Nora Norine - Kelly Henke
The exciting moments of pregnancy have turned to sorrow and heartfelt loss with the death of our baby girl, Nora Norine-Kelly Henke on December 30th, 2012.  


She was preceded in death by: Great-Grandparents Henke, Great-Grandparents Kelly, Great-Grandparents Schmitz, Great-Grandpa Fritsch.  


She leaves behind her loving family who will always love her: Parents Nicholas and Lindsey, Grandparents Bod and Gerry Fritsch, Grandparents Paul and Barn Henke, Aunt Kristi and Uncle Zach, Aunt Carmen, Cousin Hannah, Great-Grandma Debbie Fritsch, and other loving family and friends.  


In lieu of gifts or flowers we would appreciate a donation in her honor be made to “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep” (https://www.nowilaymedowntosleep.org/donate/). This organization provides free professional photography to parents in situations such as ours which will provide comfort and memories for years to come.

Sample Funeral Ceremony

Reading For a Baby

Today, we come together in sorrow over the death of Lindsey and Nicholas’s baby girl, Nora Norine-Kelly Henke. Their child, created in love and eagerly wished for, has died-never to be nestled securely in their arms in this lifetime.

To these parents, the pain and the disappointment is great and their loss will be carried heavily in their hearts for all their days. In the weeks and months ahead, they will miss their child terribly and will be in need of love, compassion, time and understanding from all of us.

Each life comes into this world with a mission. Sometimes the mission or purpose is clear; sometimes it is vague and shrouded in misunderstandings. In time, we will see what this baby’s mission was on earth. Could it have been just to add a little flicker of love that otherwise may never have been lit? Was it to soften our hearts so that we may in turn comfort others? Could it have been to bring us closer together?

This child’s life was short, yet the death has left a huge void in all of our hearts and lives. Let us remember today and for always the tiny baby who will never see childhood or adulthood, but will remain our tiny baby forever.

(Lindsey will read this)

Just Those Few Weeks – by Susan Erling Martinez, revised by Lindsey Henke

Just Those Few Weeks:

I had you to myself. And that seems to short a time, to be changed so profoundly.

In Those Few Weeks:

I came to know you…and to love you. You came to trust met with your life. Oh, what a life I had planned for you!

Just Those Few Weeks:

When I lost you, I lost a lifetime of hopes, plans, dreams, and aspirations. A slice of my future simply vanished overnight.

Just Those Few Weeks:

It might not have been enough time to convince others how special and important you were. How I had lost a truly unique person that I will never know.

You Were For Just Those Few Weeks, My Little One, My Baby Girl:

You darted in and out of my life too quickly. But it seems that’s all the time you needed to make my life so much richer and give me a small glimpse of eternity.

A Prayer for Baby (Anonymous) - Dedicated to Nora from her Daddy, Nick Henke

Never to have known you, but to have loved you.

Never to have held you, the ways fathers do.

With you I bury my hopes and dreams

For an unknown child I’ve never seen.

But I also bury the love in my heart

And the sadness of knowing that we must part.

And I pray to God to do for you

All the things I would like to do.

And keep my baby safe from harm

To laugh and frolic in springtime’s arms.

Lindsey and Nick would like to light a candle during this song as a remembrance to their daughter Nora.

Song – Celine Dion “A Mother’s Prayer”. – Nick and Lindsey light a candle in her honor.

Nick and Lindsey want you to "realize that the parents are sad because they miss this baby, this special person: he or she never can be replaced by anyone else. They had pictured their child in their minds, learning to walk, starting school, making friends, graduating, getting married, and having their own children. This was not “just” a baby but a real person and a whole future that has been lost.” – Empty Arms, by Sherokee Ilse

“Lindsey and Nick told me that one thing they have learned from this is how much they, Nora, and their hopes and dreams are loved and respected by their family and friends and how grateful they are to be blessed by all of you and your love for them”.

Closing saying:

Little footprints by Dorothy Ferguson

How very softly you tiptoed into our world, almost silently, only a moment you stayed. But what an imprint your footsteps have left upon our hearts.

Resources

All of these samples were created and taken from Sherokee Ilse & Susan Erling Martinez's Planning A Precious Goodbye.  

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Letters to Nora - A Tale of Two Sisters

July 14th, 2013

Dear Nora,

Today I want to tell you a story about your Awesome Aunt Kristi and me.  It's not a true story per say, but it is a story that is very much based off our childhood and love for each other.  Your Aunt so wanted to be YOUR Aunt.  She wanted to hold you, rock you, and kiss you.  She probably wanted to tell you all the stories of how I tortured her growing up too.  But today I will tell you a bed time story of her love and devotion as a sister.  I can only hope that one day, you too, will have a sister as special as mine.

So snuggle up and listen as I tell you A Tale of Two Sisters:

Once there were two sisters.  There was the older, wiser sister, who believed she would not break.  That she was invincible. She would run with the farm dogs, play games with the boys, and climb the highest tree with no fear.   

And then there was the younger, gentler sister whose heart was full of tender love and who spent her summer days following her older sister around.   This got on the older sister’s nerves and while playing in the garden with her friends one afternoon the older sister, no wiser than eight years, turned to her younger sister and said, “Leave me alone.  I don’t need you.”

The younger sister’s eyes swelled with tears and a deep sadness flooded her heart as she turned away, rejected from her older sister.  She ran through the wild flowers back towards the safety of her house where her mother was waiting.  When the younger sister arrived inside she was crying.  Her mother opened up her arms and comforted her with a tender embrace. 

 

“Honey, what’s wrong?” The mother asked as she tried to console her younger daughter’s heart.

“Older sister yelled at me and told me to leave her alone! And that she doesn’t need me.” Younger sister said as she continued to weep tears of grief.

Mother pulled her youngest daughter out of their embrace and held her shoulders sternly while looking her square in the eyes and said, “Honey.  I want you to listen to me now.  Older sister might think she is strong and wise, and will never break, but one day, no matter what she says now, she will need you.  More than she has ever needed anyone. Promise me you will never leave your sister, no matter what she says.”

As mother spoke, younger sister took a deep breath and held in her tears as her lip quivered in protest.  She nodded her head in agreement with her mother’s words and gave a sincere promise that only a five year old can because she felt the weight in her mother’s words and knew there must be purpose to this promise.

As the years passed older sister and younger sister went about their separate ways.  Older sister always thinking she was wiser and stronger than younger sister.  And younger sister from time to time would try to check in on older sister as mother made her promise to “Never leave her sister, no matter what.”  Older sister didn’t make this task easy and for the most part younger sister had to be there in spirit and heart as older sister went about her own business as older sisters often due. 

Then as years passed, and younger sister was not so young anymore, and older sister was about to get older, younger sister was awoken by an early morning phone call from older sister’s husband. 

“I need you to come to the hospital.” He said through tears of terror.

Younger sister did not ask questions and with her husband they arrived at the hospital room within minutes of the call.  There, younger sister walked into what was supposed to be older sister’s delivery room, but had turned into her child’s tomb, as older sister’s baby died in the womb the day she was to be born.

With courage, wisdom, and strength, younger sister stepped into the room and met older sister’s eyes. 

“I’m scared,” Older sister whispered.

“I know. Be scared,” Younger sister replied.

“I am broken,” Older sister screamed. 

“I know. Be Broken,” Younger sister replied.

“Don’t leave me. I need you,” Older sister cried out as she grabbed her younger sister’s hand.

And like in the years not so long before, when younger sister looked into her mother’s eyes and took a deep breath as she held in her tears and her lip quivered, she again said, “I won’t leave. I promise.” 

   

As older sister replied with fearful but comforted eyes, “Thank you.”

And together they both wept tears of grief.   

****
So Nora, what did you think?  I hope you enjoyed the story.

Love Always & Forever,

Mom

P.S. Goodnight Dear. 

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Sundays at Grandma's - Grandma Gerry's Ways She Remembers

Today we will hear from my mother.  She is a memorialist.  She likes to remember through rituals, memorials, and actions taken to create physical memories of Nora on this earth.  So this month we will hear about her journey to memorialize Nora as it is the month of The Importance of Remembrance.  

Let's see how gardening helps my mother heal and  in doing so she gets to act as Nora's Grandmother even in her death. 

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Nora's Garden

At Nora’s funeral, my scrapping sisters told me that they wanted to help me plant a garden for Nora—from turning over the dirt to transplanting plants from their gardens into mine.  My BF Holly said it would be nice to include my ‘blood’ sisters (as she calls them) also, and spend a few hours talking about Nora as we grounded with the earth.  It would be a real family ‘labor of love’.  The idea was very appealing to me.

Since that time Holly and I have had several outings to a local antiques mall.  We talked about ideas for the garden, and once a ‘whimsical’ garden theme was decided on, we looked for things that could be put into the garden.  Anything that looked to be child or storybook related we picked up and discussed.  Talking with Holly on these excursions has been a very cathartic experience.  She is a good listener and doesn’t judge my grief—probably because she is experiencing it also.  I have come away from our excursions feeling a little lighter each time and with many great ideas for the garden.

Once spring finally arrived I started the garden in earnest.  I decided I would add to an existing bed, and that it should be right outside of the living room windows so that I could see it year round—a living memorial to Nora.  I went out the first weekend in May and with my roundup, sprayed the grass in what I thought was an ameba-like shape.  I was rather surprised when a day later as the grass started to die and turn brown, that the shape I had browned out on the lawn was a lopsided heart shape.  Perhaps subconsciously I had done this to represent my love for Nora.  As I lay in bed that same night unable to fall asleep immediately, my thoughts turned to the heart-shaped garden again.  I wanted to put a meandering stone path into the garden and plant small yellow poppies in amongst the stones—my version of a yellow-brick road.  Inspiration hit and I decided that the wandering path would go through the middle to imitate a broken heart—which is exactly how the family has been feeling with Nora’s stillbirth—heartbroken.         

I have found that gardening has always been my way to meditate.  As I plant, pull weeds, and harvest food my thoughts turn inward and this is where I contemplate my life’s ups and down, think about problems, and come up with solutions.  It seemed logical to me that a ‘Nora’s Garden’ would help me grieve.

It was in May when I found the tree I wanted to put in Nora’s garden.  I found a Weeping Pea Vine at a local nursery, which I just happened to have a gift certificate for.  It would never grow to be more than 5-6 feet tall, and the downward arcing of the branches would forever represent the tears I shed for Nora.  The leaves were very small and narrow.  The sales person called it “ethereal”.  I could picture Nora in my mind watch fireflies in the trees and thinking they were fairies.  It was the prefect complement to Nora’s Garden.  Knowing I would be busy until the end of the school year, I purchased it and asked it they could keep it until mid-June when I would have the space ready for planting.  Done and done.

In June, my husband cleared the browned grass just prior to him leaving for training for the summer months.  It was his way of being a part of Nora’s Garden.  A week later, I had the Weeping Pea Vine planted.  Nora’s Garden was under way.

I will be focusing upon the many aspects of Nora’s Garden in upcoming posts.  It has been, and continues to be, a beautiful tribute to my beautiful granddaughter’s memory.

In the garden I tend to drop my thoughts here and there.  To the flowers I whisper the secrets I keep and the hopes I breathe.  I know they are there to eavesdrop for the angels.  

~Dodinsky