Tag: Why Rocks?

What to Name Your Child

Posted on by MM4L

What to Name Your Child

Whether the decision to name your child was a no-brainer for you or whether it was a difficult decision, Miscarriage Moms For Life both compliments and welcomes you to this discussion. Deciding on a name is a big responsibility. While family names may change due to marriage, most people don’t change their given names, so it’s a lifetime decision.

Don’t stop with a nickname. While this may be tempting, give your child a real name—a “legal” name, even if you cannot register that name with a hospital or human government.

What to Name Your Child

When deciding on a name for your child, consider…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for another helpful tip.

If you’ve already decided on a name for the child of that pregnancy, consider sticking with it. Keeping the same name may signal to others that the child that died is irreplaceable, and you will always love that child. If you are feeling undue pressure to reserve that name for a child you get to interact here on earth longer, then figure out another name that will honor the memory of the child in Heaven (read My Baby is in Heaven).

Read more of What to name your child?...
  Consider naming your child as unique and different from their siblings. Try to avoid names that seem to provoke sibling rivalry. Remember that you hope that their siblings will like to say the name of their brother or sister in heaven.

 

 

 

 

 

Give your child a name that—if given a private internment—you will not regret seeing on their grave marker or tombstone twenty years from now. That is the sobering reality for us. Even if you were not able to provide that, Miscarriage Moms For Life hopes to raise the funds to provide all pregnancy loss children with gravesite recognition (read Why Rocks), so consider choosing a name that will last longer than we will at such a site. Name them with respect, dignity, and love.

This may be a great opportunity to…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for additional information.

Consider giving your child a name with…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for heartening information.

 

Attend a Miscarriage Moms For Life memorial for more on this topic, or read our book, Other Side Of Grief. Find more validation in reading our book, When Unborn Babies Speak.

 

Importance of Funeral Rituals

Posted on by MM4L

 

 

One of the purposes of Miscarriage Moms For Life is to (as resources allow) provide memorials (at gravesites, where available) for our children who died during pregnancy and were not buried. But why do we feel that is important anyway when it seems like everyone around us is so dismissive of our losses? Because memorials acknowledge that human lives matter—regardless of how brief they were.

Some points to the Importance of MEMORIAL Rituals

Memorials offer…

To learn more, read our book, Other Side Of Grief.

Memorials remember the deceased.
“It has been said that every life has value and every life makes a contribution to the world. The funeral/memorial service is a testament to that truth. Everyone deserves a funeral because every life is valuable, every life deserves recognition, every life deserves that ‘pause’ in our busy day to celebrate that this person lived and contributed,” Ken Kuratko, Grief Journey Consultants, Riverside, Illinois. Sharing our memories of (and hopes and dreams for) our babies both solidifies within us and testifies to others the value—the love—we have for them.

Memorials point…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for additional information.

Memorials offer closure.
There is a sense of resolution, of finality, in having the deceased remains respectfully handled and laid to rest. Mourners are given the opportunity to (if possible) see the body one last time and say goodbye. There are laws against desecrating human corpses, yet women who suffer miscarriages are often told to just flush the toilet. In our hearts, some of us notice this disparity and we may begin to feel like the rest of the world thinks our babies are disposable trash. . .. Unless our babies are granted the dignity of a funeral. This point hints at Rizpah’s knowing it wasn’t right for her sons not to get buried and her unrest until they were buried.

 

Memorials…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for this exclusive information.

 

Memorial invite others to support us.
“Funerals make a social statement that says, “Come support me.” (read the Importance of Validation) Whether they realize it or not, those who choose not to have a funeral are saying, “Don’t come support me.”… at funerals we are “allowed” to embrace, to touch, to comfort. Again, words are inadequate so we nonverbally demonstrate our support. This physical show of support is one of the most important healing aspects of meaningful funeral ceremonies…. Our physical presence is our most important show of support for the living. By attending the funeral we let everyone else there know that they are not alone in their grief,” Dr. Alan Wolfelt, C.T., centerforloss.com. We are encouraged to “weep with those who weep,” Romans 12:15.

These are just some of the several reasons highlighting the importance of memorial rituals. No matter the age, we love our children, and memorials are a way to express our love and gain comfort in laying them to rest. Even though many of us have been denied the opportunity to bury our children, we believe in the healing value of conducting these rituals symbolically. This is why Miscarriage Moms For Life wants to provide grieving families a way to memorialize their children—whether lost recently or 50 years ago—symbolically with a painted stone (read Why Rocks).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Learn about a few other vital points shared in our book, Other Side Of Grief.

 

Why Rocks?

Posted on by MM4L

Why Rocks?

At the memorials from Miscarriage Moms For Life (read the Importance of Funeral Rituals), we use rocks to represent our babies whom we lost during our pregnancies. Rocks are plain and basic. Don’t our babies deserve something fancier? Something a little more aesthetically appealing? Sure, but there is a special significance to using rocks.

So Why Rocks?

Scripture says from dust we were made and to dust we will return. Dust could be challenging to personalize, and we can’t have that. But rocks are also earthy, and using rocks to symbolize our children does not have to be considered demeaning.  So why rocks?

Let's take a brief look at...
what scripture says about rocks:

Psalm 18:2- The LORD is my Rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my Rock, in Whom I take refuge, my Shield and the Horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

Psalm 71:3- Be my Rock of refuge, to which I can always go; give the command to save me, for you are my Rock and my fortress…Be my Rock of safety where I can always hide.

I Corinthians 10:4- And drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual Rock that accompanied them, and that Rock was Christ.

 

 

 

 

 

II Samuel 22:47- The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Savior! . . . Praise to my Rock! May God, the Rock of my salvation be exalted….

Those are examples of our Lord God being our Rock spiritually.

But what about us…

Read our book, Other Side Of Grief, for further information.

 

 

 

 

 

…But at least now we have something tangible, something to represent our babies whom not only died but whose bodies we were not able to properly commit in a memorial service. And now we can hold their memorial service and symbolically commit them at an official memorial (or gravesite, where available).  [But don’t worry–it’s symbolic, so you can keep the rock you worked so hard to personalize.]  May this act help bring peace and comfort to your hearts.
 

Attend a Miscarriage Moms For Life memorial to memorialize your baby. Read our book, Other Side Of Grief. Find more comfort and healing in reading our book, When Unborn Babies Speak.

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