A few years ago I met a woman who taught me a lot about myself and my own thinking style. She told me that when she was of child bearing age she not only had several miscarriages, but had also lost two full term babies, one at birth, the other after a month. I could not conceive of such a loss or such a tragedy and was amazed by her and her attitude towards her dreadful losses.
This woman had such a profound impact on me through her story that I started to look at myself and the way I had handled my own losses. I had experienced many miscarriages, at many different stages of pregnancy, but I realized from listening to her how very differently we had each handled our tragic situations.
My losses had been over the course of several years during which I was severely depressed. When I look back now to then I realize that I completely lost those years, as did my husband and so my young child, my son for whom I was not really there because I was consumed with grief. I can remember feeling such love for my son, I loved him more than I thought humanly possible, yet, I was not there for him, I was lost and somewhere else. How can you not be there for someone you love so much? But I was not.
As I got to know this woman I grew to have the greatest of respect for her and her handling of all her losses. For me there can be nothing worse than to lose a child except perhaps to lose two children!! And she had indeed lost two babies.
She told me how she had not wallowed in her grief, but how she had made a conscious decision to get back into her life and move forward and try to have more babies. She said she believed it was not helpful to wallow in grief and so she didn’t. She said she worked very hard on herself and was determined to overcome her losses, each time having the same attitude, never wallowing, never asking her G-d “Why me?”
Her goal was to move forward and she did. It is now many years later and I have only known her for three years, but know she succeeded beautifully.
I look at her and think to myself that here she is, this wonderful woman who is well on the other side of it all now, she is a grandmother and succeeded in having four full term babies all living and healthy. The way she had handled her situation all those years ago has never rebounded on her, she didn’t suddenly become depressed or have Posttraumatic Stress, no, she is so emotionally healthy it is a joy to be with her and listen to her.
Had I known her all those years ago when she made her decisions to get on with life rather than wallow in the deaths, I would have said that sooner or later it will all come rebounding back, how can it not? But here we are all these years after her losses and her attitude still stands as strongly and firmly as ever. She has the most wonderful and healthy perspective on life which has seen her through more grief most of us could ever know.
She has made me take a look at my own life and my own handling of my many losses. I had become depressed and those around me suffered just as much as I myself did. They lost me during those precious years, years we can never get back. I lost years of my child’s childhood, years of my own relationship because of where I was. My heart aches for all that was lost to us, but more than that though I regret that I could not find a way to come to terms with the losses throughout those years.
Now many years later I can look back and say that I wish I had done it differently, but grief is a strange thing that can be all consuming. For me unfortunately it was, for her it was not, she made sure it was not. She was in control of her feelings even given such dire times.
Yes we are different people with different personalities, but I could have done better with myself.
She has taught me that no matter what the situation and however dire that situation is, we ourselves choose how we handle it. If she, in such terrible circumstances could manage her grief so well, then it must be that we can manage anything. If we try hard enough and choose a healthy perspective surely we can overcome most situations, because for sure there can be little that can match her experience, it is all a matter of perspective.
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