Anxiety after child loss is a very real thing. The thing we have or have not worried about has come to be a reality, so we wonder what else is a possibility? What else can happen to us? When is the next big thing going to happen?

I believe it’s so important to notice that grief has a purpose. The grief is there is so you can mourn the loss of your child. This is so important, because you have experienced something so difficult. Your pain is there because you loved your child so deeply.

In 8 years, things can change a lot. I know I normally write about grief, but since I’m married, and we are both grieving, our grief, and our marriage are tied together. There are many lessons to be learned in marriage, and I think back to the day we got married, as a young 18 and 19 year old. We were ready to face married life with all the love and hope for our future that such young people have. I wouldn’t change it for the world, but we have grown a lot together, and changed a lot together. As time has gone on, I’ve realized how the years, joys and sorrows, bring a deeper more mature love into our relationship, rather than such a new exciting and crazy love.

After you lose your child, so many new and crazy emotions that are so foreign come up. For me, I started to feel crazy and lost. I thought I was the only one who felt like this, and I needed to figure out what to do. As I went to therapy, and I started talking with other mothers who have also lost a child, I learned what I was feeling was normal with grief, and most everyone feels these emotions on some level.

It doesn’t really matter if you talk a lot or you don’t like to share with others as much. Writing is a way everyone can get their thoughts out of their head and on to paper. It’s always interesting to go back to your writings and see how far you have come. I think sometimes we don’t realize how far we have come until we go back and see. Those emotions and pain are so real, and it can be helpful to know that all the work you have done is not for nothing. That you have taken steps to learn to live with your grief.

Birthdays are supposed to be a joyous occasion, a happy one. But now, we are “celebrating” a birthday of someone who no longer gets to turn a year older. It can be a very difficult time, and we all wonder what we should that day. What feels right for you? What will bring some peace that day? How can we get through it?

Rainbow babies can be healing and bring a lot of joy into your life. But having a rainbow does not take away the pain and loss you feel from your other child. I believe you have enough room in your heart for both. Your heart only grows bigger, it doesn’t push the child you have lost out.

Self-care can be seen as selfish and not motherly. But I believe that in order to be the best mothers we can be, we need to take time for ourselves to recharge in whatever way that looks for us. As grieving moms, we need to especially take time to take care of ourselves, as our tanks are already always near empty.