Between Breaths Issue 3: Painful Milestones and How to Support Grievers Through Hard Days
I longed for summer to end - you heard my plea in my last newsletter.
Grief feels most at home in the winter, and autumn’s falling leaves set the path there. I still welcome autumn, and yet, with it comes a dreaded milestone: the beginning of the school year.
This year, my daughter Junie would have entered kindergarten — one of the biggest events and rites of passage in a young child’s life. I can imagine taking her and Annaleigh back-to-school shopping. I can picture her picking out a backpack and having her name lovingly inscribed on it.
But my sweet girl didn’t get that opportunity. She didn’t get to choose first-day outfits or learn the name of her teacher. She didn’t get to wear a backpack or climb onto the bus for her first day.
Milestones in a griever’s world are deeply painful. They are reminders of what should have been and never will be. They tug at the fabric of our lives, revealing once again how unfair it all is. While others are celebrating graduations, birthdays, and weddings, we are reflecting on the voids within us — the places where hope, joy, and excitement used to live.
While you celebrate these milestones, we often must watch from the sidelines, cheering you on, yet desperate to be part. We try not to let envy consume us, yet the question, “Why my child?” devours us.
In these moments, we hope our children are remembered and our grief acknowledged. Some of us want to be invited to your celebrations, while others among us prefer to watch from a distance. I hope you give us that choice. Even if we say no, it’s comforting to know we — and our children — were considered.
And more than considered, our deepest wish is for our children to be honored. To be included. We want you to say their names, to remember them out loud, to carry their spirit into your lives. We know it may not feel fair to ask that of you, but it’s what we long for: that you join us in the work to keep our children present. When you do, it is a beautiful, unexpected gift. For a moment, we can exhale, because you’ve breathed life into them, and into us.
For those who care for a griever, these milestones are sacred opportunities to show support and deepen connection. We don’t expect to be included in every celebration, or for our child to be honored at every event, but a simple gesture, a moment of thoughtfulness, can mean the world. Here are some ideas:
Have a symbol or item that represents our child present
Include their name on a program
Leave an empty seat or place setting in their honor
Reach out to let us know you’re thinking of them
Wear a specific color in their memory
Donate to a cause in their name
Have a moment of silence
Light a candle
Create a memory table
Serve their favorite food
Do an act of kindness in their honor
It’s not your responsibility to carry our grief, but your willingness to help hold it makes it a little lighter, a little more bearable. Please consider how you might show up for the grievers in your life in this way. It doesn’t matter if it’s been weeks, months, or decades — we will always want our children to be remembered.
It was your turn, darling.