Honoring Your Baby in Heaven During the Holidays

Ideas for how to create holiday memories and traditions for your baby who has passed away during pregnancy or infancy.

Life after loss can be brutal. Even ordinary days can trigger memories, and remind you of a future that is so different from how you had planned and hoped for. So what about days that aren't ordinary, like the holidays? As the holiday season approaches, it can feel impossible to think about the days ahead without a pit in your stomach. I wrote this blog to remind you that it's okay to feel emotional leading up to certain dates, and it's also more than okay to honor and remember your baby on these special days if you choose to.

Now, I have yet to go through a Thanksgiving or Christmas season since our lost, but these holidays were actually a few of the first things that came to mind after we lost our son. Especially Thanksgiving as our baby would have been born just a few weeks before. However, I do know what it's like to go through a holiday after a loss. Just about two weeks after we lost our baby was Mother's Day. Then there was the 4th of July. Each of these days, as well as other holidays or important dates that have passed, have been extra emotional for sure, so my hope is to encourage you, and if you are up to it, to still make memories. They may not be the memories you'd hoped to have made, but it's still possible to honor and remember and even include your baby in the holidays, and I'm going to share a few ways I plan to do so this year and in the years to come.

Sticking to a few holidays I will personally be celebrating in the upcoming season, I will be mainly focusing on Thanksgiving and Christmas. However, you could certainly apply many of these traditions to any holiday.

Durning the month of November, perhaps you could donate food to a local food bank or church in your child's name. There are often many organizations collecting food in order to bless families in need with a Thanksgiving dinner, and how special to be a part of that in honor of your child.
I also plan to write a letter of thankfulness. Maybe your letter is written to your child, to God, or just includes some of your thoughts. As painful as the season is that you are walking through, try to think back to your pregnancy, or any other memories that remind you of your child that you can be thankful for. A few on my list include; the promise of Heaven and being able to meet my baby someday, I'm thankful for those 3 short months I got to carry them, I'm thankful that despite the heartache we have endured we have been able to comfort others. Those are a few examples but I encourage you to make your own list.
Just before Thanksgiving dinner, either on your own, or with your whole family, light a candle in memory of your baby. Allow the candle to burn during dinner. When you blow it out, take a moment to think about your baby, and say a prayer.

For Christmas, we ordered a small personalized stocking with our baby's name on it and throughout the season we are going to fill it with money. We are going to ask our family to leave donations in his stocking as well. Just before Christmas, we are going to donate the money we raise to a good cause, perhaps an adoption or loss charity. Another option would be to use the funds to bless another loss family or mother with a gift to encourage them during their loss.

We will also hang a personalized ornament on the tree for our baby. You could purchase an ornament or craft your own.
We also plan to bless a child the age our sweet boy would have been each Christmas. There are many charities that allow you to choose a child by gender and age to bless, such as The Salvation Army's Angel Tree charity or Operation Christmas Child. This year we will try to bless a baby boy, next year a one year old, etc.

I hope this list sparks some ideas for how to bring a little more joy to these wonderful but potentially difficult days ahead. And please know that it is also completely fine to wake up on a holiday with none of these traditions planned, and simply think of your baby for a moment. That is tradition enough and you must do what works best for you.