Guidelines for Couples Grieving the Death of a Child

1) Realize the death of your child will hurt more than you imagined. It will rearrange your life and world view. Your relationship with your partner will be stretched. There are some things you can do to reduce strain on your relationship.

2) You and your partner will grieve differently. Let go of the assumption that you “ought” to do it alike. Respectfully make room for each other’s style.

3) Increase the amount of time that you spend in each other’s company. Listen to each other as much as you can. Do special little things for each other.

4) Realize you cannot meet all of your partner’s needs. You have limits. You are both over-extended. Do seek appropriate outside support when you need it.

5) Focus on what you need. Let go of trying to get your partner to do something different about his or her own grief.

6) Grief takes its time and is not very predictable. Let go of trying to conform to anybody else’s idea of how you ought to be doing.

7) Women, if you don’t see your partner grieving in ways you recognize, stay clear of the trap of deciding this means he doesn’t care enough. Ask him what he does with his sadness and sense of helplessness. Remember you both hurt. You will both feel it and show it in different ways.

8) Men, if your partner needs to talk about her grief more than you can absorb, encourage her to find additional places to talk. Show her you care in other ways. Keep clear of the trap of thinking you aren’t doing it “right”. Let go of trying to get her “through it” easier or faster.

9) Remember other parents have survived this much pain. Life will be meaningful again.

10) Keep remembering life will become meaningful again.

Based on Coping with Infant or Fetal Loss: The Couple’s Healing Process by Kathleen Gilbert and Laura Smart, 1992. Summarized by Marilyn Gryte, MS. Permission granted by Kathleen Gilbert to be copied and shared.