Grieving the loss of a child
On July 4th 2025 the hill country of Texas was covered by flood waters and so many lives were taken and many more changed for forever. Since then the media, social media, and politicians have taken it upon themselves to turn the darkest of days into a disgusting shameful show.
People have been showing their true colors when it comes to their ideology and their deep seated feelings around our leaders, racism, religion, and privilege. It is the most heinous of acts to take advantage of a sad, beyond comprehension, situation and turn it into a platform for bigotry and hate. Shame on you if you have participated; and shame on you if you have agreed in your head and/or heart. Jesus will deal with you.
There is another part of all of this that has struck me; beyond the not being able to wrap my head around so much loss, I have noticed what others are saying within their concern and love for the families. Even though things are said and thought with all good intentions, I wonder how it may be affecting the families of the flood victims. When someone gives their condolences and then says something about their own children they turn their concern from the families of the victims to themselves.
Granted, people don’t know what to say or do in situations like this. But so many right now are taking whatever their platform is to give their thoughts and prayers to the families and then immediately turn the attention back onto themselves by saying how they are feeling about it, how they would feel if it were their children, etc.
These families have got to want to rage against the heavens for their loss and the way that it happened. We, as bystanders, have no idea how they feel. Period.
I wrote a book about coming along side someone who is grieving a year ago. In it I wrote a chapter on grieving the loss of a child. It was by far the hardest chapter to write. I have not lost a child to death. I don’t have a clue what that feels like. Here is the chapter from that book:
Loss of a Child Chapter 6
You are plunged into the cold. It all goes dark, there is movement around you, objects are touching you, pulling you down deeper into the depths of nothingness; you want to open your mouth and yell but you know you can’t. Panic is setting in, your body begins to do things involuntarily. Your lungs are screaming for breath, every fiber and cell is telling you to breathe but your brain tells you not to do it. Don’t do it. You can’t help it, you suck in a breath and evil fills your lungs and you begin the slow agonizing dive. You go deeper, you give in to the darkness and you sink. You know you will never resurface.
You are not drowning, you have lost a child.
The pain of bearing a child does not compare to the pain of burying one.
The loss of a child is universally considered the most agonizing loss and grief to enter. Most of us don’t even allow ourselves to fathom it. It is too awful.
The loss can be the death, kidnap, or runaway of a child. As agonizing as death would be, a kidnap or runaway situation, where you are left with the not knowing, would be a completely different gutting every minute of every day. Can you imagine looking into the face of every child for the remainder of your life, always adjusting your search for the age your baby would be now?
Loss of a child is not just the death of one you have watched grow, play, love and learn, it is a miscarriage, or a stillbirth.
The loss of a child can be the loss of any potential children such as in the case of infertility or an adoption that falls through. Women grieve their empty wombs; parents their empty arms. The loss of hope and a future is very real. Everything, every dream is dead.
The death or loss of a child is so devastating because, even if not blood related, a child is an extension of their parents. Losing a child is the wrong order of things. Parents are not supposed to experience their child leaving anything but the nest.
As with all grief, the death of a child places their loved ones smack dab on the tracks of the train that will take them through denial, anger, bargaining, and so on. This particular train never stops though. It is not like other grief cycles that lessen over time. This train goes on for eternity. The child will always be gone and the loved ones will always miss them and their place in the world will forever be void. Unlike other grief, time just continues to march through milestones that the missing child is not experiencing instead of time soothing the soul.
In the case of miscarriage or still-birth, the death is just as real as if the parents had watched their child take their first breath, first step, graduation, and so on. Having an extension of one’s DNA and love extinguished before a life lived, is no less horrible than having walked hand in hand with a little one. The loss of a child is a loss at any stage in the living process. Whether a medical dream, an adoption, or a blood relative, it is a loss.
One parent is not affected more than the other by the death of a child. Even in miscarriage, where mom was the only one to experience the physical presence of a child, the other parent is affected in a powerful way as well.
There is no title for a parent who has lost a child. Is that because it is so awful and not in the natural order of things that unlike a widow/widower, or orphan, the relationship cannot be described; the grief cannot be defined?
How to be with someone who has lost a child:
As with so many situations, bystanders to this grief do not know what to say or do. Most will want to avoid the grievers because of the horror of it all. It is as if they are contagious and their affliction could possibly affect your own family.
What to do for someone who has lost a child? Whatever they need.
Do NOT pepper them with words or smother with your presence or your own tears and sadness.
Cover them up when they fall into a restless sleep on their couch; order food/flowers for the funeral; take the dog for a walk; help with other children; fix meals; stay in the background until they want to cry, talk, rant, or walk with someone.
God forbid you try to remind the grieving that they can have other children, that they do have other children, that the loss in any way was part of a greater plan. Whether any or all of that is true, a grieving parent or lost child’s loved one is not capable, nor should they be, of accepting words such as these.
If you are attending to a grieving parent, presence and space, help with day to day, caregiving and silence, love and empathy are gifts that will be appreciated. Maybe not recognized outright, but appreciated because they are not hurtful or intrusive.
It is such a fine line between wanting others to know that we are affected by this and any loss situation because we are human; and wanting to be sensitive to a grieving parent and/or grandparent (who has a loss of a grandchild AND has to watch their child grieving). In today’s instant gratification and everything is made public society it is especially difficult to remain caring for grieving parents. But you can do it. There are ways to let others know that you are sad and thinking and praying for someone without making the ones with the loss feel like you are taking their situation and using it as a spot light for yourself.
It’s actually pretty simple. It requires empathy: what would you want in this situation if you had lost a child? You would want well wishes, space, and to not be reminded that you don’t get to hug your kids tonight but others get to hug theirs. You would want for the attention to stay on your child and only there.
May God bless Texas.
