Sunday, May 6, 2007

Tip of the day

Dear friends,

You know we love you and your kids. And most of the time, we are even happy to come to your kid's birthday party. Just one little thing, really. Could you please remember not to encourage random other friends of yours who we don't know and who come to the party with their infants to sit down on the bench next to us so you can take a picture? Especially if said infants were so obviously born within weeks of A's due date? Pretty please? 'Cause I could've sworn there was plenty of air to breathe in that room just a second before.

Signed,

Wiped Out

10 comments:

Sara said...

Wow. I don't understand how people can be so thoughtless. I really don't. This brought tears to my eyes. I guess I'm lucky in a way that we know so few people with any children yet....

Aurelia said...

Oh that's so awful. I'm so sorry that you had to go through that.

Aghhhh

S. said...

It took courage to go to the birthday party--I'm sorry your friends didn't keep your grief in mind.

Lori said...

It's remarkable how quickly people can assume we are "over it" or can handle any situation. Or, I am not even sure they stop to realize why that particular scenario would be painful. They seem to think that our lives and feelings are really that separate. That because that isn't my baby, I shouldn't be bothered by seeing that baby. It's so hard to explain these things to people who just don't "get it!"

Anonymous said...

Oh. Dear.

I have this whole theory about grief and the amount of time a person feels completely and utterly raw compared to the amount of time a person's well-meaning friends THINK that rawness lasts. Needless to say, the two are not related as closely as one would like.

I am, as always, thinking of you and sorry for your suffering.

S said...

Oof.

That's fairly insensitive!

I wish being intuitive were not such a rare commodity.

S said...

Oof.

That's fairly insensitive!

I wish being intuitive were not such a rare commodity.

Julia said...

Thank you, all.

I know she didn't mean to send me into tailspin. As a friend who saw me looking rather flattened later on said, people relaxed. They don't necessarily see the same cues. I know she was just happily taking pictures, and then this other friend walked in, and she automatically told her to sit down. Which, unluckily, happened to be next to me. But man-- that hurt.
I don't expect people to always watch out. But yesterday that was just too much.

niobe said...

Sorry that this happened to you.

Somehow people have this disconnect going on where they somehow know that you've lost a baby, but they don't know.

One of my pregnant friends told me the other day that she's so glad that she's reached 20 weeks because she doesn't have to worry about the baby any more. It's as if she couldn't remember who she was talking to.

meg said...

Hi Julia,

Thanks for visiting my blog! I'm catching up on your story here. I'm so sorry for your loss. I'll keep checking back and seeing how things are going.

I love your post thanking your nurses too. We're pretty lucky to have them, when we're going through something like this. They have seen it all before, and we benefit so much from that knowledge.

Often, it's the unspoken moments that mean the most. But mostly, I remember a deep kindness...and sense of respect for my babies. And that meant the world to me.