Coping at Christmastime
In our last blog post, four incredible women who shoulder the grief of involuntary childlessness share with us some of their ways of dealing with Christmastime - a time that, for women who grieve their unborn and born-sleeping babies, is often fraught with emotional challenge.
PLICA is thrilled to share a post from the extraordinary Jody Day, Founder of Gateway Women and PLICA Ambassador. For most of you reading this, you are well familiar with Jody's incredible work in this space with her global community of sisterhood and support. In the following excerpt, Jody's words go straight to the heart of the anguish and agony of the path for those of us who are struggling with what this time of year can bring.
In Jody's Words
I see you sitting at home muting the rolling TV ads of ridiculously happy, rumbunctious, multi-generational families hilariously solving some Christmas dilemma in under 2 minutes. And yet somehow no one shouts at anyone else and the scene where someone makes painful assumptions about your life because you don’t have kids is missing. And no one asks you if you’d mind sleeping in a tent this year…
I see you scrolling through Facebook – like seductively picking an emotional scab – and gasping as your last sister-in-childlessness scanbushes you (and the whole social media universe) with a surprise sonogram. A real miracle baby Jesus for Christmas. Just great. I see how your hot tears are part rage that, after all you’ve been through together, it didn’t occur to her to let you know privately and, partly the anticipatory grief because, whatever promises she makes about how this ‘won’t change anything’ between you, it will. It always does. And so now, on top of everything else, you no longer have that one friend in your life who understands what it’s like to be ‘the childless one’.
I see you walking aimlessly around your home alone in the middle of the evening, too early to go to bed, looking for something although you’re not quite sure what it is, but maybe if you open and look inside the fridge one more time you’ll find the answer? No TV program is safe, no social media platform is trigger-free. It’s just babies, families, couples, grandparents, grandchildren everywhere. Even the news is all about ‘hard-working families’ and ‘families unable to get together this Christmas’. But for those of us who’ve been home alone all year? Nada.
I see you carefully and thoughtfully choosing, wrapping and mailing presents to other people’s kids even though you know that, in all likelihood, you’ll be lucky to get a Christmas card from them. And that you can whistle dixie for a thank you letter or even a text acknowledgement of your generosity. Does it make you a terrible person that you just want your love and care acknowledged, just this once? Do the kids even know who you are anymore, or what you once meant to their parents? Are you a fool to think that they give a shit about you anymore?
To read the post in full, head over to:
Gateway Women Blog
Join the Community and keep up-to-date with news and events!