Thursday, June 6, 2013

When We are Standing on Sacred Ground

Ecclesiastes

Today I stood on holy, sacred ground.

It was beautiful, and terrible.

I should have taken off my shoes.

I'm not sure what to say about it, about meeting my friend's dead child and watching her hold him and pat him and kiss his tiny, sweet forehead.  About listening to her make the decisions for her son that no parent ever wants to make.  About crying with her as she handed his fragile body over to the nurse.

Except that it was beautiful.

And terrible.

Sacred ground.

And of course it brings me back to when I was the one being watched, I was the one making the decisions and cradling her child for the first and only time.  When it was me sobbing as I stood over my sweet Eve's body, knowing it was time to say goodbye, to let the nurse wheel her away in her bassinet, and not being able to for some time.

No mother should have to give her child's body away to be burned to ash.

That is the terrible part.

The beautiful part is how peaceful it can be when a mother is holding her dead child close, exploring his delicate skin with trembling fingers, falling into devastating love with this tiny person who was, who is but is not here.

I am so grateful for that peace.  I felt it when it was me and Eve, and it was wonderful to see my friend experience the same with her son.

And it was terrible.  Because that calm in the storm of grief is so short-lived, and all too soon the bereaved mother is shoved back out into the world where everything feels so harsh and her heart is so raw that if feels as if she's walking around with no skin on and everything, everything hurts.

But I needn't have worried about the words.   They flowed easily, at the right times, and much of the time we sat in silence in the place of birth meeting death.

Sacred ground.

I should have taken off my shoes and pressed my face against the cool tiled ground and cried out mercy, because there was so much of it, and yet not enough to stop the hurt from throbbing so. 

But I am grateful to have stood witness, and am honored to have been invited into such a holy intimacy.  It seems to me as if today was one of those days delineating "before" and "after."  A pivot point on which your world turns and nothing ever looks quite the same.

Meeting Eve was one such point.  Watching my friend meet her dead son feels like another. 

As hard and horrible as the whole thing is, something clicked true in my soul about it, too.  Something that has to do with calling.  Maybe with calling to this.  I don't know.  I am afraid.  I don't know.

I think I'll lay myself down and cry for that mercy now. 

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19 comments:

  1. That was heartbreakingly beautiful.

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  2. Wow, you're thinking about becoming a doula?? That would be awesome! I think it's amazing that you were willing to share this experience with your friend, and even more amazing that she asked you to. I think you are the strongest person I've ever met.

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  3. "I should have taken off my shoes and pressed my face against the cool tiled ground and cried out mercy, because there was so much of it, and yet not enough to stop the hurt from throbbing so."

    beautiful

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  4. I have contemplated becoming a doula too - to be able to help families who are bereaved in some way would be amazing. I don't know either. It can't be easy to do. I hope that in time it will become clearer.

    Sending love to you and especially your friend as she begins this journey. I know she will find great comfort in having you there for her when other people don't get it <3

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  5. Oh, beautiful friend. You are precious and full of grace that comes from Heaven alone.

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  6. This is incredibly touching and raw Beth, so beautiful. When you spoke of your calling I immediately thought of 1st Corinthians 1:3 & 4:
    "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercy and Lord of all comfort, who comforts us in all our afflictions so that we will be able to comfort those....with the comfort with which we ourselves received by God".
    There is a reason for everything. Even though we may never know what that reason was, when we walk faithful He will work all things together....
    Hugs,
    Margo

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  7. This is wonderful. My dear friend who was with me during Evie's time on this earth has told me many times that those were "holy moments". From the outside looking in, I imagine they were. Thank you so much for sharing. Praying right now for your sweet friend.

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  8. Oh my goodness... wow. I got all excited when I clicked on your link to you becoming a Doula. What an awesome thing that would be.
    Thank you for sharing your experience, you are truly a wonderful friend.
    Hugs and blessings

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  9. I will bring Beth out of this fire like gold refined...God's words for you echoed in my heart today. He continues to do a good work in you and through you. Doula? Yes indeed, friend.

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    1. Oh Cassie. This makes me melt (not trying to be ironic, either). Thank you for reminding me. I need to look again at those things you wrote and read at Eve's memorial.

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  10. Dear friend, that is exactly what it is..sacred ground. I was just talking about that in the naming of my book. It is the place where heaven meets earth...that sacred ground. A place of unexplainable peace. When the world stops to pay homage to this precious life. When heaven whispers passed, and Jesus carries a little one home. That sacred, holy time. I too was grateful that peace existed for other mothers when I first became a doula...the beautiful peace I experienced so many years ago. I told my husband through tears....when I came home..."It was as if I saw our children for the first time in 16 and 14 years...heaven was that close in the room...and with them...that was that last time I knew such peace."

    It is beautiful. Excruciating, devastating beautiful. You are amazing and beautiful and what you've already done is what a doula does, my friend.

    Here is the post from when I returned home from that sacred ground for the first time:

    http://blog.sufficientgraceministries.org/2013/03/something-to-give/

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    1. "It is the place where heaven meets earth...that sacred ground. A place of unexplainable peace. When the world stops to pay homage to this precious life. When heaven whispers passed, and Jesus carries a little one home."
      What a beautiful, comforting thought. Thank you for putting such beautiful words to this experience. I still can't figure out how it is so beautiful and so incredibly sad at the same time.

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  11. Crying again as I read. I remember being the one being watched too. Then I close my eyes and I remember the beautiful people who came and shared that day with me. I am not sure they will ever know what it meant to me. And I ponder what it meant to them.

    And my heart feels it all.... The love, the mercy, the grace all spoken in silence that day.

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  12. Yes, you're right, a good stop!

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  13. Beth, thank you for visiting my blog this morning. I am so glad it led me here to read this poignant and powerful post. I have experienced many beautiful and terrible moments in the last few years of my life and I must say you have captured the essence of it here. Truly these moments are sacred ground and they hold a fragile beauty all their own.

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  14. Beth, this is beautiful. I can only dream what this experience you speak of is like. I wasn't allowed to touch my full term son in May of 1975. I was told to stop crying and put this behind me in less than 24 hours after his birth. There was a funeral for my son the day after he died. Two family friends kept me busy talking to me in an upstairs bedroom while the family sneaked out the door to have the funeral without me. I had no sacred ground or fragile beauty. Today I speak out! Thirty eight years later, I am making my sacred place.

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  15. So beautiful. I have lost an infant son at 10 weeks old because of a very severe brain birth defect that was not found until he was born. I cherish those 10 weeks we had with him in 2010 .. and I am in tears remembering being the one watched while me made the most difficult choices, but the ones we knew were right for Gavin.

    "Because that calm in the storm of grief is so short-lived, and all too soon the bereaved mother is shoved back out into the world where everything feels so harsh and her heart is so raw that if feels as if she's walking around with no skin on and everything, everything hurts."

    So very true.

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  16. Wow! So beautiful...thank you so much for sharing this, Beth. <3

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  17. This made me cry, I stood on sacred ground beside my friend and met her son after he was born, and died. It was the hardest and most profound thing I have ever done, to hold his little body, who we waited for and hoped for, and threw a party for, when everything was wrong, we should have been celebrating, instead we were devastated. It is sacred. Sacred in a way that nothing else is. Beautiful post.

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"I am glad you are here with me."
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King