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Nathalie Himmelrich

Inspiring Hope | Finding healthy ways of Grieving | Writer

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Nathalie with Amy Watson on Stillbirth, Miscarriage, and Pregnancy After Loss | Episode 7

August 8, 2022 By Nathalie Himmelrich Leave a Comment

Amy Watson on Stillbirth, Miscarriage, and Pregnancy After Loss

Today I speak with Amy Watson who has experienced a stillbirth and a miscarriage. She talks about pregnancy after loss, how she struggled but also how she supported herself through the different losses. The interesting part of her story is how differently she experienced her two losses and how she managed those differences. 

Amy says:

‘I call it Radical Self-Compassion, which means you love every part of you, including the grief, including the trauma, including the mess that it at all is, because that’s the reality of being a human. We go through these hard things and even if we don’t realise it, we all have these ideas of what it’s supposed to look like and how we’re supposed to be. I mean, that kind of covers at all? It’s like an umbrella: if you’re just really kind yourself. Because sometimes we think, well, if I just love myself when I want to lay in bed, I’ll just lay in bed forever, right? I’ll never get any better. But the opposite is true because if you’re kind and you just give yourself the space to maybe sleep in a little bit, you’re probably going to process through. And end up being able to get going if you want to. Or maybe you lay in bed, and you don’t make it mean anything about you.’

About this week’s guest 

Amy Watson is a certified life and grief coach. She takes her own experiences with stillbirth, miscarriage, and pregnancy after loss and combines them with proven techniques to help moms find themselves again after loss. She shares everything she knows to help you feel more peaceful, confident, and hopeful on her podcast, Smooth Stones. Amy wants all loss parents to know that by making friends with grief, tapping into their own inner voice, and learning to truly love themselves again they will be able to have not just a life to be endured, but one that is full and beautiful. Amy is a sought-after podcast guest, and she loves sharing her story, her babies, and hope everywhere she goes.

Visit Amy here:

  • Website
  • Instagram
  • Podcast Smooth Stones

Topics discussed in this episode

  • Lauren’s stillbirth
  • Explaining death to Lauren’s siblings
  • Pregnancy after loss and when you know it’s the right time
  • Whom to have on your support team for pregnancy after loss
  • Firefighter and builders – read more in the book Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple by Nathalie Himmelrich
  • River’s miscarriage, complicated D&C with physical trauma
  • Difference between grieving Lauren and River
  • Grieving and faith
  • Radical self-compassion

Resources mentioned in this episode

  • Pregnancy After Loss eBook
  • Amy’s Instagram @amy.smoothstonescoaching

Links

–> For more information, please visit Nathalie’s website. 

–> Subscribe to the newsletter to receive updates on future episodes here.

–> Join the podcast’s Instagram page.

Thanks for listening to HOW TO DEAL WITH GRIEF AND TRAUMA. If you’d like to be updated on future episodes, please subscribe to my newsletter on Nathalie Himmelrich.com

If you need grief support, please contact me for a FREE 30 min discovery session.

HOW TO DEAL WITH GRIEF AND TRAUMA is produced and edited by me, Nathalie Himmelrich. 

Support this Podcast

To support this podcast, please rate, review, subscribe to, or follow the podcast on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you.

Remember to keep breathing, I promise, it will get easier.

Filed Under: podcast, child loss, coaching, grief support, grief/loss, grieving parents, trauma Tagged With: child loss, grief support, grieving, grieving a child, grieving parents, miscarriage, pregnancy after loss, stillbirth

Nathalie with Melo Garcia on Compound Grief and Finding Someone Who Speaks Grief | Episode 3

July 11, 2022 By Nathalie Himmelrich Leave a Comment

Melo Garcia on Compound Grief and Finding Someone Who Speaks Grief

‘When you decide that it is yours, you’ll understand that along with that grief comes an amazing life of living after loss because you have something that no one else can ever, ever have. And that is the love, that is the love – that’s the love that remains.’

Melo has experienced three multiple significant losses in a short time frame. In this interview, she explains how through grief it felt as if she lost her mind and found it again in her journey with grief and trauma.

About this week’s guest

Melo Garcia, a grief specialist, assists those who have lost what isn’t replaceable. She created After Chloe, an online community that provides support, resources, and assistance through the difficult grief journey, in honor of her daughter Chloe who passed away in 2011, and after losing both her parents.

Melo felt it necessary to help others deal with the grief and loss life presents from death, divorce, identity, age, fertility, and empty-nesting by creating various types of solutions that the grieving finds a life worth living.

In 2021 she started the podcast, The Resilience of Grieving, and hosts an annual online Summit during the holidays to provide resources to grievers.

Melo allows you to speak your grief in your way, a way that will assist you and inspire you to live and grieve. Find out more about Melo on After Chloe on Instagram.

Topics discussed in this episode

  • Compound grief: The death of Melo’s father, mother, and baby daughter Chloe in the time span of two years
  • How to deal with therapists who do not speak grief
  • How to understand trauma and how grief and trauma have changed her and shaped her life
  • Self-help through bibliotherapy

Resources mentioned in this episode

  • What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love by Carole Radziwil
  • Which Book?? Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, David Kessler
  • A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of a Course in Miracles by Marianne Williamson
  • Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple by Nathalie Himmelrich
  • I Had a Miscarriage: A Memoir, a Movement by Jessica Zucker
  • Motherless Mothers: How Losing a Mother Shapes the Parent You Become by Hope Edelman
  • Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie
  • The Grief Club: The Secret to Getting Through All Kinds of Change by Melody Beattie

Links

–> For more information, please visit Nathalie’s website.

–> Subscribe to the newsletter to receive updates on future episodes here.

–> Join the podcast’s Instagram page.

Thanks for listening to HOW TO DEAL WITH GRIEF AND TRAUMA. If you’d like to be updated on future episodes, please subscribe to my newsletter on Nathalie Himmelrich.com

If you need grief support, please contact me for a FREE 30 min discovery session.

HOW TO DEAL WITH GRIEF AND TRAUMA is produced and edited by me, Nathalie Himmelrich.

Support this Podcast

To support this podcast, please rate, review, subscribe to, or follow the podcast on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you.

 Remember to keep breathing, I promise, it will get easier.

Filed Under: grief/loss, authenticity, child loss, counselling, grief support, grieving parents, podcast, trauma Tagged With: child loss, communication, compound loss, grief, grief and loss, grief support, grieving, grieving a child, grieving parents, relationship

💭 I daydream…

September 15, 2021 By Nathalie Himmelrich 18 Comments

I daydream about … 💫 who they would have become ✨

Grief Quote by Nathalie Himmelrich

Last night I went to Ananda Mae’s parents’ evening at the school. Every parent had to introduce their child given it was a new formation of kids.

As I heard the other parents describe their child, mentioning their siblings, I went off daydreaming about AM’s sister, A’Mya.

Who would you have become? What would it be like for the two to go to the same school, or even class? To share friends, experiences, and birthdays?

Just the other day Ananda Mae had asked me to daydream with her about her sister. She asked exactly those questions. “Mum, would A’Mya look just like me?” “I imagine very similar, given you are identical twins,” I replied.

Go ahead, daydream

Daydreaming about a future that cannot be is a way of remembering. Remembering your loved one. Living a relationship, learning to be in a new relationship when the kind of relationship we would have wanted to live is no longer possible.

Whoever came up with the notion ‘not to grow up the child/baby who died’ (I remember it was a therapist 🤦🏽‍♀️ – not me though) was wrong. It is completely normal and natural to do so, at least in my experience and the experience of her surviving twin.

Thank you for being right here and now with me 🕊

Filed Under: authenticity, child loss, family of origin, from personal experience, grief support, grief/loss, grieving parents, parenting Tagged With: child loss, grief, grief and loss, grief support, grieving, grieving a child, grieving parents, relationship

Do More Than Survive The First Year After Loss

March 1, 2021 By Nathalie Himmelrich Leave a Comment

writing in a book
Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash

They did not survive. I did.

Having lost our daughter at 3 days old and then my mother through suicide just four and a half month later I often doubted I would survive this emotional intensity called grief. I was tired of living. I was exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster. Yet suicide was totally out of the question for me as I was acutely aware of the emotional turmoil my mother had left behind in the family surviving her self-chosen death and I was absolutely clear of the important role I played as the mother to my other child.

Did I do more than survive?

How did I survive the first year? I wonder as I’m looking back. Big sigh. Something in me knows but somehow my memory can’t take me there because it’s not necessary to re-live those days? I don’t know. I find it hard to recall the time besides certain moments that have carved their mark on my soul. Luckily I ofter wrote so I can go and read about it. Journal entries, notes to my friends and family, emails, poems and I wrote a blog. All these writings are what lead to friends encouraging me to write a book.

Writing a book wasn’t part of my life’s aspiration. I regularly wrote articles as part of my professional website as a psychotherapist. Even though I had no idea what writing a book would entail, I knew everything could be learned. Fast forward to today I have written and self-published three books and am working on a not-for-profit community project book. The fourth book I’ll be publishing will be an anthology containing the writing of many mothers and fathers like you. They describe the challenges of the first year after the loss, an account of how they managed to survive.

Writing helps

Having just emerged from reading the submissions we’ve received I was taken on a journey back into the experience of the first year. Not just mine but in fact over 50 mothers’ and fathers’ experiences that they candidly shared with me. These essays took my breath away, left me gasping for air and drying my tears. Even though each parent’s experience is unique I could relate, as a mother, as a bereaved mother and as a human being, touched by their loss in the many-faceted challenges it brings.

What I didn’t fully realise when calling for submissions for this new book, was the potential for healing that this project offers. Writing and its healing potential has been researched widely (for example here and here) but reading the essays I noticed so much more. I remember now that I had already noticed this when doing the research and interviews for my first book Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple. The intense involvement with my own and other people’s stories, their ways in which they confronted and handled challenges and what happened inside of me in effect to all of this offered a huge shift in my grief towards healing. And it won’t end with me because given the end product is a book many people will receive; it offers this potential to all those who read it.

This post was originally posten on March 1st, 2017.

Filed Under: child loss, depression, emotions/feelings, grief/loss, grieving parents Tagged With: book, child loss, first year, grief and loss, grieving, grieving a child, grieving parents, grieving timeline, share your story, writing, writing your story

The Complete List Of Do’s And Don’ts When Supporting The Bereaved

January 29, 2021 By Nathalie Himmelrich Leave a Comment

grief quote by nathalie himmelrich
Grief Quote by Nathalie Himmelrich

On rare occasions, I had ‘friends’ tell me versions of: “Wouldn’t it be time to move on?” or “You’ve got such a beautiful daughter, don’t you think it would be better for her to stop mentioning her twin sister or the topic of grief and loss?” Who hasn’t heard some version of the above? Have you?

I find it hard when people tell me to change the way I feel. Especially when it’s people that haven’t experienced what I have.

Every person surrounding us has their version of what healing after loss looks like. My version is called healthy grieving: I believe in integrating loss into my life, which allows for joy and sadness, reminiscing in the past and full present-day laughter, remembering with mindfulness and gratitude.

There are lots of words written about what not to say in response to grief but not enough about how to respond to grief. As part of the book Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple I have made it a priority and my heartfelt intent to help supporters understand how to be with the bereaved. If you find it helpful, feel free to share it with your family, friends and supporters. Remember that this always needs to be applied with respect to the person’s culture and traditions. If something has really helped you, let me know in the comment section, as well as if something does not feel right for you.

The “5 Star Grief Support Guide”, which you’ll receive upon signing up for updates on the Grieving Parents Support Network summarises what I wrote here below:

Things to say or do

Things that made most difference: dropping food at our door, taking Harry out to play… just being ok with how we were.

Gavin Blue, President of Heartfelt Australia

First and foremost bereaved parents have shared with me that supporters should not feel obligated to say anything. What some call the “Art of Presence”, being there is all that is needed.

However, should you feel compelled to say something, here are the three simplest things to say:

  • I am sorry for your loss.
  • I am here for you.
  • I don’t know what to say, I’m at a loss for words.

Whatever you do or say, remember these things:

  • Acknowledge the bereaved parents, son, daughter, family member of the person who died
  • Listen but do not try to fix
  • Encourage and give them hope
  • Practice the Art of Presence.

The following points are an excerpt of my blog I wrote twenty months after Amya’s death. These are suggestions that help to acknowledge the grieving parents’ pain, journey, and responses. Use your own words or way of saying things.

ASKING QUESTIONS

Inquire how I’m doing, what I’m feeling. Don’t tell me “it must be hard” or “you must feel so awful.” Ask me, but don’t tell me. Ask again tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. Be gentle when asking, it needn’t be an interrogation.

Suggestions:

  • How are you coping?
  • What kind of help would be supportive for you? (Make a couple of suggestions)
  • May I bring some food over tonight?
  • Would you like me to just be there with you?
  • What did the doctor say?
  • Do you have anyone you can talk to?

I’M SO SORRY

This is the simplest and most appropriate sentence. It bridges any “I don’t know what to say” or “I’m lost for words” moment, any awkward silence that you might be tempted to fill with clichés. Don’t. Just say, “I’m sorry for your loss”.

SHOW YOU CARE

The little messages “I’m thinking of you” on the anniversary of my daughter’s or my mother’s death mean a lot.

  • I hear you
  • I’ve been thinking of you
  • You are not alone – I am here for you
  • I read your blog
  • My heart goes out to you.

Recently I received a touching message from someone I don’t even know who told me how much my blog touched her. She was a 38-year-old identical twin who had lost her twin sister when they were 10 days old. I would have never known whom my writing touches if she hadn’t told me.

CONTINUE TO INTERACT

I must have stunned many people into silence with my grief spell. It is okay to be contacting me again and again, even if I might not have the energy to hold long conversations. Social interactions are more tiring, yet I still crave to be with people. I am no longer the person I was pre “date with death” and as much as I sometimes want that person back, I have to deal with the New Me. Please try to do so, too.

ACCEPT ME

It’s hard enough to be sad and depressed. I am learning to accept being what I am in any moment. If you can accept that too, you won’t need to make me feel better, offer me advice, solutions, or try to tickle me with humour. Please accept me as I am.

BE WITH ME

There doesn’t need to be much talking. Knowing that you are not afraid of being in my presence, no matter what, counts. Offer your presence even if by just holding my hand.

RESPECT MY SPACE AND MY BELIEFS

You might believe in God or that, “It was meant to be this way.” Whatever it is, keep it to yourself. You cannot know where I stand in relation to your beliefs. Leave me with mine. Respect where I am with regard to what I believe or even where I might have lost any faith and trust.

ACKNOWLEDGE THE DEAD PERSON

I do understand that you might fear my reaction if you speak about my baby or my mother. Do trust that by acknowledging or talking about them you honour their memory. Say their names.

RESPECT THAT I WON’T GET OVER IT

I didn’t really understand the depth of grief before my personal experience. You do not need to understand it to accept and respect that holding my child in my arms as she passed isn’t something that I will get over. I am learning to live with it, whatever that means. Anything can and will trigger the grief and I don’t always know when or why…

TACT AND RESPECT

By all means tell me about what is going on your life, no matter how trivial or devastating it might be. I can handle it if you handle my response with tact and respect. What I do not need at this moment are trivializations of women who got pregnant and didn’t even want to have another child or mothers who abort their baby because of its gender.

PHYSICAL CONTACT – HUGS

There are times when I am very sensitive and do not want to be touched. Please consider asking before you want to give me a hug.

THE ART OF PRESENCE

Be there, not merely in the moment of crisis. Walk alongside me in the months and years to come. Allow me my process of healing. Sit with me in the moments of painful emotions and the darkness of depression. It is an illusion that in times of crisis people need space. Respect someone’s wish, if they tell you so. Otherwise, be present.

The “5 Star Grief Support Guide”, which you’ll receive upon signing up for updates on the Grieving Parents Support Network summarises the above.

The things not to say or do

Even though other authors on Still Standing Magazine have already covered this topic, this is what I wrote in the book regarding things not to say or do.

TIME

It does not matter whether you allow the grieving parent more or less time than they need or make suggestions on what should be difficult or not – comments like those mentioned below are unhelpful as they lead to self-judgment or guilt about the situation experienced.

  • Time heals all wounds.
  • It will get better with time.
  • The first year is the hardest.
  • Take your time.

DESTINY

Any suggestion on where or how the baby is now or what his or her destiny should or shouldn’t be are wild guesses or assumptions. For any mother or father there is no better place for their child than in their arms now and for eternity.

  • He is in a better place.
  • She was not meant to suffer any longer.
  • It was for the best.
  • Better it happened now than in x amount of time (days, weeks, months, years).

PARENT’S FEELINGS

Refrain from assuming you know how the grieving parent feels. You can’t know that. These comments cut like a knife. There is nothing that compares to parental grief.

  • I know how you feel.
  • It must be hard.
  • You must feel terrible!

BELIEFS AND SPIRITUALITY

Do not share your beliefs even if you think you follow the same religion or spiritual practices. The grieving parents might not be in a place to feel the same way about their religion or spirituality following the loss. Keep your religious beliefs, spiritual ideas, or ideologies to yourself.

  • God needed a special angel.
  • It was God’s plan.
  • It was meant to be this way.
  • It was his life’s plan.
  • She did what she came here to do and it was her time to go.

HOW TO GRIEVE

Suggestions on how to grieve and/or heal are ill-considered. They are based on the assumption that you know better on how to deal with the grief than the parents. Even if you have lost a child yourself, remember that every parental grief is based on their individual story, the meanings, and beliefs they have.

  • You just need to get back to your old self.
  • Chin up!
  • Distract yourself.
  • You need to… (followed by any suggestion).

COMPARISONS

Each trauma needs to be respected in its uniqueness. Every parent’s loss needs to be heard as its own story and with full attention. There is nothing that compares to the loss of a child.

  • I know how you feel, I lost my grandmother (or dad or pet).
  • I can imagine how hard it must be.

CLICHÉS

Say nothing or “I don’t know what to say” instead of any platitude.

  • Life goes on.
  • It will be all right.
  • There is a reason for everything.
  • It’s all for the best.

YOU SHOULD…

References to what they should be happy about, think about, or do instead are uncalled for. Whether it is fact or not is unimportant. The fact is the parents are mourning the loss of their child.

  • You have two other children.
  • At least you had your child for x number of years.
  • You should think about your husband.

THOUGHTLESS PHRASES

Be mindful of what may slip out of your mouth without thinking. You might be shaking your head in disbelief at these statements below. Trust me, we have all heard them. Better to say nothing at all.

  • How are things at home?
  • Was she in pain?
  • Have another baby!
  • You can have other children!
  • You’re kidding!
  • That’s not good!

INTERPRETATIONS

Over-interpreting, trying to make sense of the inexplicable or finding reasons why the baby or child has died are not helpful. Every parent experiences the why question looping in their mind. Don’t add your thoughts; leave them to

work on that.

  • Maybe it was because… (filling in your reasons why).

LET ME FIX YOU

Please do not try to fix, or make suggestions on what to do. The grieving parent only knows what it means to lose a child and what they want or do not want to do or be at this specific time in their grieving journey.

  • You need to keep yourself busy.
  • Distract yourself!
  • You need some time to yourself.
  • You need to look after her (said to the husband).

SILVER LINING

Leave any silver linings out of conversations with parents. If the grieving parent speaks them, it is their prerogative. It is not yours.

  • It’s all for the better.
  • At least . . . did not suffer.
  • You have 3 other beautiful children.
  • You’re lucky it was early on (in case of a miscarriage).
  • You are so strong.

¸.•´*¨`*•✿      ✿      ✿•*´¨*`•.¸     

What is your version of healthy grieving?
What does it look like for you?
Share it with me, us, the world because the world need your story of healing.

Let’s start a tidal wave of
#healthygrieving
when you are ready…

¸.•´*¨`*•✿      ✿      ✿•*´¨*`•.¸     

This article was first published February 4, 2015 in Still Standing Magazine.

Filed Under: child loss, counselling, grief/loss, grieving parents Tagged With: child loss, grief, grief and loss, grief support, grieving, infant loss, pregancy loss, supporting someone

Healing After Child Loss? Possible Or Impossible?

June 2, 2020 By Nathalie Himmelrich Leave a Comment

Photo by Rossina Abril on Unsplash

After the death of my daughter six and a half years ago I wrote: “I will never get over this.” This still holds true to some extent. However, I’m no longer in the despair that led me to make over-generalized statements about healing and sentences that implied I had the power of premonition.

Healing – no way!

The topic of healing after child loss is loaded. Loaded with personal definitions, ideas, and expectations from self and others. It is also emotionally loaded with the intensity of the traumatic life-changing event of the death of your child. A father in my first grief support group said: “I don’t want to heal because the pain is my only connection to my daughter”.

Healing – at least in my view and experience – is possible. Before jumping to conclusions or entering into an argument, you would need to ask me: What do you mean by ‘healing is possible?’

Ask yourself: What do you believe about healing? What is healing? What does it mean when used as a noun (the healing), as a verb (I heal) or in its progressive form (I am healing)? Definitions are personal and are based on what we’ve learnt, been influenced by and the myths we’ve been fed.

The most suitable definition I found is: “healing means to alleviate a person’s distress or anguish”.

Healing is personal

In the same way we individually define healing, we also heal in our very own personal way. What is supportive and helpful to me, might not be for my partner.

I processed the loss of my daughter a lot through my writing. First, it was by writing personal emails and notes on Facebook. I just needed to find words and express myself, initially not with the purpose of letting people know but to clarify things for myself. In the beginning, it was a safe way to talk to people without having to reply to their responses. The distance between the writer and the reader was my safe place.

With my mother’s suicide, I chose a completely different path: I joined a group of family survivors of suicide victims for a year-long group. It was intense, intimate, deep and very much worth every minute we spent together. I had also spent a few hours in grief group sessions after the loss of my daughter, but this was a different experience.

Healing expectations

In many cases, those who have expectations (or wishes) about our healing have not experienced the loss of a child. Even our own expectations, which we can hear in statements like “will this ever get better” or “when will I be better”, are based on an experience (pre-child loss) that is not comparable to the one we are having right now (post child loss).

Far too often the emotional healing after child loss is compared to physical healing from a wound or illness. This is so vastly different, there should be different words!

Healing is an activity

Writing, finding words for my experience, and especially the time it took to go through the memories, talking to other parents, was what helped me most.

The second most helpful was when I translated my first book Grieving Parents: Surviving Loss as a Couple from English into German and the realization that came from the changes that had already happened within that year since writing it.

And of course, being a beacon of light for others through my heart-work with events such as May We All Heal as part of the Grieving Parents Support Network.

What is helping you alleviate your distress and anguish?

Filed Under: child loss, grief/loss, grieving parents Tagged With: child loss, grief, grief myth, grief myths, grieving, grieving parents, healing, loss, miscarriage, parental grief, pregnancy loss, trauma

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    Nathalie Himmelrich

    I accompany people therapeutically as a holistic counsellor and coach.

    I walk alongside people dealing with the challenges presented by life and death.

    I’m also a writer and published author of multiple grief resource books and the founder of the Grieving Parents Support Network.

    Copyright © 2012 - 2022 Nathalie Himmelrich