Help For Grieving Couples | Miscarriage, Stillbirth & Infant Loss

Feb 15

Practical Advice & FREE DOWNLOAD for grieving couples | Learning how to have fun and really talk again after miscarriage, stillbirth or infant loss. | The Morning: Resources and community for those who have experienced pregnancy or infant loss.

In Podcast Episode 023 Sharon McKeeman gave helpful wisdom about how to pursue a healthy relationship with your spouse or partner when you are grieving. Tangible and practical words of wisdom that I wanted to help you put into action.

One practical bit of wisdom she shared was this:

Schedule fun. So you can remember how to laugh again.

I imagine if you are in the thick of grief, that sentiment can feel very relatable. Sometimes our hearts hurt so badly for so long we forget what it looks like to experience fun and the simple joy of laughter together. It may feel silly to "schedule fun" but as a woman who has spent the last 10+ years fighting for a healthy marriage after the loss of my son I know this to be true. We can easily slip into a new normal, forgetting why we married this person in the first place. Hearts so full of grief and guilt that we don't even know if having fun, if laughing, is a good thing or a thing we want. Will it mean we love our baby less?

No. But I do remember asking that same question. It doesn't mean you love your baby less, it means you love your spouse and want your marriage to make it. So schedule fun. And as Sharon said: "Make time away from the kids or away from normal life and do something together."

For my husband and I another problem we faced was that neither of us wanted to talk about what was going on in our heart, we were afraid of voicing our pain and our fears, our hurt and struggle -- so over time that meant we forgot how to have meaningful conversation, we were just moving about the days, never connecting on a heart level.

I think scheduling time to have fun and scheduling time to talk are both really helpful in cultivating a marriage that is healthy even when you're hurting.

So, make a plan to schedule fun and schedule conversation. And then put it in your calendar and set an alarm on your phone. I promise this small effort will go a long way in bringing unity to your marriage.

To help you remember how to laugh and play and talk again, I created a little Marriage Bingo Game & Idea Checklist for you. This printable is a fun objective way to make sure you actually do things together and ask the questions that may feel hard to ask right now. The perfect little tool for those moments of scheduled fun and scheduled conversation that I wish I had for my marriage all those years ago.