Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Virtual Book Tour (A Gift of Time) Responses to Several Other Contributors' Questions

What reaction did you expect the book would cause you?  Is that the reaction that you experienced while reading it?

I found myself understanding the shared insights, perspectives and experiences of many parents.  In reading A Gift of Time, I felt much gratification, and even pride, in knowing that now a comprehensive guide was available to help parents in navigating the daunting decisions one faces when they know the life of their unborn child will be so brief. 

Which topics/sections of the book were most helpful to you or do you think would have been had the book existed during your pregnancy with the child you lost and why?

Every section offers relevant guidnace for the situation I experienced, but I know I would have highly appreciated the "Getting Ready:  Preparing for Your Baby's Birth, Life and Death" chapter because when facing our anticipated loss, I anguished over the decisions to be made (and lack of direction for circumstances for my expected loss).  I also think that the chapter "Welcoming Baby:  Birth Experiences and Meeting Your Baby" and the closing "Reflections" chapter would have provided much hope and comfort given the high anxiety I experienced. 

What emotions did reading the diagnosis section(s) bring out in you?  Did these surprise you?

I was saddened--even shocked--by some of the strong, demeaning actions/words of physicians who didn't understand/respect a family's decision to continue a pregnancy.  We had a negative, disheartening experience with a perinatologist verbalizing his disapproval of our decision to let nature take its course and not end the pregancy immediately.  Reading similar--or even worse--experiences shared by others in the book also made me feel an even greater, heartfelt appreciation for the tremendous support and validation we received from our OB and a neonatologist.  Thankfully we had these physicians for quality medical care and a more complete/wholistic understanding of the matters of life, love and loss.

One participant in this book tour, who also contributed to A Gift of Time, has the ministry for griveing families and one of their outreaches is to provide memory-making materials to parents and hospitals facing the loss of a baby.  What items do you feel are essential to families?  How can they provide the best support?

These are some of the beautiful gifts we received in memory of our daughter, which were beautiful gestures in memory of our daughter:

- Our deceased baby was our only daughter, so I especially appreciated the gifts we received that were gender-specific; it's more personalized for this child I will only know in a time limited to moments instead of years.  One acquaintance who had also experienced an anticipated infant loss and was a volunteer for our perinatal hospice brought a cute toy bunny dressed in soft pink--a gift that would've been a precious, sentimental gift for a baby girl.  I appreciated having a cute baby girl gift!  Another friend also gave us a beautiful baby girl bracelet with a prayer box charm.  This was an especially touching token of acknowledging the loss of our unique child, our little girl. 

- To witness the loss our two sons experienced was probably the most painful--and anger-provoking--aspect of losing our daughter.   A church from another state, not affiliated with our denomination, had a beautiful ministry which sent teddy bears to families who lost children.  The day after Gianna was born and died shortly after birth, three large packages were delivered to our home, each including a cuddly teddy bear--one for each of our children.  Each bear had an attached tag reading "I have lived among the people of the First United Methodist Church of Evergreen Park.  With them, I have heard God's Word read, prayers offered, hymns sung and sermons preached.  I have been given love and I have loved others.  Now, I come to you with blessings of worship and love from my dear friends."  This was a beautiful ministry outreach; my boys still have their bears close to their beds, and we keep Gianna's bed with some of her items on permanent display in our house. 

- Scrapbooking and journaling materials would be excellent.  Creating memory books for each son in memory of their little sis, as well as a huge collective scrapbook and photo albums in memory of Gianna for our family was very therapeutic for me. 

- The infant-loss specified baby books are really special too.  I'm glad I knew about this before we delivered Gianna, so we had it at the hospital with us when we delivered.  It has her foot and handprints, just like a regular baby book would have--as well as holds a lock of her dark brown hair. 

- Sweet, small baby quilts would be a nice remembrance.  We had a keepsake nightgown and blanket packed for the hospital which are now in keepsake memory boxes.  Blankets, clothing and/or shadow boxes would be appreciated gifts for retaining memories.

- I regret not having any casts of our daughter's face, hands or feet.  In hindsight I wish I had this done.  Our perinatal hospice suggested that we take the casting materials with us, but I didn't.  I thought it sounded difficult and felt overwhelmed by the prospect.  Later, though, I've learned that it's simple and the casts are so precious.  Had someone at the hospital offer this to us once we had Gianna, I would have appreciated the opportunity to preserve her sweet little body with casting.

- Books 'normalizing' infant loss for children were also fantastic and might be a good idea for sharing with others.  I bought the book We Were Going to have a Baby, but We Have an Angel Instead for my sons because I loved the way that the hard realities of infant loss are reflected in a simple way for children to understand.

After your loss, what kind of support was most helpful to you?
We were so fortunate to have amazing support from so many in our community and from our perinatal hospital's services for bereaved families.  I attended an infant-loss support group sponsored by a local hospital twice a month, too, and that was very helpful.  I read the monthly publications from M.E.N.D. (Mommies Enduring Neonatal Death/http://www.mend.org/) and found those articles to be very helpful too.

Talking to friends and our perinatal hospice director and volunteer who had also experienced a pregnancy or infant loss was very helpful for me processing grief, too.   (Some of these individuals were friendly acquaintances--or even strangers-- prior to the diagnosis of our daughter, but upon learning of the diagnosis of our daughter quickly transformed into shining anchors and extraordinary friends who will have a special place in our hearts forevermore.)

During pregnancy the books Waiting with Gabriel by Amy Kuebelbeck and Letters to Gabriel by Karen Garver Santorum were beacons of hope for me, given my anticipated loss and anticipatory grief. 

After Gianna was born and died, several books were great for helping me process my post-loss grief:
Empty Arms:  Coping with Miscarriage, Stillbirth and Infant Death by Sherokee Ilse
An Empty Cradle, A Full Heart by Christine O'Keeffe Lafser
Mommy, Please Don't Cry:  There Are No Tears in Heaven by Linda DeYmaz
I'll Hold You in Heaven by Jack Hayford

Lastly, two years after Gianna's birth, we learned about Faith's Lodge and were encouraged to apply for a retreat with other families.  Staying there and having some quiet time to reflect on our experience, after our lives had resumed the new normal, was a wonderful experience.  Visit http://www.faithslodge.org/ for more information.

To continue to the next leg of this virtual book tour, please visit the main list href=http://chicagobensons.blogspot.com/

6 comments:

  1. I'm in the midst of reviewing another blog, developed by Kelly G., and learning about her family's amazing outreach minstry for parents facing pregnancy and infancy loss. The suggestions I tossed out in my response to one of the questions for helping families have memory-making keepsakes of their littles ones are already in full play with the Sufficient Grace ministry. Visit http://sufficientgrace-dreamsofyou.blogspot.com/ Excellent work, Kelly! "That in all things, God may be glorified."

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  2. Thank you so much for contributing your story to A Gift of Time and for participating in this book tour Jen!

    I have enjoyed getting to know you and John a bit better lately through Facebook and was excited to see which questions you chose and read your answers today.

    I also felt a connection to the other contributors to A Gift of Time while reading it. Though I have met many parents of children that were born still or died soon after they were delivered, I actually know very few “in real life” who received a prenatal diagnosis that their baby was expected not to live long before or after their birth, as we did. So it was a new and unique feeling for me to be able to read excerpts from so many stories of mothers and fathers who, as you said, had “shared insights, perspectives and experiences” that I could understand and relate to.

    I was also very surprised and saddened to read in A Gift of Time about how many doctors had encouraged contributors to terminate their pregnancies. Though our doctors did offer that to us as one of many options for dealing with our diagnosis and prognosis, we never seriously considered it and they never pressured us or suggested it again after we made it clear that we didn’t really even consider that “an option” because of our faith and beliefs.

    I appreciate the significance of the gender specific gifts that you received and how much they mean to you as you remember your daughter Gianna. At the time our baby girl was born and died, she was our only daughter and I did not know if we would ever be able to have another child, let alone another girl. So I was very much into all things pink during the time surrounding Molly’s birth and right after she was born and died. I would buy and wear pink clothes, planted all pink flowers in our garden that year and found a lot of comfort in decorating her grave site with girly looking things in honor and memory of our little princess.

    I have more to say, but apparently Blogger has a limit of 4,096 characters per comment... So I will finish in a subsequent comment! ;)

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  3. Okay, I am back! :)

    I also can relate to the pain and anger you felt having to watch your sons lose their baby sister. Our son Sean was 4 ½ at the time and had wanted to have a brother or sister for so long. Sean was so excited about “the baby” and it was very hard for us to see that dream literally die. However, I do feel that the experience our son had with his first sibling/baby sister Molly has made him a more compassionate child and hopefully that will carry over into his personality in adulthood.

    That teddy bear ministry sounds wonderful. That is so nice that your sons still display and cuddle with their bears that honor the life and memory of their sister Gianna. We actually went to Babies R Us prior to Molly’s birth and death Sean picked out coordinating teddy bears (one was pink and one was blue). Sean brought the pink bear the day Molly was born and died and “gave” it to her (even though she had already passed away by the time he got to see and hold his baby sister). Molly was buried with the pink one and Sean still has the blue one. Sometime later I was at Babies R Us and they had some of the pink bears on clearance, so I bought all of them! At that time I wanted anything that could help me to feel a connection to our baby girl.

    We also have a infant-loss specific baby book and I am grateful that one of our family members was thoughtful enough to find one and give it to us. It means a lot to me now (and did then) to have baby books for all of our children (both living and in Heaven).

    Our son Sean received multiple copies of We Were Gonna Have a Baby But We Had an Angel Instead from family and friends. He read it for the first time the day Molly was born and died with his Daddy before bedtime. We read it often in the days and months to follow. He still picks it up every now and then and we all recall how helpful it was to him after his baby sister’s birth and death. I am glad that your sons and your family have found reading it to be therapeutic too.

    I am glad that you had so many resources for support as you grieved and healed after Gianna’s death. I also found hope and healing from being involved in perinatal bereavement support group and found reading some of those same books to be therapeutic.

    Thank you again Jen for participating in the A Gift of Time book tour and for sharing part of your story as a contributor to A Gift of Time! I really enjoyed your thoughtful and heartfelt answers to the questions you chose to discuss and I look forward to meeting and spending time with your family this fall at Faith’s Lodge! :)

    Take care and God bless, Kathy

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  4. Hi Jennifer,

    I appreciated reading your answers and learning more about you. Thank you for your beautiful, encouraging comments on my blog as well.

    I remember being touched by your words as Gianna's mom while reading A Gift of Time. I feel such a bond with all of you after reading the book, and I hope to be able to attend the gathering at Faith's Lodge...although I'm not sure yet if it will work out for our family. October is in the thick of golf season and our oldest son will be a senior next year. He is a very serious golfer. But, I'm still hoping to try to go. It sounds like such a wonderful place.

    Thank you for taking time to answer the question about things that were offered to you that you found comforting. I am the one with the ministry who asked that question. We offer Comfort Bears to our families, and I loved what you shared about the bears offered to your family. It has been interesting to me how much the bears mean to the families we serve...the mamas and especially the siblings. When we originally created the bears (my mom was the creator), we were thinking of filling a mother's empty arms. But, we have heard from many families that the older siblings have found great comfort in their grief from the bears. One big brother even calls his bear his Cuddle Brother and carries him everywhere. He has worked out much of his grief through interacting with the bear. Others include the bears in their family pictures in memory of their babies in heaven.

    I also am grateful for baby books that focus specifically on baby loss. There were none when our family walked this path, and there still are not many. But, our ministry did create one (the Dreams of You Book), and there are a few others now, too.

    We include other things for families. One suggestion we don't currently include are casting kits to make molds of hands and footprints. But, that would be a great addition.

    I love the books I'll Hold you in Heaven and Mommy Please Don't Cry also. Those books are included in some of our baskets. Great resources.

    A Gift of Time is such a wonderful resource...and I'm glad we were all able to be part of it.

    Blessings to you...

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  5. Jennifer...I just read your first comment...after I commented! How sweet of you to mention Sufficient Grace. And, thanks so much for taking the time to read about our ministry. We do offer many of the things you suggested. Thanks so much for helping us spread the word, so that we can reach out to more families. I'm so glad you liked what we are doing!

    Thank you again for your kind words.

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  6. Dear Jennifer, thank you for participating in this tour! I remember being struck by what you wrote about people coming forward very soon after your diagnosis to offer support and to tell you about perinatal hospice. It's a beautiful image of being held up by others in time of need. By sharing your story for this book, you are continuing that thread of goodness for others who need it. Many thanks to you and John for sharing Gianna Marie with us. You are her parents always. Amy

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