How Come No One Understands Me?

The post title is a question I have heard from other grieving mothers, as well as, "What is wrong with people?" or "Just let me be, I will get over this on my own!". I have been this mother.

I have had something spark inside me over the past few days & noticed that as a parent of a baby angel people are not always out to get me or not understanding. Their thinking is just not the same as mine & maybe the words they choose to share are really not about coming off as an attack or to say, "Get over it already". Maybe they just really do not know what to say or since they do not understand, they think they are just trying to be consoling.

I have felt at times that people are telling me that they do not want to be a part of my grieving or remembering & that they think I should just get help or move on. I know that is probably not at all what they were saying.

Also, there may be times when someone has tried to be there & their actions were taken the wrong way & then feelings were hurt. As a grieving parent sometimes we may have to let someone else grieve with us or even for us. I have had instances of both acts of kindness taken as selfish acts & selfish acts taken as selfish acts:

After giving birth & having to do an emergency procedure to stop the bleeding, I got moved to a private room of the labor & delivery ward. Some of my husband's biological family from his father's side showed up, these are people whom we never speak to. We had been to a dance they attended at least eleven years prior & they attended our wedding seven years before, but my husband had not had a relationship with these people since he was a small child. I took this as a sign of selfishness. I mean, did they expect to see a show or something? How can you show up at a traumatic moment after no communication what so ever? Later we found out that my mother-in-law had called them, but my feelings were hurt. This particular incident has been forgiven. I know these women were only there to comfort & show support.

Then my mom & JD had each left to go take showers & eat some relatives showed up to see me. I had barely woke up myself. My mother-in-law was showing them the beautiful box the hospital donated with photos of Nehemiah, which I had not seen yet, a blanket, a card signed by all the nurses & some cards with his hand prints on them. All of a sudden the woman starts crying, LITERALLY, about how she may never get to have kids of her own & she will be stuck with her stepson as her only child. I just played like I was asleep, praying for either my mom or JD to show up & get them out of my room. I was so heartbroken! This particular incident, I have not gotten over.

Then there is the one who thinks they have to be "The Rock". Well honey let me tell you, you are not anyone's rock until you have cried with them. There was a time when I thought my husband was not human, when he did not cry or talk about his feelings. He would always just sit & console me. Well that just made me feel like I was getting on his nerves or I was going to bring him down. When he finally cried for me & let me console him, that was when I realized we were a rock for each other.