Tonight's picture was taken in March of 2003. Mattie was 11 months old and this was his first trip on an airplane to Los Angeles. That day we took Mattie to Huntington Gardens. This photo captured Mattie's favorite mode of transportation... on Peter's back!
Quote of the day: Then, after the first year anniversary of your child’s death has come and gone, the silence invites itself in. ~ Ann Rami
I have signed up for an online magazine called Still Standing. In my inbox today, I found an article that immediately captured my attention, it is entitled...... On the second year of (forgotten) grief. The article is written by a bereaved mom of an only child. As I read the article, I felt as if the article could have been written by me, as she was expressing many of the same sentiments and feelings I experienced. In a nutshell, everyone thinks that the first year after a child dies is the worst. Your care community is very in tune, supportive, and reaches out constantly during that first year. But when that calendar flips over to year two, it is as if a switch is triggered, and that same support community expects you to bounce back and return to NORMAL. TO MOVE ON and GET OVER IT!
Unfortunately that doesn't happen. On the contrary, year two and frankly year three are horrific. This is about the time when the reality and magnitude of child loss really hit. It is also when the mind starts kicking in and you become much more reflective and are able to face the emotion of such a traumatic loss. Yet just when I was facing these raw emotions and reality, my support community stepped back. So in a way, it was like a double loss. A loss of Mattie and a loss of those who supported me through this crisis. All I can say is it was a very lonely, isolating, and depressing place to be. It is a time I will never forget and certainly I can appreciate how our community needed a break from childhood cancer and death, but I never got a break, and still haven't gotten a break. As this is my life. Expect back then I not only had to face having no child, but I also had to face that I no longer fit into our social community. A painful reality.
I am under no delusion that this is unique to Vicki. This happens to most if not all parents who have lost a child. Yet, these are things we do not always talk about. Which is why the candor of this article was refreshing. This information needs to be shared so when parents face the second year of isolation and abandonment, they will understand that this isn't personal or specific to them. It is a societal pattern that so many of us have had to suffer through. Not that this eases one's feelings or pain, but there is a certain level of comfort knowing you aren't crazy, you haven't done anything wrong, and that YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
On The Second Year Of (Forgotten) Grief:
https://stillstandingmag.com/2020/02/28/on-the-second-year-of-forgotten-grief/
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