Welcome,
Mama.
You're here,
And I want you to know,
I'm so glad that you followed the thread that brought you here.
And I also know,
Though,
That you wouldn't be here if you hadn't lost something unthinkably precious.
And while I wish with all my heart that you didn't need this space,
I wanted to be here with you in it.
While I cannot offer you answers and how I wish I could,
Instead I offer you presence.
I offer you my hand.
Mama,
I see the way you are doing the impossible,
And that you are doing it with love.
As you're here,
Sitting or lying down with me,
I want you to know that this is a resting place.
A place where the multifacets of grief are welcome.
Where truth is spoken in a language only a broken,
Open heart understands.
These words are offered from one mother to another,
From a place that has known the silence,
The sweetness,
And the aching.
These words come from my truth and body,
Which aches like yours,
Broken and reshaped by love and loss.
Now let's begin by breathing.
Not because it will make the pain go away,
But because sometimes we can only go day by day,
Moment by moment,
Breath by breath.
So I want you to inhale gently,
As if you are sipping in warmth of a warm cup of tea,
And then exhale softly like your breath could carry your ache out into the open sky.
You are here,
And that in itself is an act of extraordinary courage,
To still feel,
To still wake,
To walk through this world with a chest so raw it feels like the wind might undo you.
Mama,
I know there are moments where the sadness reaches its fingers into your body,
Pulling you from the inside out.
Where grief feels not like something you carry,
But something that carries you.
And the anger,
It's wild and messy,
The kind that wants to scream at the stars,
Burn down everything along the way and howl against the walls of what could have been.
And then there is the quiet,
That eerie,
Aching quiet.
The room you prepared,
The little clothes folded with hope,
The laugh you were waiting for,
The milk perhaps your body made,
The instincts still living in your limbs ready to hold and protect.
These words are not here to smooth it all over,
They are here to walk with you through the landscape of your love.
Because grief is not a measure of brokenness,
It is the echo of love that had no end point.
It is your body saying,
I knew them,
I loved them,
I still do.
And grief doesn't seem to follow time,
It doesn't obey orders.
You can feel like it just happened yesterday,
Or like you've aged a hundred years in a single hour.
Both are true.
So let yourself remember,
Let these memories rise like mist from the earth,
The first flutters,
The name you whispered in the dark,
The way the light hit the room when they arrived.
Say their name now if you wish.
Notice how the room feels again.
And always remember your breath,
Mama.
You are not alone.
Others walk this path too.
Imagine just for this moment,
In this darkness,
You are walking towards a fire lit circle.
You get close enough that you feel the warmth of the flames kissing your skin.
A circle of women,
Mothers who know,
Open their arms and reach for you.
Their hands are welcome,
Their hearts are open.
You feel the sacred wisdom they hold,
For they have walked this path too.
It's here you don't have to speak,
Because they understand that it has always been a part of the journey of motherhood,
Even when it is not spoken about,
Or its depths embraced.
And as you sit there,
The fire crackles softly.
Tears fall down your cheeks,
Like cool rivers on a too hot landscape.
Your body aches.
An emptiness born from love that overflowed the form it was given.
There is no right way through this.
But there is this moment.
And in this moment,
I offer you my hand.
And around this fire,
Others offer theirs too.
Because you are being held.
By every mother who has ever wept like this.
And by the earth that knows both birth and decay,
And still chooses spring.
Mama,
You have loved so fully that your heart broke open.
And while nothing can make this loss okay,
Nothing can ever take away the love that was shared between you and your baby.
That love is still here,
Woven into your breath,
Threaded through time.
A sacred bond that needs no body to be real.
Yet,
It's perhaps one of the most real human experiences there is.
In this unseen world,
Things end.
But in the unseen world,
The one that pulses through trees,
That carries bird calls across great distances,
That lets seeds sleep for years before blooming,
That world tells us nothing ever really leaves,
It only changes form.
Breathe into the fact that this grief,
It isn't wrong.
It isn't something to be tidied or timed.
It's holy.
It's the raw edge of life's truth rubbing against your skin.
And when you feel like a stranger in your own body,
Know that your nervous system is doing something enormous.
You are surviving a storm in every cell.
Breathe,
Mama.
Let nature hold you now.
She understands cycles.
The blossom,
The decay.
Because did you know,
Mama,
There are a species of tree whose seeds only crack open after extreme heat.
A fire must pass through before they can even bloom.
And there is an arctic poppy that follows the sun all day long,
Just to gather enough light to keep blooming in the cold.
You are that kind of sacred.
You are that kind of strong.
And if this experience has been an initiation,
Then perhaps,
Just perhaps,
It has cracked you open into something that feels like sacred knowing.
Not because of what you've lost,
But because of how deeply you've loved and how close you have witnessed all that we are here to experience.
There is wisdom in your gaze now,
Tenderness in your rage,
A powerful,
Earthly grace in your grief,
And a willingness in your love that surpasses everything you have ever known to this point.
And know that there is a kind of bravery in you that you don't even understand yet,
That will light the way for others you may never meet.
In any moment you want,
Give yourself permission to feel the presence of your baby in whatever way feels true for you.
Perhaps it's the sunlit moments,
In dreams,
In music,
And in the inexplicable moments that the mind doesn't understand,
Yet the spirit knows beyond belief.
Breathe.
Let your mind soften,
Your body rest.
Feel the warmth of the fire,
The hush of the women beside you,
The pulse of the world still beating under your feet.
You are not alone.
You are not broken.
You are a mother.
Grieving.
Loving.
Becoming.
Growing.
Deepening.
And we are here with you,
And we will hold you for as long as it takes until you are ready to hold yourself again.
I see you sister,
In all that it means to be a creator of life.
I see you eye to eye,
Heart to heart.
And we'll hold the knowing for you,
From one mother to another,
That you are strong,
You are brave,
And you are love,
Until you are ready to hold it for yourself again.
And as you start to return to where you are,
We will meet on the exhale,
And together,
We will take a deep breath in,
Full of the knowing in every cell of our bodies that we are always,
Deeply connected to our babies,
Through the unseen,
And the love that has no limits.
And exhale,
To arrive back,
Centred,
Knowing,
And ready for wherever the moment is taking you next.
Thank you mama.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
