To sit with the pain

As I wrote in a previous post “The Nursery'“ I kept Maisie’s door open when we returned home from the hospital, empty handed. Turn towards the pain I thought. Because everything in our home - and every feeling in my body - was a blatant reminder that our baby didn’t come home with us.

Empty bassinet.

Unopened diapers.

Breastmilk coming in.

And no baby to rock, change, or feed.

The blatant fact that my baby died hits me over and over again. Every minute. Every day. Even in my dreams.

I couldn’t fight it. I couldn’t hide from it.

I now viscerally understand why some turn towards unhelpful vices to mask one’s emotional pain. To turn away from it. To avoid it. To numb it.

But the pain is always there.

So instead of fighting it, or hiding from it, I decided to stay. To sit with the pain.

I let it course through my veins. I let it come to the surface, to pour over and out.

I got to know my pain, intimately. My pain has a story. My pain is an expression of my grief.

And to know grief, is to know love.

My pain filled 99% of me. I had to meet it, process it and work through it so that I could make room for the love. Especially in the first few months, everything I did was to process the pain. Everything else was nonessential.

I find it helpful to process the pain through the mind, body, and soul — from therapy and support group, to acupuncture and message, to journaling and honoring my daughter through ceremony and rituals.

I also find it helpful when others can sit with me in my pain. Help share the burden. To see me, to witness me. To be there, with an open heart and ability to stay. Without fixing. Without comparing. Without the platitudes.

So I invite you to cry with me. Be mad at the world with me. Breathe with me. Listen to me. Mourn with me. Love Maisie with me.

My heart is still tender and always will be. The pain is still there, sometimes living just beneath the surface.

And when the pain rises and pours over, I kindly ask you to help me sit with the pain.

xo