After our three days together in Chatham, we returned to Toronto for August David’s body. The autopsy had confirmed that his problem had not been congenital. Losing my twins did not confirm my doctors’ prognosis that I should not give birth. My blood pressure medication was not intended for pregnant women. Even switching after I was pregnant wouldn’t have helped, because the medication would have remained in my system long enough to affect my babies’ development. I tried not to blame myself or anyone else. The doctors didn’t know I was trying to get pregnant and I didn’t know about the possible side effects. The twins had taken everyone by surprise.
My parents flew home to Kentville, Nova Scotia, while my husband and I drove August David’s body from Toronto to the Maritimes for burial. At first, we had wanted to fly with him, but that would have meant a lot of red tape to get his body on the plane. The journey turned out to be a blessing. It was the pilgrimage we needed to bring the body of our child home. As much as we would have enjoyed guiding him through this life as his parents, we believed he had skipped the challenges of the temporary and moved straight to Glory, where we would all meet one day.
When passing through Quebec, we stopped among rolling hills devoid of people, sounds or cars and felt the peace and promise of creation. I liked the idea of wandering into the forest and sitting somewhere—to cry, to pray, to meditate or just stare into space. And that’s what we did. I’d never experienced the rejuvenating powers of being in nature before I lost my babies. But it is very real: wind rustling the trees; the smell of grass or rain or fresh air; an organic colourscape; the ocean eternally turning over on itself; deep root systems as elders, confessors, witness. All my relations. Nature only requires me to be still while it does all the work by just being itself.
We stopped again in Nackawic, New Brunswick, which boasts the world’s largest axe, weighing over fifty tons and standing almost fifty feet high, with a head twenty-two feet high. My home province of New Brunswick is famous for having a lot of “the biggest”—the biggest blueberry, the biggest spud, the biggest coal, the biggest frog, the biggest peanut and the biggest axe. We took crazy trompe l’oeil pictures of the axe sticking in our heads, and of one of us wielding the axe while the other pretended to run away.
We understood that grieving was a process with no discernible end, because even while we laughed together, we carried the place in our hearts that the loss of our first-born had created. The time we had together on our drive to the Maritimes was a practice run for lives that incorporated our grief into our emotional DNA. Losing a child is never not a part of you, but as my Vipassana ten-day silent meditation course would teach me about five months later, the mind filters out the toxicity of the pain so that the heart can find a healthy spot for the memory to peacefully rest.
We took August to Kentville, where we gave the brown box holding our child to a funeral director. My father, having led his share of funerals as a pastor at New Minas Baptist Church, had arranged it. He knew this funeral home was a symbol of compassion in the community, but the hardest part for me was giving them August David’s remains, because they would prepare his body for burial, and this would be the one part of the process that I couldn’t oversee. I wanted to know where his remains would be and what would happen to them. Just handing over that box, after we’d carried it for twenty-one hours, after I’d carried him for twenty-one weeks, almost broke me.
We still had to pick out a cemetery plot and order his marker. I never thought I would ever live to see “Brueggergosman” on a tombstone with a single date, but there we were, placing the order. On August David’s grave marker, we chose to carve his name, his date of birth and Psalm 139, acknowledging that he had existed, that he had been loved and that he would remain a significant part of our family and our marriage moving forward.
Should he be in the shade? Will his plot get enough sun? We would discuss these options with the cemetery groundskeeper, as if any of this mattered to a child who had never seen trees or the sun. Despite the grief that chokes me, I know my child is not actually there. Even as we were picking the location where the box containing his remains would be buried, I wasn’t making the decision based on whether my baby would like it. He was in heaven having the time of his life! What we were in truth deciding was where we would like to visit to appease our own grief and to remember this chapter in our family’s life.
My husband wanted to dig the grave himself, which I completely understood, but we were told this wasn’t permitted for insurance purposes. However, we were allowed to watch the grave being dug, so we arrived at 6:00 a.m. on September 1, 2011, the day of the memorial service, and silently watched the gravedigger carve away the square of grass where our tiny brown box would fit, shovel out the dirt of our child’s grave and carefully pile the earth to one side.
I have such beautiful memories of that day. The gravedigger was a warm, soft-spoken, middle-aged family man with a dog, a man who seemed to have been tailor-made for this kind of ministry. He told us that most people wanted the loose earth covered with AstroTurf, which I guess creates the illusion that your loved one isn’t being covered in dirt. We wanted to see the pile of dirt and we wanted to refill the grave ourselves.
To someone who has not experienced a child’s death, bearing witness in this way might seem unnecessarily morbid, but I wanted to know the full process of burying my child. As his parents, it would serve as the only journey on this earth that we would get to oversee. I believe all these steps braided us into the condensed life of August David. I had prayed that my grieving process would be unqualified and complete, and bearing witness to every detail was how that manifested for us.
When the rest of my family arrived for the memorial, we put our brown box in the prepared place and had a short but beautiful service, opened in prayer by my father. My brother spoke encouraging words and my sister read Psalm 139:
1 You have searched me, Lord,
and you know me.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
4 Before a word is on my tongue
you, Lord, know it completely.
5 You hem me in behind and before,
and you lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.
7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts, oh God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand—
when I awake, I am still with you.
19 If only you, God, would slay the wicked!
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br /> Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty!
20 They speak of you with evil intent;
your adversaries misuse your name.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, Lord,
and abhor those who are in rebellion against you?
22 I have nothing but hatred for them;
I count them my enemies.
23 Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
24 See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.
This Psalm would also be the very first thing my sons Shepherd and Sterling would hear as they entered this world. What initially attracted me to the passage was how David talks about the Almighty’s omnipotence being made manifest even as God knit me together in my mother’s womb. But, in the years my grief has had to morph and change in the light of my life with my sons, I find myself drawn to David’s humility to God’s sovereignty when he says the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. The power to transcend darkness and see night as day is the super power I am cultivating now. The spiritual ability to “see in the dark”—or see the night as day—takes away all power to enslave; a spotlight is shone on the deceptions and fears that would continue to enslave. By the blazing, revelatory light of Truth, the prison door is flung open and we are set free.
Markus and I brought the memorial for August David to a close by describing the whole trajectory of his brief time with us, and how it was okay to be sad and okay to acknowledge this as a tragedy, even though we had faith that August David was in Heaven. We said that we knew we lived in a broken world, with illness and injustice, but the brokenness is meant to point us toward Christ. That when we search for answers or want to give in to bitterness, we must remember that God isn’t responsible for the brokenness. That He is the healer of our brokenness and that there are heavenly benefits to skipping this earthly existence and going straight to Glory, as August David had done.
We filled in August David’s grave, exchanged condolences and took our turns holding each other.
Blessed are they who mourn for they shall be comforted. (Matthew 5:4)
To turn its corners, the grieving process transforms and rediscovers itself: It changes its position in the middle of the night; it jostles for supremacy and finds a comfortable place to lie dormant. It doesn’t leave you, because it’s the latest in a collection of experiences added to who you now are.
In the fall of 2011, I had cleared my entire concert schedule because I was supposed to be having my first baby and then caring for that baby. Now I was staring down a six-month, dark and empty tunnel with no place I was supposed to be and nothing I was supposed to be doing. I hadn’t had that much time off since I’d done Bikram teacher training, and that was only nine weeks. This was a phenomenon I’d never experienced before. I consciously tried not to panic.
I trusted that whatever time was free was whatever time I was meant to use to grieve, and then, in whatever state I was in, I would be in whatever state of readiness I needed to be in in order to accomplish whatever was to come next. About five minutes after coming to this conclusion, I was thrown a lifeline: the invitation from the Canadian broadcaster CityTV to become a judge on their newly launched reality variety show, Canada’s Got Talent. As a spinoff of the British series, it would feature singers, dancers, magicians, comedians and other performers of all ages, competing for a prize of $100,000. Auditions in Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto and Halifax would begin in mid-October for the show’s debut in March. The winner would be chosen by audience vote from contestants pre-selected by the judges.
Well, if you had told me when my career started that I would be a judge on a reality talent program, I would have never believed it. I love reality television!
Let me quickly qualify that statement by clarifying that I am a fan of talent-based reality TV: Dancing with the Stars, Project Runway, The Amazing Race, So You Think You Can Dance, RuPaul’s Drag Race. I gravitate toward the campy, to be sure, but I like the presence of a distinct qualifier: a passion to train, or launch your business, or hone your craft through competition. I can also go in for a good Survivor marathon, though you won’t catch me auditioning to starve myself and lie to strangers. But I’ll watch it.
The producers of Canada’s Got Talent—John Brunton’s Insight Productions—had already hired comedic genius Martin Short as the panel’s supernova. I was added, along with the pianist and composer Stephan Moccio. Through Canada’s Got Talent, I was handed an opportunity to fill in some crucial gaps—financial, professional—at a time when I needed it most. God knew that I wanted to be working . . . but not really working. That is to say, I was thrilled to be having so much fun with a production company I loved, with two co-hosts who were so incredibly kind and generous to me. The show ran for only one season, 2011 to 2012, the only time in my calendar that allowed me to do it. I’m not saying I wouldn’t have done more seasons if we had gotten more seasons. But it served the purpose it was meant to serve: fitting neatly into a narrow, calendrical pocket. I could have thought greedily about how I could have used the money or the fame, but that’s not the role this experience was meant to play in my story.
Our chemistry as panellists was wonderful. I never expressed to Marty or Stephan how essential they were in healing my heart and soul. They, along with the team at Insight—though they may not know it—played a major role in easing my profound grief. You never know what will trigger the construction of more supportive scaffolding under your grieving heart, but for me it was a national parade of star-searching misfits and undiscovered geniuses—and the “support staff” that came with them.
We finished the auditions for Canada’s Got Talent, which finally wrapped at the end of January in Vancouver, and I went to the ten-day Vipassana course to press the reset button on my inner life. I had the best of all possible reasons: I had become pregnant over Christmas in Switzerland.
After August David’s death and birth, my husband and I waited for a month, then began researching ovulation tests and timing and began trying for a baby. Another month went by, then two, with no result. Maybe we were trying too hard? As a healthy, fertile couple, why not just have a lot of sex because it was fun, not because I was ovulating? So that’s what we did, and that’s how we got pregnant.
We didn’t tell anyone. The last thing I wanted was this big announcement on TV, coupled with the pressure of staying calm while the professionals around me stifled their nervous empathy over the two babies I’d already lost. I’d originally shared the loss publicly because I had also been public about being pregnant, and wanted to share my story in the hope that it would bring hope. I knew our story was shared by countless families, and when the newspaper article ran nation-wide, people across the country were incredibly respectful and supportive of our grief and loss. But this time around, I would not be telling anyone who did not need to know.
My blood pressure medication had been changed, so we were in the clear on that potential complication, but I was still afraid of compromising my pregnancy, especially during the critical first trimester. That’s why I made the choice to do the ten-day silent Vipassana course. I wanted to get my head right. I needed to do whatever I could to cleanse myself and emotionally reboot. I’ve described how crucial that experience was for me. The baby train had left the station and I wanted to joyfully climb aboard.
I know that there are couples out there who justifiably wait to get pregnant after the loss of a child, and those who justifiably jump right back in the saddle, like my husband and I did. For my part, I knew I wasn’t getting any younger and I saw getting pregnant again as closing the circle of my grief. It was just an image I had in my head of August David (and his sister) morphing into the ongoing cycle of life.
My heart also goes out to those couples who do not get pregnant as quickly as I did, or who have to make their peace with not having children at all for whatever reason. I can
’t imagine a dream that hurts more to have unrealized than wanting children but not being able to have them. I don’t know what God’s plan is in those circumstances. But I honestly believe there is one. I would not have been strong enough to keep trying and trying and trying without success. So that wasn’t my fight. We are each of us handed losses and struggles that to someone else would seem unfathomable and unbearable in their depth. These losses redirect us into experiences we would never have dreamed possible; like having my grief appeased by being a judge on a reality show. But God sent the unexpected to me, and I do know that God hears you in your grief. You are not alone.
You will press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called you heavenward in Jesus Christ. (Philippians 3:14)
People often assume that I am a high-energy person. That I have boundless, bottomless, truckloads and football fields of energy. How else would I be able to accomplish all that I do? Makes sense, right? Well, let me dispel that myth. This could not be further from the truth. Honestly. I don’t wake up and yell, “Hellooo, WORLD!” I’m not bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and practically climaxing at the day’s potential. The fact is, I am tired. All. The. Time. There isn’t a millisecond in the day when I don’t wonder if my time could perhaps be better spent lying in bed. I’m barely awake most of the time. Yes, I may create the illusion that the energy is there, but that’s the fallacy of the highly “energied.” We fake it till we make it. That’s the only thing that separates us from those who seem to be low “energied” or even average “energied.” We’re just better actors. But trust me, we’re exhausted.
When I’m working, I know my day is coming to a welcomed end when I finally get off the frickin’ elevator of some hotel and put one sluggish, heavy leg in front of the other sluggish, heavy leg. Then my injured left hip—for about five years now—starts to scream at me that it needs to be replaced, already! I start to get cold and achy, because the powerful balance of pressure and expectation that I use to distinguish myself from the crowd all day is also releasing itself. I take one last look around me to make sure I’m alone, and then I draw in the deepest breath of my life so far and exhale one long, audible “Aaaaaahhhhhhhhh . . . ” I might even release a few tears. Because it looks like this day is finally going to end.
Something Is Always on Fire Page 19