When our child dies, we may have many reasons to “stick around” but none of them seem to matter. We cannot imagine being here for any length of time without our child here with us. Most of us are not suicidal, we just don’t want to be here anymore and would be fine with something happening that would take us out of here to go be with our child.
Laura has experienced this same thing, when her daughter, Becca, died and talks about what it was like both then and now, almost twelve years later.
Links Mentioned in this episode:
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Find out about Laura’s newly released book Reflections of Hope: Daily Readings for Bereaved Parents.
Birthdays:
Hunter Josiah Whitney was born on June 25 and is forever 18.
Courtney Kolb was born on June 26 and is forever 23.
Lukas Christofferson was born on June 28 and is forever 19.
Dominic Cardenas was born on June 28 and is forever 24.
If you would like your child mentioned on the podcast the week of his or her birthday, click here to fill out the short form with the needed information.
The special song written for our children’s birthdays I Remember Well can be heard here.
Remember to Hold On Pain Eases; there is HOPE!
To have Laura come and minister at your event, contact us at office@gpshope.org.
Grieving Parents Sharing Hope (GPS Hope) is here to walk with parents through the darkness of child-loss, guiding them to a place of hope, light and purpose.
It is a safe place for anyone who has lost a child from this earth. There is no shame or judgment in where you are in this journey, including if you are struggling in your relationship with God or your faith has been completely shattered.
about someone, we know what type of life-changing loss they have experienced. But when telling someone about our loss, it is along the line of, “Her child died.” There is no word that identifies the devastating, horrific, heart shattering traumatic loss in our lives.
I think it is important to have a word that validates the fact that parents who have lost a child through death have a weight that is extremely heavy…heavier than most will experience in this life. Not as a label to give us permission to wallow in our deep sorrow, but one that draws us together to be able to strengthen and encourage each other within our life-long club membership that none of us wanted.
The word pareavor sounds like a pretty good description of what happens when our child dies, no matter the age of the child. We are parents who have been deprived of our children who were seized and torn away from us through death. We are pareavors.
Sharing Hope (
twenty-five years, nestled in rural Bibb County, Alabama. Along with her husband, Hector, she raised four children, along with dozens of various farm animals. Since her son, Dominic, ran ahead to Heaven in 2014, she has spent a great deal of her time and energy writing about their family’s grief journey and ministering to the bereaved parent community through her blog, thelifeididntchoose.com, and in person through speaking. In her spare time, Melanie loves hugging and playing with her two grandsons, sewing small one-of-a-kind handcrafts, and reading lots of books from many different points of view.
To have Laura come and minister at your event, contact us at office@gpshope.org.
