If you are listening to this meditation you have experienced the very worst loss of a loved one that is humanly possible.
This loss is stretching you beyond your capacity to feel,
To hope and to deal with life.
This is really the ultimate challenge.
You are not supposed to bury a child.
They are supposed to bury you and yet here you are grasping,
Searching for some help with this tragedy.
So give yourself a moment of gratitude just for being here,
For trying,
For taking time to care for yourself as you walk along the path of healing.
So settle into whatever you might be sitting or laying upon,
Making yourself as comfortable as you can and taking a few deep breaths as you breathe into the loss of your child and become aware of where in your body you hold this loss.
Breathe and now notice where in your heart and in your mind that you're holding this loss.
Notice if it has a shape,
A size,
A color,
A texture,
A sound,
Maybe even a song.
Just allowing yourself to sit with it and breathe and honor your grief.
This is part of the healing process.
And when this child came into your life you learned that your heart had a capacity to love that you didn't know it had.
Maybe your love for this child was instantaneous,
Joyous,
Intense.
Perhaps you felt your heart swell and almost burst with love at times or maybe it took a while to warm up to this new person in your life.
Perhaps this was a very difficult child to love but the fact remains in whatever shape it takes that you loved them and you still love them and even though they're gone your love exists.
Your love is a tangible unbreakable thing.
Take a moment here to breathe and let your love for your child wash over you like a wave.
You can sway with it,
Float with it,
Let it move you.
Thinking of all the things you loved about this child,
Their smile,
Their quirks,
Their wonderful imperfections.
Giving yourself a moment to rejoice in their existence,
Their life no matter how brief or how long and nobody else quite gets it.
Only you have this exact relationship with this child and you may feel very lonely,
Very alone as you try to wrap your mind around this loss and you might feel angry,
Rageful,
Furious or you may be experiencing numbness,
Withdrawal,
Depression,
A stupor.
Perhaps you are amazed that the tears keep coming and coming and coming.
You might wonder if you're going to be dehydrated from weeping so much and you may cycle through all those things over and over again and so you wake up in the morning and you're still alive.
Perhaps you wish you weren't.
You go through your day,
You function,
It's hard.
You might just want to run away from everything.
It seems so impossible and what you may not know is that in addition to the heart's capacity to love and to feel pain,
It also has an infinite capacity to heal and take in a deep breath and know this that even though your loss is so unique,
So specific,
So personal that nobody else quite understands but others have trod this path before you.
Millions upon millions have lost a child.
This experience of losing a beloved child and healing from it is a well-worn,
Rutted,
Bumpy and yes difficult path but it is a path.
There is wisdom and strength in the vastness of healing that has gone on and which is going on right now throughout the world and throughout history and you can draw upon it.
Take a deep breath and imagine the multitudes of men and women who have lost a child reaching out their arms to you,
Sharing their wisdom,
Their knowledge,
Their healing,
Their wholeness with you.
It's like a warm blanket gently wrapped around you giving you kindness,
Comfort and hope and it's okay to accept these gifts and in their wisdom they give you permission,
Permission to weep,
To scream,
To rage,
To curl up into a ball,
To let it out,
Whatever it looks like,
Whatever shape your grief needs to take but safely,
Always safely.
You may feel like you're fighting for your life.
It may be hard to live right now.
Know that this is normal.
It's all normal and you are normal and as you survive day after day you will sometimes notice that you are not thinking about this every second.
You have moments of happiness.
You may even forget sometimes and you don't have to feel guilty about this.
It's okay for you to progress.
You are not abandoning or betraying your child if you move forward and walk on the healing path because of this truth that your child would want you to heal.
This child is a part of you forever no matter what and your healing honors and respects them and you can allow yourself to believe this and when there are little moments of joy that emerge like tiny plants peeping through the snow embracing the sunshine,
Imagine your child smiling down upon you being happy for you.
It's okay to be kind to yourself,
To listen to yourself,
To ask for what you need,
To make sure that you get it.
You must take especially good care of yourself as you learn to ride the waves of this grief and the waves will change over time.
Perhaps they will not always feel like a tsunami becoming small ripples and now take a final deep breath inhaling,
Exhaling one breath at a time.
You are surviving this.
You will get through this and now gently open your eyes and look around you.
Notice what you see here and smell.
Perhaps everything is just the same and yet perhaps it's a little different.
You feel a little bit stronger,
A little more hopeful,
And a little more at peace.
