Support Groups

After losing my daughter in January, I was incredibly lost. I know I am not the only one to lose a child, but I still felt incredibly alone. My body failed my daughter. She was perfect, and my body could not keep her in. When I learned what I have, I Googled it all the time and went to see if YouTube had any videos about it. I did find a YouTuber who had it and she said Facebook had some support groups. What did I do? Went onto Facebook and joined an online support group. Here I finally got a taste of something I needed, a community. A place where I could ask questions or simply post my feelings and I would not be judged. There were, of course, multiple regulations, such as no advice about health or medication. And of course, no cyberbullying. Just an open forum for people to talk about their experiences and ask some questions, or have questions answered. I'll admit, it was not enough. I'm usually a hermit with the occasional want to be around people.

About two weeks after losing my daughter, I found out a co-worker also lost hers. Circumstances were different, but I still felt the need to reach out. I know the feeling she's feeling and I'm literally going through very similar emotions. We got together and talked about everything. By March, we had been talking pretty regularly. She eventually told me about a support group that is about 40 minutes away and they meet once a month. The group is started by an author of the book Bearing the Unbearable. Once I finally got the name of the group, my husband and I decided to go. What could it hurt? We would be around other people who lost their babies and just needed to be around other people. What was great about the group was after the introductions and what happened, they let the topic go to whatever it needed to. All they ask is for mutual respect for wherever the topic lead. At the end of the night, my husband and I talked about the group. We both agreed, this was something we truly needed. A place to talk about whatever topics we needed to talk about. They had a Mother's Day group and a Father's Day group where they had specific topics. Again. I felt less alone. My emotions weren't crazy.

I didn't have this four and a half years ago when my world turned upside down. I truly felt alone. In one night, I lost my entire family, my home, and my sense of self. I truly felt alone. I did try to find a support group for this. I found one that was supposed to meet once a month, but no one ever showed up, so they cancelled the meetings. For that situation, I felt as though I needed multiple support groups. My mom and sister were homicide victims, my father was in jail, and I was just lost. You would think other family members would help you out, but honestly, they could not. Plus they saw things from different perspectives. Also, at the end of the day, they could go home.

Now that I'm part of this community, I truly see the benefit of support groups. The people who go to groups for addiction, and divorce. There are groups for children of alcoholics. My husband is even on an online group specific to fathers who lost their children. We both, with our hermit-like tendencies, understand that this is a walk we really don't have to do alone. If you are going through something, I encourage you to find people to talk to, from all walks of life, who have different perspectives. It truly helps to have a community of people to talk to.