Living in the And: Experiencing Lament and Grace in Pregnancy Loss
On Thanksgiving weekend 2019, my husband and I found out that we were expecting our second child. Our first pregnancy had been textbook: everything normal, no severe nausea, baby was meeting all the right milestones. It was difficult not to burst out with the exciting news this time. Our enthusiasm was tempered, however, by a common convention surrounding pregnancy announcements: wait until you are reasonably sure the pregnancy is viable before sharing the news. So we kept quiet, waiting until the pregnancy was farther along and could be confirmed by bloodwork and ultrasounds.
I looked forward to my first ultrasound in early November of 2019 and, though baby was measuring smaller than expected, I wasn’t disappointed. There was a little flicker of a heartbeat blinking steadily on the screen. We stuck the ultrasound photo on the refrigerator with thankful hearts, staring at the proof that our family was growing.
Three days later, the bleeding started.
I was swiftly sent back for another ultrasound. This time, there was no heartbeat. What began as an anticipatory Thanksgiving quickly turned into a daily battle to maintain a sense of normalcy for our son, who was two-and-a-half. Outwardly, I may have appeared fine, but in reality, I was going through my days feeling like a walking gravesite.
After this loss, we worked hard to return to our regular routines and the rhythms of life we were used to, trying to balance home and work responsibilities while still feeling emotionally raw and spent. The Christmas season was a difficult one and we went through the motions of celebration aware of the child we no longer had with us on earth. We approached a third pregnancy in April 2020 with much more caution, holding onto hope for healing, while also knowing how fragile and precious life is. With the pandemic just under way, I sat in the exam room, masked and alone, hoping desperately that the ultrasound tech would just turn the monitor around, revealing that little flicker of life. But there was nothing. Just another sympathetic phone call from our family doctor who walked us through the now-familiar information and next steps.
This time, I felt even more betrayed by my body. It couldn’t do the thing it had been designed to do: carry and care for a child, something women seemed to do naturally. For this to happen two times in a row, so close together, made me feel like there was something wrong with me, but I didn’t know what. I was ashamed of my body; I could walk and work, but not keep another child alive. Truthfully, it seemed like my body didn’t even recognize that the baby was no longer alive as I was still experiencing morning sickness the day before my post-miscarriage surgery. God’s curse on women when Adam and Eve sinned in the garden felt particularly weighty during these days; I realized that the pain of childbirth isn’t just in the physical act of giving birth but also in losing young life in the womb.
Despite how personal and isolating our loss felt, especially in the separation of lockdown, we never felt like we were grieving alone. In our heartbreak, we were surrounded by family, friends, and members of the church community who lifted us up in prayer when we could only pray with wordless groans. Friends who had also experienced loss or difficulty in conceiving opened their hearts and arms to us.
We’ve had deliveries of food, flowers, chocolate and tea. We’ve had friends praying for us and sharing Scripture passages that were meaningful to them in their times of difficulty. We’ve had community members checking on us in the days, weeks, and months following our losses. Friends have remembered various milestones: baby would have been this many weeks now, we would have found out the gender now, today was baby’s due date. They have been gracious through their own pregnancies, knowing the sting that their joyful news could cause.
I’ve also experienced the power of social media in providing space for grief. The anonymity of the online world makes sharing personal stories less complicated, and it felt like there was no expectation of how anyone was supposed to feel. Connecting with strangers was easier some days than relying on family and friends who just wanted to help us feel better. The Facebook groups, Instagram accounts, and even visible individuals, like Meghan Markle, that openly address loss and miscarriage help make the topic less taboo. The load of pain isn’t lessened, but it is easier to carry when you don’t feel that you are hurting in isolation.
Suffering isn’t meant to be experienced alone, though we often feel like we are by ourselves in our deep grief with no one who listens or understands. In the book Finding Chika by Mitch Albom, Albom writes about a conversation he has with a priest who lost a child due to a long illness. He asks the priest how he managed to keep his faith and why he didn’t turn his back on God. The priest smiles, and replies that he knew there was someone listening whenever he cried out, “why?” The book of Lamentations, written after the fall and destruction of Jerusalem, teaches us how to speak our grief and how to cry this “why” to God without condemnation. The writer admits, “My soul is bereft of peace, I have forgotten what happiness is; so I say, ‘My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the Lord,’” (Lam. 3:17-18). This is our model of prayer: confessing our emotional and spiritual rawness and emptiness to God. Our words aren’t disappearing into a void, but going to the throne of God where he bottles our tears.
The way that the people of Israel collectively plead with God in the book of Lamentations also reminds us that grief can be felt corporately, in the communal body of the church.
In our personal experience of pain and grief, we have seen God using our sorrow as a means to bless others. We have been comforted by many and we’ve tried to comfort others in return. We’ve had the opportunity to speak to those who have also lost a child, to hear their stories, and to mourn with them. And this is what the grace of God looks like: God turning suffering, evils, and pain into a beautiful balm that we can offer to others in their anguish. We can sit with others in their grief and lament alongside them. Every person is uniquely designed by God, and their heartaches are experienced differently. Our care for each other needs to honour the fact that we are unique members of one body. Whether this takes the form of meals delivered or prayers spoken, physical visits or respectful space, as a church we have an opportunity to share each other’s burdens.
The book of Lamentations ends with a desperate plea for restoration. Thankfully, Scripture does not leave us in despair. We know that the Man of Sorrows came to bear our burdens; we know he grieves along with us; we know he will come again to wipe away every tear. Nevertheless, pain is a real experience here in this life and cannot be ignored. We can sit in grief with ourselves and with others, while also having hope. Both are part of our lives. Bearing burdens with hope requires us to acknowledge that suffering is real and that grief is painful. In attempts to offer consolation, the word “but” is frequently used: “I’m so sorry, but...there must be a plan...it’s better this way...” Yet this word is so dismissive of a person’s heartache. Grief and trust in God’s providence do not have to be opposed; rather, they are both part of this broken world that will one day be restored.
We are often quick to share how we have been defined by moments of great joy in our lives. We celebrate graduations, marriages, professional accomplishments, and festive holidays. However, this is only one part of our story: we are also shaped by the sadness and loss in our lives. Losing two children has changed who I am and has shaped my individual story. Scripture verses now hit differently because of my experience: God’s curse of the woman in the garden now extends to the pain of heartbreak over a child; Sarah’s longing for a child while others easily conceive seems painfully familiar; the book of Lamentations gives raw words to my cries. While pregnancy announcements continue to be difficult to see, I now know that so much is not shared. It makes me wonder at the lives behind the shared posts, stories, and pictures. What invisible grief do others carry? How does sadness shape their identities?
As I write this, we are approaching what would have been the first birthday of the first child we lost. We chose to remember that first child, as well as their sibling, by giving them a specific name. This was inspired by another mother in Scripture, who loved her child deeply, and had let him go too early. In the opening chapters of the book of 1 Samuel, the story of Hannah and her family are laid out before us. Hannah weeps before the Lord, longing for the gift of a child. She pours out her soul in lament, whispering words she has repeated for years. In his time, God does entrust a son to her. Despite her arms being filled with this precious, long-awaited child, Hannah promises him to God. She would eventually bring her son, Samuel, to the temple, and leave him to serve the Lord for his whole life.
My husband came up with the idea to name our child Sam: a child who was prayed for, a child who was a gift, and a child who went to live in God’s presence well before his parents felt ready to let him go. On December 18, 2019, my family met at a graveyard in Burlington, Ontario where my grandmother had been buried eight years earlier. There we said goodbye to the little one we knew for only a short time. We placed Sam with my grandmother, knowing that the little soul was already with Jesus. Both children who are in heaven are remembered with the name Sam, and we hold on to the hope that we will one day be reunited with them. When that day comes, all grief will be no more.
If you or someone you know is experiencing the grief of pregnancy loss, here are three resources that helped me in my journey:
Zoë Clark-Coates - books, social media, and website
Tim Keller - Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering
gracetoronto.ca/care for prayer or counselling support
Text: Maria Faber
Art: Min Hwang