While pregnant, I belonged to a Facebook group for women expecting babies in September. It was a place we needed to deal with all of those pregnancy anxieties, to vent away the hormone induced frustrations. Well, that’s how it started. It became a group of over a hundred friends, brought together by similar circumstances. We laughed together, comforted each other, and supported one another. I can’t say enough how much I recommend a group like that. Support from others is crucial during a time like this when your world feels like it is caving in on you, but it is just as helpful when you are excited, nervous, and looking forward to something so major in your life.
As soon as we lost Isaac, I felt like those women should know. However, my husband deactivated our Facebook accounts so that we wouldn’t have to deal with letting that huge network know why I was suddenly not pregnant – why there was no baby. The deactivation didn’t bother me, but it nagged at me over the next few weeks that this group of women didn’t know what had happened. On Monday, in a moment of panic, I reactivated Facebook to make sure that I remembered the newly reset password (I had set it while still on A LOT of medication). I took the chance to let the women know what had happened and promptly deactivated my account again.
Not long after, the group’s administrator, Jennifer, reached out to me. She was hugely supportive and knew just what I needed to hear. We talked for most of the day and into the evening. Yesterday afternoon, it briefly occurred to me that I was surprised I hadn’t heard from Jennifer again. However, she was looking forward to the birth of her sweet baby, and I hoped she was focussing on the “happy” instead of our loss. Last night, another group leader reached out to me. Wednesday, Jennifer lost her baby, Ariel. Physically she is alright, but Ariel, her sweet and beautiful baby girl, is gone.
Jennifer did not deserve this. No one deserves this. I had been writing something else for today, something about being out in the world. Then a bad thing happened to a good person, and suddenly whatever I was writing didn’t seem important anymore. Hopefully, I can be of some help to her in this terrible time.
I don’t know exactly what I believe about heaven, just that there must be something. Whatever and wherever we go, at least Isaac and Ariel have each other.
Letters to Isaac 
So tragic 💔
I have also been a member of a pregnancy forum, we were not all at the same stage but had various types of infertility in the past, and could be totally honest with each other about our worries and fears behind the cloak of anonymity. They were one of the first groups that I told after Jovan was born, and their support and kindness has really touched me. Some ladies made donations to a stillbirth charity in Jovan’s memory, such is the kindness of strangers. I still follow the thread to know how everyone is doing though I will stop if it gets too painful.
Although I do use Facebook, I’ve never used it to share every detail of my life and hadn’t done a typical pregnancy announcement. I did however share Jovan’s memorial website through Facebook once I was ready to (it took a few weeks) because I wanted everyone to know about him. He was here! I have pictures to prove it! The response has been overwhelmingly positive. I have also joined a local support group both in real life and on Facebook (secret group).
It’s an immensely personal decision about what to share, and how, and each person can only do whatever feel right to them.
But as to why bad things happen to good people, I don’t know, it’s just so unfair xx
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