Dealing With Grief as a New Parent

It was two days before Christmas — 6.10 am to be precise when my phone rang. I could barely open my eyes and was surprised to hear my phone ring that early.

What happened next was something I had not even remotely expected!

Words That Changed My Identity

My parents had been on a Christmas vacation with my sister and her family that year. For the last couple of days, they had been staying at a small beach town.

And before they had all left for the vacation, I had taken my parents out for lunch — just the three of us. An outing with my parents had been a rare blessing — and I can still remember most of what we ate and talked about.

My dad had especially suited up for the lunch date with me and mom. I remember hugging him in the restaurant and taking a photo as he smiled widely into my phone camera. I remember the day so clearly that I am tearing up as I type this.

That was the last time that I saw my wonderful dad!

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When my phone rang that morning — two days before Christmas — my sister tearfully called to tell me that our dad had suffered a major heart attack. He had been taken to the local ER.

Since they had been vacationing in a small beach town, there were no big hospitals nearby. The local hospital recommended moving him to the big hospital in the next city — 25 kilometers away. The next few hours had been a blur with paperwork, arranging for an ambulance, and finding an appropriate hospital. Being a thousand kilometers away from my family, I could do nothing at that point. I was on the phone nonstop — sometimes with my mother, my sister, my brother-in-law.

But my dad died on the way to the big city hospital.

My severely asthmatic mother (and his wife of 33 years) was holding his hand in the ambulance when it happened. To say that the passing of my dad while on vacation a thousand kilometers from home was a shocker — would be an understatement.

I can still vividly remember the exact moment my mom told me, her voice blurred with tears and shock. I kept asking her to make the ambulance drive faster and she muttered in between sobs that my dad wasn’t alive anymore.

I still remember the ringing in my ears and the silence in my brain for the next few seconds.

I am a writer. But for the first time ever, I realized what it meant to be at a loss for words. I didn’t know how to respond to her so I just hung up. Yes, I just hung up. Then I bawled my eyes out sitting on my bed.

What Made it Even Worse?

I was a new mom to a five-month-old daughter at that time. I was still full-time nursing and while I sat stunned at the news, I could still hear my daughter crying in the other room for me while my husband tried desperately to calm her down.

Blessed with a shiny new summer baby earlier in the year, my life has been turned upside down and I was still trying my best to learn how to be a mom. Now I could just feel myself drowning without an anchor.

Those 24 hours were a blur for me. It was a ginormous task bringing my dad back to our home city for the funeral. There was paperwork for the flight, police verification, embalming formalities, and many other things — that we had never even heard before. As my sister struggled in an unfamiliar city, I tried my best in coordinating all the procedural formalities over the phone with a baby latched onto me.

Over the next few days, weeks and months, there was really no time for me to rationalize what happened. After the funeral, my mother herself spent more than a fortnight in the ICU due to the shock and trauma. And I spent most of my time trying to make my family feel better.

But I am not sure if many people understood what I was personally going through. And it is not as if I talked about it as well. Somehow, I stopped talking about dad with anyone since I thought no one would understand how I was feeling.

But did that mean I had coped? Far from it!

Why am I Telling You This?

It is absolutely, brutally, gut-wrenchingly hard to lose a parent, no matter how old you are.

It is probably a few degrees harder when you are a new parent yourself and have absolutely no clue of how to place one foot after the next.

So if, unfortunately, you know a new mother who just lost a parent — here are three things you can try not to do. And trust me, I have learned this by being on that wobbly boat of grief.

#1. Stop telling her to move on.

Yes, just stop that. She didn’t just lose her dad. Most likely, she lost her guiding north star. She lost the one person in the whole world who she could have counted on with her eyes closed.

She lost her anchor for navigating through difficult times and tough conversations. She lost the mentor who taught her all the things you might like best in her. She lost all the moments that she imagined her baby would have had with her Grandpa.

And most of all she lost her backup life support for anything that could have ever gone wrong and she doesn’t how to breathe without him anymore. So just stop telling her to move on. She just can’t. At least not yet

#2. Stop telling her she is a Mom.

Trust me she knows she is a Mom. She knows she needs to be brave because she now has a child herself. She knows she needs to not cry in front of the baby. Trust me she knows that!

She must already be spending more than her fair share of energy in trying not to cry at every waking moment of the day. She must be trying really hard to not cry while feeding the baby since that is when she is left alone with her thoughts.

She is frustrated, angry, sad and most of all overwhelmed with all the changes around her. So just stop reminding her that she is a mother. She Knows.

#3. Stop trying to make her forget.

The first year is the hardest for her — understand that. Accept that. You might forget sometimes that she lost her dad. You might even think it’s been a few months already and wonder why you catch her forlorn in thoughts or drenched in tears at times. Just give her space then, to think, to reflect, to breathe, and to try being stronger.

Every day of celebration in that year, whether it’s Christmas or New Year’s Day or Easter will make her think of her dad. It might be the worst on her birthday or his birthday when she might remember all the sweet little rituals they had growing up.

Or it might be the worst on Father’s Day when every screen, TV commercial, and store reminds her to buy something for her dad. She will remember she doesn’t have anyone to buy for anymore and she will cry. Not in front of you or anyone else for that matter. But she will.

So if you catch her hugging the baby and crying, just let her do it.

Or better yet, just go hug her.

Parting Thoughts

A new Mom is already at her most vulnerable. She might be a big executive at the workplace or a stay-at-home mother. But no matter who she is, she feels the most vulnerable at the moment.

She underwent a frankly traumatic experience in bringing someone into the world and is barely coping with the anxiety, sleeplessness, physical discomfort, and unending helplessness of being a new parent. She is already feeling incompetent in taking care of a whole little person who depends on her for — quite literally — everything. And while she was still dealing with this life-altering change, she lost a parent.

Over a span of months, not only did she become a parent, but she also lost one.

All is she needs is a quiet, non-judgemental hug and mostly time to heal. So just stop, and give her that. And if you can, then just give her some space!

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Whether or not a new mom, are you dealing with the loss of a loved one yourself or know someone who is? Can you share some positive notes to help fellow survivors feel better? Sending you hugs – and you can leave me some in the comments.

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This post was previously published on Medium.

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