For couples who have lost a child, holidays can be very difficult. Mother’s Day and Father’s Day can be particular difficult times. It is hard to figure out how to navigate this particular day as nothing is as it was supposed to be.
For me as a man, one of the hardest things about the whole situation is not being able to fix it. Men are typically the ones who want to “solve” problems as they arise. In this case, however, there is no solution. There is no way to remedy what has happened. This is of course magnified on days like Mother’s Day. Your wife will be in pain and you are helpless. There is nothing you can do to fix it or take it away. If you are like me, this sort of thing is almost as painful as the problem itself. I hate seeing my wife suffer and all I want to do is make the bad things right. So since we can’t make it right, what can we do to try to make it easier?
Just be there. Just being there for your wife is probably the simplest and most important thing you can do. It seems like it is almost too easy. All you need to really do is be her rock to lean on. She is going through a difficult time and this holiday is making her relive all sorts of feeling and emotions that normally may not be as strong.
Recognize her. This is not the time to sweep things under the rug. It may be hard and it may make her emotional, but simply buying her a card or some flowers to say to her that you love and support her can make things a little less painful. She already has to go through life explaining to people that she is a mother of an angel. Do not fail to acknowledge it.
Do not push. Remember this is her day. Let it be at her pace. Whether you have an extravagant plan to make her feel special or she told you what she wants to do, be prepared to be flexible. This is a day that things do not have to follow a particular formula. If your wife tells you she does not feel like doing something just go with the flow. This is hard enough already, fighting with her will not help.
Do not feel judged. This day is going to be hard. It is going to seem strange to the people around you who do not know your story. We have a giraffe that has a recording of our daughter’s heartbeat in it. We take the giraffe all over the place. We get pictures with it. There are all sorts of things we do. The giraffe will undoubtedly be with us on Mother’s Day no matter what we do or where we go. We know that we will get strange looks. We know we will have to explain ourselves to the few people who are brave enough to ask. It is okay. It is okay for them to ask. If you get strange looks, that is okay too. They should not judge you, but it does not matter if they do. This is your time to honor your wife. What other people think of the way that you do it is not something you need to worry about.
The most important thing to remember though, there is no “normal.” Last year was our first Mother’s Day without our daughter Hannah. We could not do all the things that people “normally” do. Instead, we had to come up with our own way to get through the day.
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