• • •
Sage began to detail the ways in which she honored her daughter, who was stillborn. My body heated up with envy. As the rain pounded the pavement outside, we sat across from each other in my hazily lit office, talking about death.
Sage had ceramic footprint moldings, hair clippings, and a headstone. She had a place to visit her baby and a ceremony to honor her short existence. She’d gotten several photographs with her daughter. Her family had the chance to hold her. They got handprints too. She’d go to the cemetery almost weekly, bringing flowers and books to read aloud. One day she brought a chocolate cupcake with sprinkles and sparklers. These rituals felt like the most compelling ways she could think of to mother her daughter, she told me.
My body gave me all sorts of information—most notably in my chest, ever so slightly affecting the cadence of my breath—as I intently listened while she spoke about the version of motherhood she traverses. As I drove home in the rain that evening, I worked to understand what my body was attempting to communicate to me about the feelings that were elicited in that particular session. My mind fiddled as the windshield wipers sloshed to and fro. I was determined to figure this out, but ultimately couldn’t. Stumped, I slept on it. I’d felt that pang of envy in session, but wanted to understand its meaning, its roots, the nuance. Why, of all feelings, was this the one that landed in my lap while face-to-face with Sage?
It wasn’t until the following week, when Sage and I sat together once again, that it finally coalesced. She had access to so many rites and rituals—so many thoughtful, loving ways to honor her daughter’s brief life and the impact she’d made during it. Sage had access to a framework that outwardly legitimized her experience with life and death. She had her faith, her religious community huddled in close, a plot of land that she’ll visit until the end of time. She’d had friends and family surrounding her as her daughter was buried there. Flowers, and prayers, and tangible things. Things to have, and to hold, and to see, and to treasure, to prove that her daughter in fact made her way into this world, even if only without breath. It wasn’t until now that it dawned on me: I needed something more of Olive. For myself, for our family, and for her. Something more to normalize loss and its riotous aftermath. Listening to Sage ignited an untapped desire in me to create, to instate, and to demonstrate out loud that which was brewing inside. To represent in a meaningful way—through rites or rituals—the profundity of these liminal spaces.
The following week, I shared these reflections with Sage and had the chance to express how moved I was by the ways she mothered her daughter, and in so doing, the ways she mothered herself. And how she, perhaps, was mothering other loss parents who have yet to share with her that her acknowledgment of her daughter’s life was a silent acknowledgment of other babies lost to miscarriage or stillbirth too. We talked about the scarcity in our culture of rites of passage surrounding untimely death, and the isolation this begets. We spoke about motherhood in the absence of a baby and how invisible she feels in it, especially amid the countless women who have babbling babies in their arms; who have valid complaints about the utter exhaustion of parenthood—an experience those like Sage wish they could endure.
This version of motherhood goes widely recognized—a motherhood that is celebrated, adored, spoken about ad nauseam, rarely truly supported but nevertheless paid endless lip service—whereas the other version, the kind with no baby to show for it, is not so much. Sage spoke about wanting to feel legitimized in the mothering she does—recognized, acknowledged, appreciated, even. Her motherhood is work, too. Her motherhood is tiring in a whole different way than it is for those with littles running circles around them. And so, memorializing seems vital. Through it, we might not only buoy ourselves in the throes of grief, but these rituals might also invite others into the very essence of what it feels like to be a loss mom, empty arms and all.
Hearing Sage talk about her frequent trips to the cemetery—the hours spent reading nursery rhymes under a tall eucalyptus tree there on the dirt—and witnessing the pride she took in this encouraged me to think harder about grief traditions available to women. Our conversations got me thinking about our current cultural limitations when it comes to memorializing miscarriage, how these acts of mourning and honor may make those untouched by pregnancy and infant loss uncomfortable.
• • •
A couple of weeks after officially naming Olive, my son and I went on an overnight getaway during his spring break, with sand toys and his scooter in tow. We spent hours on the beach talking about how the Earth spins, how the sun rises and sets, how the water moves—the ebb and flow of it all. The mood was playful as we danced in the moist sand and the sun eventually tucked behind the mountains lining the Pacific coast. Listening to Liev’s lines of thinking as we skipped rocks felt like a meditation on the past, beckoning me to reflect on all that had happened since his birth. I knew this boy before my loss. He knew me before it too. And oh, how I’d changed.
Moments in which the previous me emerges leave me wishing I could somehow rewind—to go back to pre–grief laden times. To the mother I was before her demise. Unencumbered. As we readied to head back to our hotel room, he dug one last ditch in search of teeny sand crabs while I wrote Olive’s name in the sand. Fingers enlivened by etching each letter, I realized it was my first time writing her name. Olive. Within a moment, the tide washed her name away and off it went into the sea.
Woven into the fabric of our newly shaped family, Olive came and went instantly. But the length of one’s life does not dictate their impact. Brief stays can surely make themselves deeply felt, can’t they? A profound and mighty impression they do make. Writing her name there, in the Santa Barbara sand, felt significant. It felt weighty. In a way, it felt like she was there with us on that beach, the letters of her name standing in for the footprints that should have been.
I wanted more. Setting her name in the light-brown granules on the Pacific Coast made an impact. It shored me up. But the tides would wash them away, and it was then that it became clear: I wanted to memorialize and signify our loss in more ways than this.
• • •
Soon, I turned my sights on Japan. I’d read about the unique ways Japanese culture acknowledges pregnancy loss and was eager to see for myself, in real time, on the ground, what it looked like. Zojoji Temple, located next to the Unborn Children Garden, is the resting place of six shoguns from the centuries-long rule of the Tokugawa shogunate. It is known for being one of the largest and most important Buddhist temples in Japan. Originally founded in 1393, the temple relocated to its current site in the 1590s. Surrounded by Tokyo’s Shiba Park, the temple grounds are said to be airy and spacious. This garden is specifically dedicated to those lost to miscarriage, stillbirth, and infants who didn’t survive. People decorate statues in bright colors. It is a place people can visit even en route to work, as it’s smack-dab in the middle of the city—integrating death into everyday life. I was yearning to experience a culture that had a healing ritual for this kind of grief, and this seemed like as good a time as any to go. So in the spring of 2017, I enlisted my dear Aliza, a friend I’ve known since my days in Boston—the same friend who recommended my therapist, Valerie—to travel with me to experience it firsthand. The week before departing Los Angeles for Tokyo, while sitting with patient after patient, it dawned on me that even though our culture doesn’t have standardized ways of memorializing loss, my office (and countless offices around the world) has become a sanctuary of sorts. The amount of love expressed within those four walls could deem the space holy, almost. Although we exchange words during therapy sessions, there is an abounding sense of grounding meditation. Ritual in the making. Simultaneous to words, gentle breath. Lost babies spoken about and felt deep within our bones. This realization was a potent way to begin my trip.
Adventurous to the core, I long for cultural immersion, the tastes and smells of elsewhere, stories written on unfamiliar faces. But I hadn’t boarded such a long fligh
t since I was blissfully (and naively) pregnant with my son. Jason and I ventured to Australia and New Zealand with Liev in utero. How was it possible so much time had elapsed? And how had I stayed put for so long? Motherhood, miscarriage, grief, anxiety, pregnancy after loss—all of this grounded me. And by “grounded,” I mean cemented me locally and filled me with dread when I dared to even contemplate leaving my babies. My wanderlust was negated by my need to stay close to them.
Sitting alongside Aliza, I felt a shift. I was ready to be doing this again, often. Aliza too. She is all too familiar with pregnancy loss herself. After four miscarriages, she brimmed with joy as she FaceTimed her son, adopted at birth over seven years ago. We are both loss moms. We are both working mothers. We were both in need of this break more than words can explain. It says a lot that we both blurted out in the airport lounge that this act—sitting uninterrupted for more than a few minutes—felt like a needed treat, a vacation in itself. This woman is a light, a revolutionary, a warrior. I couldn’t have chosen a better companion to dive into what was sure to be a pool of complex and conflicting emotions as we set out to explore the Jizo-filled garden in Tokyo and the countless bunches of statues strewn throughout Kyoto. We are familiar with the loss of pregnancies—the extinguishing of dreams. We also have in common fierce hope and an intention to transform culture (even if only a little bit), born out of personal experience.
The morning after we arrived, my mind was abuzz, eager to head straight to the Zojoji Temple just below the Tokyo Tower, adorned with Jizo statues. Said to represent both human and deity, child and monk, with eyes closed, hands clasped in prayer, and serene facial expressions, these statues adorned in red crocheted caps stand in memorial of miscarriage, stillbirth, and infants lost. A public place—a place where people gather to honor and connect with what they’ve lost. I’d seen pictures of this garden online—the Sentai Kosodate Jizo, translated as the Unborn Children Garden—but now I would have the chance to actually visit and drink in its profundity.
After enjoying a traditional Japanese breakfast, complete with miso, grilled fish, rice, and pickled vegetables, we were on our way. It was categorically awe-inspiring. I couldn’t believe I was actually there, a witness to the rows and rows of decorated statues representing the souls of unborn babies, those who died too soon as well as those yet to be born. For late morning on a weekday, it seemed to me there were quite a lot of people—women and men alike—paying their respects. Several generations ambling through this meaningful space. Just because. Because they could. Because this space exists precisely for this very reason. To visit with those who are no longer.
The pinwheels stuck among them spun, the birds chirped, and the calming smell of incense floated through the air. I choked up with emotion as I stood amid this powerful scene. Japan has a culture known for its humility; here, they grieve through action—grieve out loud, in the open—rather than hiding it, the way our culture is prone to do. The statues reveal ritual, protection, love, remembrance, beckoning pilgrimage. In our culture, research has found that a majority of women ask, “Why me?” My hunch is that in Japan, they don’t. When loss is normalized and ritualized in tender ways, we are less apt to blame ourselves or wonder, “Why me?” There is an art to grieving there. It is honored.
I thirst for this at home. Women I spoke with in the garden said they visit often, some monthly. One elderly woman shared that she comes to pay homage to her sister that could have been—her mother’s stillborn baby. She laid flowers and quietly prayed, gently touching the statue’s face.
That night, as we lay around in our hotel room relaxing and getting ready to go out for a night of sushi and sake, I posted to the @IHadaMiscarriage account with a recap of my day. In lieu of one of the many photographs I took, I posted a piece of art of the Jizo statues, which I commissioned before my departure, and another with an illustration and the phrase “Empty arms, full heart” written in both English and Japanese. I wrote about the enormity of my experience and how much I wished we all had access to a culture where grief exists out in the open—amid the fresh air, accessible to all—not just gnawing and eagerly scratching within the confines of our bodies. And although I don’t know this online community in real life, I know their pain intimately, and I brought it there with me and wished they could all gather there too. Despite the sixteen-hour time difference, I saw comments populate immediately and found so much connection in the reactions as I read through them. I was moved all over again. The people of Japan may have this spectacular garden to connect and recharge themselves, but those responses were a beautiful reminder that I have a place I can always go, too: my Instagram community.
Next was Kyoto, otherwise known as the city of ten thousand shrines. In Kyoto, at every turn, you’re met with calm-faced Jizo statues—some cuddling up together, others surrounded by handwritten messages, most accompanied by mini flower bouquets. Death is honored, almost celebrated there, by incorporating it into daily life. Can we aim to achieve this at home? I wondered as I zigzagged through throngs of Jizos meant to maintain remembrance. I carried Olive’s spirit through the meandering, historic roads chock-full of temples and shrines, honoring heritage and tradition. I felt her.
• • •
Upon my return from East Asia, it became abundantly clear that my trip had marked a turning point in my post-loss life; namely, in the post-traumatic stress I experienced after my miscarriage. Those symptoms were alive and well during my subsequent pregnancy and flowed disruptively into the initial months of mothering 2.0. Though I had every reason to experience these feelings as I barreled through the next pregnancy, I just didn’t understand how much I was struggling … until I wasn’t.
The fact that I boarded a flight to Tokyo, left my children safely at home with Jason, explored for just over a week, and enjoyed every second of it felt like a profound victory over PTSD and the trauma that birthed it. It was an emblematic turning point. As I sat among the embellished Jizo statues in a culture comfortable with acknowledging loss, I had the chance to bid farewell to any remaining bits of hypervigilance, releasing the proverbial monkey on my back. I found unparalleled comfort in being surrounded by symbols of loss out in an open space, watching as people came and went, lighting incense sticks and closing their eyes in reverence. Outside in nature, surrounded by others who presumably knew a similar ache. The ultimate embodiment of serenity. This was rites, rituals, and representation of pregnancy loss in action—it all seemed so natural and revitalizing. To actually witness people honoring their losses in real life—not online or in print, but in real time—made a lasting impression.
• • •
Back in America, I opened up a dialogue with the community about their loss rituals. Through these conversations, I met Zoe, whose son was stillborn at thirty-two weeks. After naming him, she began getting tattoos in his honor, to concretize this loss—to make real someone who had only been ephemeral, a life that wasn’t lived, but which nonetheless existed acutely for her.
“The process of getting the tattoos was healing for me. The adrenaline felt during the process of getting them numbed the pain,” she told me. She now has seven of them. “They became an invitation for people to ask about me and about my son. It meant that I could share my story. I have a strong desire to keep him alive, though he was born dead—for people to recognize his existence,” she explained.
Another follower, Sivon, did not know she was pregnant until she miscarried. “A big chunk came out of my vagina while I was at home alone. I had to scoop it out and questioned, ‘Do I flush it? Do I bury it?’ We have no blueprint. How can we know?” And so Sivon flushed, feeling a wash of guilt sweep over her, one that periodically still does. “Months later, I realized that my baby’s womb life needed to be honored. My body was feeling those emotions too. It was a journey that needed to be had. I got a mini statue of a woman holding a baby with a rose quartz where the heart is. I keep it by my bed. Since I was so newly pregnant, I didn’t get to experience the joys of pregn
ancy before losing it. But I memorialize my pregnancy by acknowledging I was pregnant.” Sivon told me she now has a five-week-old daughter. “I never want to pretend this pregnancy was my first.”
Inspired by my trip to Japan and conversations like the ones I had with Zoe and Sivon, I decided to focus my efforts on memorialization for Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month in 2018. I wanted to dedicate my efforts to loss-related rites and rituals and invite others to consider ritualizing, no matter how long ago their loss may have been. We deserve ways to honor who we were previous to the loss, who we are after, and the babies we have lost.
And as my own journey proved, it is never too late to consecrate these feelings. I used the campaign to encourage women and families to find their own way of memorializing their losses, one that feels meaningful and personal to them. While there may not be a cultural standard or template for a ritual, there are touchstones that we can find familiarity and comfort in: Take photos. Make something concrete. Have a ceremony. Plant a tree. Honor the anniversary. When I spoke to women in the community, it was clear: we really do want to acknowledge our losses. The way we do it—the way we parent these beings who are no longer—is different, but we all do want it. Not just for ourselves, but for them.
• • •
Last year, a moment I had long anticipated arrived. Liev, aged ten, began talking about my work one evening as I was putting him to bed. I’d imagined the moment was imminent, as his inquisitive nature had blossomed all the more recently. A natural-born thinker, Liev is perceptive and thoughtful through and through. And as we parents craft the right way to teach our children about the topic of sex and conception, I was aware that I wanted to consciously invest some time in educating him about the possibility of loss, too. Sex-related conversations between parents and their children typically focus, firstly, on how not to get pregnant, and secondly, on the ease of reproduction—namely, on the live births that follow pregnancy. But if our children are being taught that sex (and other reproductive technologies) lead to babies, should they not also learn that some fetuses never make it that far?
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