The Ache of Losing a Child Never Really Leaves

Every year, without fail, my body feels February.

I’m not talking about the drop in temperature, or the way the snow piling up on the ground seeps through my boots every day on my walk into work.

It’s the way my heart starts to ache a little more frequently. The way my eyes tear up unexpectedly at any given moment. The turning of a calendar to a month that marked the most unimaginable loss in my life so far: the loss of our firstborn child.

It’s been 20 years since our very first dream of becoming a parent was reshaped into a traumatic stillbirth that defined, in large extent, many years in my life and many years of my parenting journey since then.

I say this out loud not to make anyone feel bad for me or uncomfortable, but because I know I’m not alone in this experience.

I know I’m not alone in needing to grieve year after year, for a missing part of my heart—trying to fill the space of someone I never really even got to meet, but loved more than anything in the world.

I know I’m not alone in trying to understand a grief that never seems to shift for me. That doesn’t seem to get easier over time. This journey is different than the way I grieve for others I’ve lost, but who I also had the privilege to walk through life with, creating memories that, over time, eased the sharp edges of pain and softened them into something else.

Each year when I mark this chapter, I struggle to find ways to grasp onto anything that will help redefine the way I can confront the undercurrent of emotion that comes with it. All trauma and nothing else to place a foothold in. A reminder of how a heart could break so young and life could be so fragile. I feel it all.

I seek comfort in our 20-year tradition of releasing a balloon. Sharing this moment with my two teenage children, all these years later, even across the miles.

I hold the gratitude I have for the people who helped me walk through the thickness of sadness, and who continue to remember with me, a child they never met, but also carry in their hearts.

And I write this for all of us sharing this road, united by a type of grief that is so difficult to explain.

I want you to know that I stand beside you and am wrapping you in understanding and love. In hope and healing.

Now, and always.

So God Made a Grandmother book by Leslie Means

If you liked this, you'll love our book, SO GOD MADE A GRANDMA

Order Now!

Amy Keyes

Amy Keyes is a middle school teacher and freelance writer in St. Paul. When she's not cheering too loudly while spectating at her teenagers' sports, she's running, working out, binge watching recommended series on tv, or hanging out with her dog.