Most of us can agree that we all have stressors, especially within our families and we all have our own ways to “cope” with these stressors. But what most of us don’t realize is that coping is not just “getting by”. In order to completely overcome hard times and become stronger from them, we must learn to really deal with these trials and not just “swallow” our feelings in order to get by.
When I was 18 years old and a senior in high school, my parents got divorced. While this was really hard for me, I just kept telling myself that everything would be okay and pretended like it didn’t bother me. Instead of talking to my parents about how I felt, I just continued to live my life as if nothing had changed.
It wasn’t until nearly a year later that I started to realize how much the divorce was affecting me, and started to connect with my parents about how it made me feel. However at that point, my parents had already moved on. My mom was engaged to my now stepdad and my dad was dating a lot. I still was able to work on my relationship with my dad, but because I didn’t deal with my feelings toward the divorce when it first happened, it was a lot harder because everyone had already moved on.
I learned firsthand that it is vital to deal with things right as they happen and not “swallow” my feelings only to have them come back up later.
I am actually really grateful for the natural consequences that came with not dealing with my feelings from my parents’ divorce. It prepared me for the hardest trial I have ever gone through, because it taught me to accept my feelings as I go through hard things.
Just three months ago, my husband and I lost our baby due to a miscarriage. This was hands-down the hardest thing I have ever gone through. Miscarriage is something that really needs to be talked about more openly and is something that you cannot even comprehend unless you go through yourself.
When I lost my baby, instead of hiding it and keeping it to myself, I chose to share my loss with others in order to gain support from family and friends. This was so important for my healing process. While I had people who told me it “wasn’t a big deal” or “it was just a pregnancy, not a baby” or “just try to not think about it”, I had even more support from friends and family who had gone through the same thing.
The biggest piece of advice someone gave me was to let myself mourn the loss of this baby as long as I needed to. This baby was just as much my child as someone who loses their child to cancer at 10 years old. My dear friend told me that no matter what anyone told me, this baby was my child. And I lost them.
This was CRUCIAL for me. It made my feelings valid and allowed me to let myself feel everything I was feeling. All the empathy I got from others who had experienced this same loss helped me truly COPE. This baby was my child, not just a “lost pregnancy”. Feeling all the feelings helped me learn to love my child and not to just never think about them in order to not feel sad. I decided that I wanted this child to be as much a part of our family as the rest of our children and I wanted him/her to be someone we always talked about with our kids.
Just a month after my miscarriage, I learned that I was pregnant again. If I didn’t deal with losing my precious angel baby, I don’t think I would have been ready to accept this new baby. I am so grateful for those kind words from my dear friend about allowing myself to heal and know that anytime I go through another “stressor” in my family, I will always make sure to cope the right way.
Elisabeth Hampton & Family 