This post was originally posted on my publication, Simple Faithful Motherhood, on Substack.

This is for the ones who didn’t look away.

I know it’s hard to know what to say.

There were those who clumsily yet lovingly blurted out something anyway. Said, “Hey you can try again,” at a time when I didn’t want any other baby than the one who left. I never held it against them.

I know it’s hard to know what to ask.

I imagine the ones who managed a “Hey how are you?” worry if they’d trigger a wave of remembering and pain if they asked me how I’m doing. I want to tell them my baby has never been far from mind.

Or they might have felt silly for asking, knowing the answer is almost certainly that I’m not doing well. I’m glad they asked me anyway, and when I answered with tears streaming down my face, I’m glad there were those who didn’t look away.

“You’re not just a like count, you’re a person with a loving heart who stopped to say you care in the best way these platforms allow us.”

I know it’s hard to know what to do.

There are those who wondered if they should schedule a meetup, and that maybe I needed more privacy than presence in this time.

Truth be told, I swing between needing both on a daily basis. And so I’m grateful for the friend who baked bread for my family and left it by my door with a card. We felt both your gift of presence and privacy.

I know it’s hard to respond on social media.

In a sea of photo and video scroll, where everybody is announcing some version of their happy news and displaying their highlight reel, I’m the oddball posting a video of myself crying and (thinking I was) cryptically sharing that I had lost an unborn child.

A “like” in the context of social media seems hardly appropriate, but you wanted your name to be counted among the list of those who stand in solidarity with my suffering.

I remember you.

You’re not just a like count, you’re a person with a loving heart who stopped to say you care in the best way these platforms allow us. Many took it one step further and texted me personally—hey, is everything okay? No, it’s not, here’s what happened, and I’m falling apart, but thank you for holding space for me.

This post is for these ones: who found it hard to figure out what to say, ask, or do, but figured it out anyway.

I’m so grateful for you.

DID YOU FIND THIS HELPFUL?

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