you keep on walking

Natalie of Lunardreams is mother to Devin, her first child conceived through IVF who died after 35 weeks due to a rare case of amniotic bands constricting the umbilical cord. Natalie has become a passionate infertility and stillbirth awareness advocate, among other things, and joins the 'Are You There, God? It's Me, Medusa' blogolympics table as a lifelong Atheist.

Natalie has a love of all things facts and figures—computer programming, physics, astronomy and math. “I see beauty in the world around me in these numbers and random patterns,” she explains. “There may not be a purpose or a guiding hand, but there is still beauty.”

”I feel like I'm walking away from this tragic loss a wholly different person than I walked in,” she continues. “And yet, underneath it all, the foundation remains the same. I just have a different perspective now. Life seem a little more gritty, a little more real.”

I have always been an Atheist. I had some brief introductions to religion, but on the whole I was raised on science and facts.  That is how I lived my life.

So when my son died I had no spiritual anchor to latch on to. There were times when I contemplated a deity, a plan—times when I tried out these ideas that others told me would bring peace and enlightenment. I understood then why people cling to their religion. I know too well now that in times of great grief you hold onto any bit of sanity you have... any thought that makes you feel even a little bit better, you hold on for fear that you will lose your mind. I understand why. But they all seemed disingenuous to me, the lifelong Atheist... like I was trying on someone else’s clothes.

Instead, I enveloped myself in the data: information about stillbirth, amniotic band syndrome, loss. I calculated percentages and risks. I took comfort in the numbers, as if understanding the calculations brought me closer to understanding the situation, closer to coming to terms with this horrible, unspeakable thing.

Some days I feel like the grief that overwhelms me is unique to the Atheist.

My son is not in heaven, I will not see him again, he is not in a better place. He is simply gone, erased from our lives leaving behind small physical scars and gaping emotional ones. Frequently I felt overlooked when people came offering their condolences. I know they came from a kind place, a caring place, and I tried to take that for what it’s worth, but how do I react when someone says my son is in heaven? Or that god had a plan? I don’t believe in heaven or god. Instead of feeling comforted I would find myself fighting the urge to explain my religion. To say No, you don’t understand.

We were uncomfortable with the idea of a funeral or wake—uncomfortable beyond the fact that we didn't really know what was acceptable for a baby who had been born dead. Our families had never dealt with this before. There was no path for us to follow.

So we made our own.

We invited family to our house on his due date. I framed his photos, a poem, I set up a table with the little baby items that meant the most to me. I wanted people to understand him. Above all, I wanted them to know who he was. Then at 7 PM—the time of his birth that day he was born so quietly—we gathered outside in our yard to plant a tree. This was our service, this was our acknowledgement of the cycle of life.

I wept as the tree roots were covered with soil, wept for my son who would be buried in the ground soon enough.

::

One thing became very clear to me when Devin died: it’s the people left behind who suffer. I do not worry about Devin, his flickering conciousness extinguished before he really gained a sense of self. He lived and died whole, cradled in my womb.

It is me who is broken. It is me that I weep for, and my husband and our families.

We will never get to see our child smile. We will never get to hear his first words. But more than that, we will never know what kind of person he would have grown up to be. It is us left holding the empty bag of promises, us who carry around the questions that will never be answered.

Over the past seven months I’ve often asked myself what keeps me going. Why wake up in the morning when there really are no guarantees? Bad things happen to good people for no reason, when you least expect it. The loss of my son feels like a huge, gaping hole that will never close—and there is nothing, no one, that can close it. There have been many times when I thought about how it would be a relief to stop feeling anything. A relief to go to sleep and not wake up. Not to be with my son, but simply to stop the pain.

But every time I start thinking like that I realize that what seems like a choice really isn’t.

This is my life, my only one—this is all I get. I do not get to pick and choose what I get to experience. I know that one day I will experience joy again—not the same type of unfettered, naive joy that I did before, but joy nonetheless—and the only way to get there is through this hell. Just as I know that bad things can strike out of the blue, so too I know that it can’t always be all bad. The dice will come up both evens and odds—sometimes more evens, sometimes more odds.

::

I understand grief now. You must rant and cry and turn it over in your hands, throw it against the wall. You’re always stuck with it in your pocket, but after a while you start to become more familiar with it. You mould it like clay. You poke holes in it, stretch it out, roll it out flat. And then you keep on walking.

After all, no matter what our faith (or lack thereof), no matter what we believe is the why or how, that is all any of us really do.

Comments

[Heather]

Although I don't consider myself an atheist, so much of what you're written rings true for me.

The ceremony you had for Devin sounds beautiful.

There is comfort and despair in the fact that all we can do is keep walking. You're right- that's all we have. The world goes on no matter what.

Thank you so much for this beautiful post.

[kate]

I don't know what I am, exactly - not an atheist, but not too comfortable with conventional ideas and mythology around religion. I'd feel out of sorts if someone suggested Liam was in a place called 'heaven', or that his injuries and death were at the expense of some being's 'plan'. I feel like those are easy, pick-and-choose sentiments that allow the speaker to wash his or her hands, to feel like they've neatly said what they think they're supposed to say. It doesn't rub me the wrong way, necessarily - it just feels foreign, as you said - like clothes that don't fit. I simply wouldn't say it that way.

It's taken me a long time to give other people permission to say the wrong thing - sometimes terrible things. Religious or not, that's one thing about babyloss that seems universal, the world's sudden and widespread foot-in-mouth syndrome.

Anyway, digressions... a lovely and thoughtful post, Natalie. Thanks so much for sharing it with us, along with the beautiful necklace in tribute.

[Lisa]

To believe that this life on earth is it is very sad to me.

[Lori]

Thank you for sharing Devin with us, and yourself.

I relate very much to your statement that it is those of us who are left behind who suffer. Oddly, there came a point that realization brought me immense comfort. I would so much rather take the burden of suffering if it means sparing my babies that same kind of pain.

I love the photo.

[Cristin]

I loved this post. I'm not exactly an atheist, but I don't believe in the conventional god, am not a Christian... When my son was born critically ill and as he spent his first weeks in the ICU we were bombarded with people offering up prayers, clergyfolk stopping by his bedside offering to baptize him... It drove me crazy... It was hard not to lash out at these well meaning people...

[Kalisha]

I found your post through SITS and I'm very grateful that you wrote what you wrote (just at the right time). Your last comment on grief; how we begin to mold it and keep walking. You are so right. You never completely get over grieving especially for something that is so untangeable, but very very loved. Thank you for writing from the heart and touching mine. I wish you well and hope that your walk gets easier.
Kalisha

[Rach]

Thank you for your beautifully written post and for sharing your story with us all.

5 weeks ago our baby Alice was born at 20 weeks and died a short time after. I am not religious. I don't believe in God, or heaven or the power of prayer. My husband is a scientist and his parents are atheists and although I was sent to church as a child, I have not believed in God since I was a child.

When Alice first died I thought it would be easier if I did believe - easier to explain to our 2 1/2 year old where Alice has gone. But we didn't. We explained the facts the best we could and continue to talk about it.

Many kind people have sent us their prayers and I always thank them regardless of my beliefs. What I don’t enter into are discussions about it being ‘God’s will’ that Alice has died. I just hope that people respect my beliefs in the same was I respect theirs.

I wish you well.

[Erica]

So much of what you write here strikes home. I'm knocked off my feet on a regular basis by out-of-the-blue realizations of lost potential, that we will never hear and know his infectious little-boy laugh, never know the person he should have become. But you're right, we keep on walking.

Thank you so much for this beautiful post.

[Me]

Hey Nat,

I know you know I'm Atheist too. And I just want to say that I hear you LOUD AND CLEAR. LOUD AND CLEAR!

[Bon]

we had a very similar backyard ceremony for our son. and i did sometimes wish i were able to believe in something that might make me feel more connected to him, that might allow me to feel i'd see him again someday, but each time my mind danced over that possibility it came up barren and dry...so in a sense his death coalesced my lack of belief, assured me that this was indeed my core inclination.

there is something profound, for me, in that, though, and something beautiful...because all is heightened - memory included - by the sense that moments with others may be a one-off, a one0time privilege.

thanks for sharing Devin with us.

[Sally]

"Some days I feel like the grief that overwhelms me is unique to the Atheist."
This really hit home with me Natalie. I'm only 8 weeks out from my loss (first child too). Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts. I have also been back to read your blog and tribute to Devin. He is beautiful and you should be very proud.

[janis]

Yes, you just keep on walking. So right, Natalie.
Thank you, for sharing yourself, and Devin, and your journey.

[Layla]

I'm an atheist too. The only place Toby continues to exist in any way at all is in our memories. I sometimes think I'd like to be able to offer my daughter some comforting story about heaven & angels but they have no meaning to me & I can't lie to her.

[Martha]

Thank you for telling the story of your love for your son. I think this is how we keep those we lost with us, by sharing our stories, baring our scars.
I am not bound to any religious ideology, choose Buddhism to help keep me centered. I'm the daughter of an atheist engineer and a student of life being a nurse for 26 years. I believe in nothing and everything. I think that all energy is still with us, it has transformed and our meager senses and intellect have no way to perceive or process this except maybe through sentiment, memory, and intuition.

[luna]

what a gorgeous post, natalie.

[kate]

Martha, how beautifully put.

[Anna]

So proud of you, Natalie, for being such a beautiful, soft star for others to use as guidance. This has been the worst calendar year for both of us. And I as a fellow babylost mama, I am just glad that I have someone I respect and admire so much walking the walk alongside me. It might be a little comfort, but it's comfort nontheless.

[Lyrehca]

Beautiful post.

[Dr Joanne]

Thank you so much for this.

[Sophie]

Thankyou for your post. I have found all these posts on religion (or lack of) to be very interesting. Each time I read a new slant on beliefs it makes me question everything again. This is no different. I like what someone commented here said. I believe in nothing and everything all at once.

I like Devon's necklace. I might have to get me one of those.

[Lori]

Not a babylost mama. Mama to a very premature son. 27w 6d and only 1.5 lbs due to severe IUGR. Delivery necessitated by HELLP syndrome.

He spent 15 weeks in the NICU. The first 7 on the vent. I had *scores* of people tell me they were praying for us. Yet I couldn't muster a prayer. Hope...yes. I don't know what I would call myself. Sometimes atheist...sometimes agnostic.

Gratefully we brought our son home and he is now 3 and doing very well.

But I have to say the thing that bothers me the most to this day is having him called a "miracle." It seems like an odd thing to have bother somebody but it does really bother me. It seems to dismiss all that his doctors and nurses did...all that my husband ad I went through.

But mostly it feels incongruent. What of the other mothers I have met who lost their babies under similar circumstances? Why was my son chosen to be "saved" and not their children?

It is not that I am not immensely grateful. I just don't think "miracle" is a word that feels right to me. It implies some kind of divine assistance. And I just can't reconcile some babies making it and others not.

Sorry for the incoherence. :-)

[kate]

Not incoherent at all, Lori - I had twins at the same gestation as your son, one of whom died after six weeks. The other, although he was smaller (2 pounds even), is a normal, thriving little boy - so everyone calls him my miracle.

Which begs the question, just as you point out: what, then, was Liam, his twin who died? Technically, medically, Liam was just as miraculous if not more so, given his injuries.

So yeah, I hear you. 'Miracle' is perhaps the word of religious origin that makes me squirm the most of all. 'Pray' I can also read as hope, energy, vibration, love. 'Miracle' can only point to God as an interventionist - or rather, as a being who chooses if and when to intervene.

[Michelle]

I just loved this post. I too am an atheist and feel as though there is something wrong with me when I don't feel comfort by religious cliché-type sentiments. It's very hard at times to try to breathe under the weight of the grief and recover from the shock of the slap of religious platitudes. I personally feel it would do my 'experience' some injustice by resigning it all up to some overlooking-righteous-yet loving and good-bestower of life (for you, but not YOU)and death (oops gotta take YOU back because of my super complex and secret plan)person/entity. I do not feel sad to not believe in such a story. I am healing by letting my wound feel the wind and sun, not by covering it with pretty bandages.

[Mother Henna aka Kara]

Wanted to very much thank you for all you shared with us here. When I posted my blogolympics entry, a good friend sat down with her 10 year old daughter to read it. They kept scrolling down after mine and read yours. Her daughter had just experienced her first very real grief, a loss that seemed to cut her to the bone. She was struggling to make sense of everything. My friend, too, was struggling to find ways to explore without imposing -- to let her daughter come to terms in her own way. They were both profoundly moved by your post. Just wanted you to know that.
Thank you!
k-

[anonymous]

Thank you. My brother died recently and people told me, "he's in a better place now" or "he's at peace." I know they were trying to comfort me, but I don't believe in God and I don't know where my brother is right now. I don't know what people can say to comfort me. I'm glad I'm not alone.

[Frustrated Fairy]

Thank you so much for posting this! I've found it hard being non religious, I've felt almost jealous of those who could at least be comforted by their faith, and angry at those who try to comfort me with religious words. It's just nice to feel that I'm not alone xxx