Kindred Spirit

In the midst of all the house stuff, I was so thrilled when one of my babyloss mommy friends wanted to schedule a brunch date.  I was so excited when she emailed me about getting together this past Friday. 

After not having seen her face-to-face in almost a full year, it was so refreshing to give her a big hug and reconnect!  We “met” shortly after Andrew went to be with Jesus when she sent us a CD through another friend of mine.  She wrote us the most thoughtful letter and included it with the gift.  I had no idea that I would meet her in person just a couple of months after that when Kevin and I attended a grief seminar (that later turned into a year and a half long grief support group). 

Our group eventually dissolved due to outside circumstances that had nothing to do with our group itself (long story that is not mine to share).  I’ve missed meeting once a month, so it was especially nice to see her again and talk about our grief journey at this point as well as our living and deceased children.

We chuckled because within the first 10 minutes of our conversation, we were already talking about our firstborn baby boys in heaven.  Leave it to us to start off with that!  🙂  We went on to catch each other up on how we are coping without our babies with us, as well as all the happenings with the rest of our families.  After our meeting, I was so refreshed and thankful to have such a friend, a real kindred spirit in this grief journey.

I remember back to that grief seminar we attended in November 2009, when I first met this friend.  I remember when the time came for each couple to share their stories and she was the first to share.  She started sharing and within minutes, I was a puddle of tears and my makeup was long gone.  What a sight I must have been! 

Her story resembled ours so very much. When she spoke of the utter devastation of finding out her baby’s heart was no longer beating and the overwhelming joy of holding his little body in her arms the next day, I was flooded with emotion because I had finally met someone who “got it” in every sense of the word.  I remember her sharing the difficult time she had in knowing she was a mom when the rest of the world had no idea and oftentimes didn’t acknowledge it, since her son in heaven was her firstborn (she has since had 4 more children).  We connected instantly that day!  And even when we don’t see each other as often as we’d like, it’s amazing how we can reconnect within seconds like we haven’t missed a beat.  It’s amazing how God does that!

My prayer for any of you who are walking this grief journey is that God might place some kindred spirit in your life who may be able to minister to you.  I’m hearing more and more stories of people who have lost babies or young children, and my heart breaks for them so much.  While God is truly all we need to navigate through such a painful journey of grief (and I certainly don’t mean to sound like I am minimizing that), it sure is nice to have a kindred spirit who understands too.