“When you honor what you have, you honor what I’ve lost.” — Brené Brown, Daring Greatly
This powerful quote resonated with me deeply during a recent cross-country trip with my sister, where we listened to Brené Brown’s audiobook, The Power of Vulnerability. It made me reflect on my own experiences with loss and how I navigate sympathy and empathy.
On our road trip in September, my sister and I listened to Brené talk about sympathy versus empathy. I got super triggered just hearing her talk about sympathy because I experience it all the time and I can’t stand it. I can’t stand to be pitied for my loss. It feels awful. I don’t want to be someone who is pitied all the time. Yes, losing my child was and is painful. It sucked more than any other experience I have had. But I don’t want pity. I don’t want “your loss is the worst thing imaginable.” I mean, for one thing I know that in every pregnancy there are 3 babies: the perfect baby, the feared baby, and the real baby. And my baby was completely all 3: absolutely perfect, absolutely feared, and absolutely real.
The truth is that most of us experience loss at some point in our lives. Children grow up. They don’t stay little. Even if my son were still alive, he wouldn’t be a baby anymore. If he had been born healthy, he would be driving now! He would almost certainly be taller than me! And it wouldn’t be long before he would be thinking about moving out on his own.
So if I don’t want pity, what do I want instead?
“When you honor what you have, you honor what I’ve lost.” — Brené Brown,Daring Greatly
I want to honor what I’ve lost by honoring what you have, by empowering you to live an awesome life! When you live a life that is healthy, joyful, and filled with strong relationships, I feel meaning and joy. I want to create a community that is a safe space where we do the hard things together. We
imperfectly take care of our mental and physical health
Prioritize empathy and do the work it takes to practice it
Prioritize our relationships and learn skills to nurture them and to manage the inevitable conflicts
Honor what you have. We take care of parents and we take care of kids and we take care of ourselves, because honestly we have to put on our own oxygen masks before assisting others.
“You cannot claim to care about children and shame mothers for the choices they are making.” Brené Brown
You honor what I’ve lost when you are respectful of other parents even when you don’t agree with their choices.
Children learn what they live. My goal is to help children grow well by helping adults to do the work and the play to feel nurtured and playful and peaceful and to create community that is respectful and nurturing and empathetic. And when we mess up, we apologize and are held accountable.
In my community we listen to mentors such as Brené Brown and John and Julie Gottman and John Medina and Stuart Brown.
When I do something that blesses you, remember this:
“When you honor what you have, you honor what I’ve lost.” — Brené Brown,Daring Greatly
Please don’t pity my loss. Instead:
Express gratitude or affection to your partner or your kid
Tell people you love what you love about them
Take care of your physical and mental health by drinking water, moving your body in a way that feels good, eating nutritious foods, or doing a meditation or a hypnosis or some journaling.
Make laughter a priority.
Share with other people how my support has helped you.
Create rituals of love and connection in your family by talking about your day and providing opportunities to be seen and heard without advice.
