Standing at the Edge of the Sea

I wish I could tell you

I wish I could convey what it’s like to lose a child. I know some of you know. I do. Child loss comes in all shapes and sizes, and forms. Some children die before they’re fully formed, while others die after decades of walking the earth.

My daughter breathed this side of heaven a mere five years —one thousand eight hundred and seventy-two days; Forty-four thousand nine hundred and twenty-eight minutes; One million seven hundred and ninety-seven thousand one hundred and twenty breaths, give or take a few as her breath slowed during sleep and raced with fun as she giggled and played.

I know some of you are thinking . . . okay, enough. I get it. Keep moving with the story.

But for others who understand? They know the gift of every.single.breath. Of watching the rise and fall of their precious child’s chest, because breathing means life, and we know what our child looks like once life leaves their body. We know what it feels like to bend over and stare at the body that once held hopes and dreams and love, oh, the love . . . begging God to breathe life back into the bones that formed our child’s body.

I’m learning it doesn’t matter if the breaths ceased in the womb or after fifty years; the ache in our heart is the same frustration as air fills our lungs while our child lays still.

Their names

I wish I could tell you about tears that reach so deep they don’t fall for days. They stir in the gut, mixing with fear and sadness and emotions we can’t even name . . . tumbling and rising with each exhale until finally, one day, they leak from our eyes. Sometimes you see them, sometimes you don’t. Sometimes it happens when we gaze at a favorite toy or catch a wisp of their scent. Sometimes it happens when our child’s name is spoken. 

Emma. 

Timmy.

Joyce.

Ben.

Russell.

Taylor.

Paige.

So many names. Too many more.

Names our hearts whisper each moment of our day but don’t often escape our lips. Names that bring love and tenderness and longing this side of heaven can’t meet.

I wish I could tell you about the rebuilding that happens after a child dies. The struggle to get up, to try, to breathe, and then to do it all again the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that, and . . . I think you see.

I wonder if that’s why some people talk about never recovering after a child dies —the idea of living in the shadow of death day after day, that kind of living isn’t natural.

Is it?

I’d say I’m asking for a friend, but I’m really asking you. You are my friend, and I wish I could help you understand what your thoughts and love mean to us, those who have watched their child’s body lowered into the ground.

Can we talk?

Can we talk about that? Yes, it’s uncomfortable. No, it’s not natural. Those words —your child’s body, stab at our hearts. Into the ground . . . when all we want to do is pluck them from the darkness.

We think about these things; can we talk about them, too? Can we trust you to respect the wound we carry? Not to fix it. I wish I could tell you that. You can’t fix our wound; please don’t try. But you can tend to it by listening. You can tend our wound by crying alongside us.

Your tears honor us. Your tears honor our child.

I wish I could tell you about the battle that rages when our faith is rocked after our child died. With fists raised to heaven, we scream at the Creator for help, to make sense of this gaping wound that oozes love and sorrow. 

We try to read the Bible; we do. Lean in a little closer to see the tear-soaked pages. We search for hope like a wanderer in the desert in desperate need of an oasis. Some of us find it sooner than others. Some still search.

At the edge

Until one day, we all arrive at the edge of the sea. The pain and silence of grief barrels down on us like the Egyptians pursued the Israelites. We stand at the edge of the sea, hoping, longing for rescue from the journey.

We’re weary.

We’re worn.

We desperately need a miracle.

Some of us stand at the edge of the sea and stare. All we see are the waves of uncertainty, the swirling doubt, the crash that threatens to crush us. We peer back at the past, where our child lived and breathed, and like the Israelites longing for Egypt, we wonder if the past is safer than what stretches before us.

I wish I could tell you the anxiety that grips our mama and daddy hearts, knowing that moving forward means leaving our child behind. Yes, we know our child died. Yes, we have memories, but we don’t have her; we don’t have him, which isn’t normal. So when we linger in the past, sometimes it feels like our child is visiting a friend and will come home to us again soon instead of being buried six feet underground.

I wish I could tell you what that’s like —the duality of reality and longing and how it lives inside of us as we stand at the edge of the sea. We wonder and wait and worry. What will life look like if we leave the edge and step into the sea? Will someone come alongside, grasp our hand, and lend their strength? Will we forget?

Will we survive this journey?

I wish I could tell you the weightiness of that —the surviving. Because on some days, surviving is all we can do —feet on the ground, longing for . . . something.

The healing

But we stand. And as we stand, we take in the world around us. We see others standing nearby. And while we wish we could reach out to grasp a hand, our strength is just enough to stand.

We see others go ahead of us there at the edge of the sea. We watch as one tentative step leads to another as they move away from the edge and step into the sea itself. Miraculously, just as it parted for the Israelites that day so many years ago, the waters recede, and the ground no longer grasps at their feet. One step follows another, and we think maybe, just maybe we, too, might leave the edge of the sea one day.

This is healing —this waiting and wondering and watching. I wish I could tell you that it isn’t time that heals nor being told what to do. Healing comes as we embrace and welcome the sorrow, giving space for the silence and room for the tears to fall. 

I wish I could tell you, too, that strength doesn’t look like your idea of strength as we heal. Our strength might look like weakness to you —this waiting and being stuck in the mire created by the gallons of tears we shed as we miss our child who died.

Healing isn’t weakness when we can’t keep up with you —it’s embracing life with its hills and valleys, with arms stretched wide as we breathe in that salty air of sorrow as we stand there at the edge of the sea and cry.

But then, one day, life shifts again. I wish I could tell you how we know. But we do because one day, we’re standing at the edge of the sea, content in the stillness when a desire bubbles up —a willingness to try. A desire to live, not merely survive.

Hope

We look out across the sea and see the sun shining instead of storm clouds forming. We know the battle of grief isn’t over, but the future doesn’t hold as much fear. We watched others step out as we hear the echoes of joy and laughter bounce about the waves. Instead of sorrow, we feel a stirring of what may be possible.

Maybe what lies ahead isn’t as threatening as what barrels at us from behind.

Maybe we’ll lose again; perhaps we won’t.

Maybe there’s joy on the other side, maybe there’s more.

That stirring becomes movement as we take one.small.step. And then another. You may see the smallness in our step, but we rejoice in our action; we didn’t collapse. 

So, we try again —another step.

And then again.

Until water laps at our feet and the chill tickles our toes, and we realize we’ve stepped away from the edge.

I wish I could tell you the torrent of fear and adventure that rages within as healing continues. We know what we leave as we move into the sea. The going holds a tender goodbye. With water reaching our ankles, we wonder if we’re safer back on the edge. Do we turn back to the familiar where our imprint still marks the ground? Or do we press on, hoping beyond hope that hope one day will win?

The water reaches our knees as doubt creeps further. This is where some retreat to the safety offered at the edge of the sea. They’re not wrong; they’re simply not ready. And that’s okay.

I wish I could help you see that it really is okay if they stay a little longer. Someone watches over them. Someone whispers words of hope; words simply haven’t heard yet.

The in-between

But for others like me? We plod forward until that moment we feel the sea shift. Instead of rising, the water starts to recede. And as it does, a pathway is unveiled. Perhaps the path was there all along, pressed down by those who endured this journey before us. The muck no longer sucks at our feet as the water-slogged ground dries. Each step pushes the water back as the urge to run builds so we can quickly move through this precarious place of in-between.

We’re not where we were, but we’re not yet where we could be. I wish I could tell you that we know that.

Some sprint ahead only to trip over unseen rocks and divots. Unintended wounds lash us as we rush and ignore where we step. 

But it’s here in this place of in-between that we begin to notice. We begin to notice those rocks and divots. We also notice fellow sojourners wounded and scarred. Some look like child loss, some look like other loss. We can see that now.

We begin to talk. We talk about our child who died and listen to others say their child’s name. Or their sibling. Or spouse, or parent, or friend.

We plod ahead in the safety of this space. Walls of water stand high on either side, giving direction and protection as we go. Looking back, we can’t quite see that edge of the sea, neither can we see the one ahead.

But we’re okay. We are. We can think and move without the sting of death snatching our breath. I wish I could tell you the joy that brings, to breathe deep. It’s little and big all at the same time.

The mystery

As we continue, we learn we didn’t cause the sea to shift. Our steps didn’t push back the waters. Someone else who has watched us, who has cared for us, who rescued us. His work was not ours, yet the waters didn’t move until we took a step.

I wish I could explain how that works, but my child’s death taught me to embrace the mystery. The mystery of hope found through darkness. The mystery of purpose birthed through pain. The mystery of life planted through death.

And suddenly, though the journey is long, we arrive at the other side of the sea. We move to its edge and stand for a moment gazing back across the expanse. 

Did we really come that far? 

There were moments in the middle when we were tempted to forget. Not our child; we will never forget our child. But we were tempted to forget the pain as our gaping wound once oozed. We want life to be normal, but what does normal actually mean?

Instead, we stand at this edge of the sea with the sun warm on our skin and realize the miracle we walk through. Life itself is a miracle, and so is each moment of healing.

I wish I could tell you that I won’t talk about those moments anymore —the standing on the other side of the sea nor the sea itself.

I wish I could tell you that I will move on and not speak of the darkest days in my life, but I can’t.

Like the Israelites who celebrate their rescue at the edge of their sea, I will remind myself of mine — of the grace and goodness I experienced so when new darkness falls, because it will, hope still lives, and the waters did part.

I will speak because there are still others there, standing at the edge of the sea.