Loss...Part 2

My wife is a very sensitive person by nature who is extremely tuned into her feelings and emotions.  The extent to which this is true has become clearer to me every year that we have been married (going on 11 years).  When we experienced loss, there were so many different emotions that she was experiencing that, at the time, I just did not understand and frankly, was unable to comprehend.  I found it very difficult to appreciate and empathize with what she was going through.  Probably the most difficult emotion that I struggled with was the severity with which my wife applied her coping mechanisms for dealing with loss, the duration that these mechanisms remained in force,  even if we were actively trying to conceive again and despite the fact that neither of us were decided that we were done building our family.  

At the time I felt that her actions were avoidance tactics and while understandable when the pain of loss was fresh, after several months it seemed it was excessive and completely unreasonable.  I thought that she was just avoiding dealing with the pain, avoiding doing the "tough stuff" to get on the road to healing.   Looking now through more "seasoned" eyes, I am amazed and often feel ashamed that I had such a hard time seeing her actions for what they were, that I was so hard on her by condemning her for her actions, that I blamed her for her actions.   I did not realize the depth of the pain that she felt, I did not realize that some cuts are so deep, and so raw, that extreme measures are needed to slowly heal the wound.  I did not see that her actions were not avoidance, she was not putting off dealing with the pain or repressing her feelings.  She was surviving as best she knew how, she was using every tool available to her, even if only temporarily, to numb the pain of loss just long enough to start the tough climb out of the cavern that loss put her into.  

I would never want to go back to that time in our life, the feelings and emotions just cut too deep, but I also have regrets that I would give anything to rectify.  I regret that I did not listen more, and I mean truly listen to the pain she was in, and look for more cues from her for how I could have helped.  I regret that I contributed to her pain rather than helped her through it, despite the fact that I thought I was helping via my actions at the time.  At a time where she needed support, someone to back up the way she felt, I did not fill that roll. However, I take comfort in the fact that, despite the length of the road traveled, we got through it and are stronger people, a stronger couple as a result, and I think Tiffany would agree.

As a final thought on loss,  my wife and I were discussing this the other night and we both agreed that the pain of a loss never really goes away.  You do move on, but you never really fully get over it.  The cuts heal, but they leave scars that serve as little reminders of what might have been.  Following a loss you are a little less naive, perhaps a little more guarded, the experience forever changes you as a person.  You develop a different perspective, take certain things a little less for granted, and truly earn an appreciation for the miracle that life is.

Loss...Part 1

This is a very difficult topic, both for me personally, as well as for many couples out there, and especially my wife.  I would love to be able to say that our journey to build our family was without experiencing the feelings and emotions associated with loss, but unfortunately I would be lying.  I would also be lying if I told you I felt qualified to discuss this particular topic.  Nevertheless, having personally experienced loss with my wife, I have some thoughts and perceptions that I would like to share.  My hope is that somewhere in my ramblings another husband might glean some understanding about what his wife might be going through, or conversely, perhaps a woman might gain some insight into what her husband might be feeling.

This is directed towards my fellow males out there.  A loss very early on in pregnancy, regardless of how many weeks pregnant your wife is, be it four weeks, six weeks or more, you are still loosing a living being that is your baby.  This is not a religious, life starts at conception, argument.  The fact of the matter is that in a woman's heart, mind and soul, she knows that there is a child growing in her belly, and she is already formulating in her mind what life will be like with a baby, the dream that is a child has come true, even just days after finding out that she is pregnant.  In the event of a loss,  that dream has been violently disrupted, just a few moments prior your wife was on cloud nine, now she feels a void, like something is missing, like something has been unfairly or unjustly taken away.  She has lost something that was very real to her, she as lost her baby, and with that comes very deep feelings of grief, confusion and possibly even guilt.  This can be, for some males (me included), very difficult to comprehend, albeit understandably so, particularly with a loss that happens very early on in pregnancy.  While your wife is starting to feel changes in her body, she is making not only a mental connection, but a physical one as well to the new life growing inside her.  We as men are just observers at this point.  We do not experience the same emotional and physical connection that our wive's feel at this stage.  Those feelings of attachment typically come a bit later for us when we can see the changes in our wive's body, when we can see her belly has grown, feel the kicking and squirming, see the baby on the ultrasound.  If for only this reason, the emotions a husband and wife feel, are in my experience, very different during and after a loss.  And both husband and wife should accept that this is okay.  I think the key to helping each other navigate this difficult time is to understand the above reality.  With that understanding comes the compassion that will be necessary to make it through.

In my case, I remember feeling as though my role was to be the strong shoulder to cry on, the one that ensures that life moves on, and as such I did not take the time nor make the effort to share in the emotions my wife was feeling.  I thought that being the "voice of reason", being emotionally void, was the best way to help her. I was wrong. At the time, I did not understand or appreciate what I  wrote above, and as such we experienced not only the pain of the loss of our child, but also the loss of the emotional connection that a husband and wife share.  This was a difficult time, however we learned a lot about eachother, how we respond to difficult situations as well as what each of us needs to grieve. We got through it and I can say that we as a couple are stronger for it.