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Hope H. Dover

Navigating life after loss with hope

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Baby Loss

Called to Love

May 16, 2019 by Hope H. Dover Leave a Comment

I usually post something on the 18th of May, the day my Thomas Roy died. And I still might post something on Saturday, but today I have some thoughts.

All four of my children are represented on this wall in our playroom, each one of them fearfully and wonderfully made. Two of my children are waiting for me in heaven and I have the privilege of pointing the other two to Jesus so we can one day all be made new and our family be made complete for eternity.

I am pro-life AND I have had an abortion. I do not share this to make a big political or religious statement. I share this to ask that before you sit behind a screen and hit post or share to let everyone know how you feel, that you will remember there are real people on the other side of the issue, no matter where you stand. Real mamas and daddies and babies. Real grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends. Real people with real feelings and very real experiences.


Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

Romans 13:8-10

I don’t think any woman includes having an abortion in her life plans, hopes or dreams. It’s not something little girls dream of as they think about their future. I do believe as a Christian I have a unique opportunity to show the love of Jesus to those who have walked this path. It is not my right to judge them, shame them, call them names or make them feel less than. (Which, by the way, I have felt all of those things over the years while scrolling through social media.) It is my responsibility to love them as Jesus loves them. And if you call yourself a follower of Christ, it’s your responsibility as well.


My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.

John 15:12

Let’s do better, church. Let’s love like Jesus. Because we are not going to win souls for him by making people feel like crap because of their choices. That’s the Holy Spirit’s job anyway.


Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.

1 Peter 4:8

So, on the seventh anniversary of the worst weeks of my life, I’d like to share my experiences as I recorded them in 2013. The emotions are just as raw seven years later.

Here is the story of my sweet Thomas Roy, the one who made me a mother.

Two Lines
The Sweetest Sound
Just a Feeling
“It’s not good.”
When Black and White Turn to Gray
Sweet Turns Sour
The 18th
Questions, Answers and Peace

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Faith, Grief

My Hurting Heart

May 18, 2018 by Hope H. Dover Leave a Comment

 

“Your heart will heal.” These were the words the nurse whispered in my ear as she wheeled me into the elevator. Hours earlier as I came out of anesthesia in the recovery room I asked her if it was over. After she confirmed the surgery to terminate the pregnancy of my very much loved baby was over, I tearfully muttered, “My heart hurts.” It hurt more than I can put into words.

It has been six years since that dreadful day and those words she spoke have stuck with me. Over the years I have waited for healing. I have waited for the gaping holes in my heart not to hurt so badly. I have waited for triggers not to be triggers anymore. I have waited, but my heart still hurts. There is still an emptiness. It is still broken.

Psalm 147:3 says, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” I have no doubt Jesus heals. But what is healing?

Over this past year, I have come to realize that healing as I imagined it (and healing by the world’s standards) is not going to come. For me, healing is not the absence of pain. It does not come tied up with a pretty red bow making everything better. Healing is messy. The holes left in my heart by the two babies I lost are always going to hurt…and at times just as badly as the initial pain of losing them. Triggers will always be present, although their intensity may fade. When I look at my family, two will always be missing.

I believe God leaves us a little broken so that we will always lean on His strength. If we were completely healed and whole, we would have no need for His presence in our lives. Jesus died on the cross so we can receive complete healing when we enter into eternity with Him.

My heart hasn’t healed and living with such a great loss is not any easier six years later. I made a choice to embrace a new normal. I let God bind up my wounds and hold them as I journey through my life here. I chose to let my loss make me a better person and give me a greater purpose.

None of this is easy. It is a fight to the end. I grow weary at times. Sometimes I want to give up. Yet I don’t give up. I put my hope in His unfailing love. I turn to God for strength and He gives me what I need to get through – every single time. And I wait expectantly for the day I enter heaven’s gates and receive complete healing.

My hurting heart has become one of my most treasured possessions. I wouldn’t be the person I am today without the hurt. God used the death of my son to bring about a new life in me (Isaiah 43:19).

On this day six years ago my baby, Thomas Roy, died and his broken body was made whole. Today I am sad he is not here, but I am praising God for the redeeming work He has done in my life since his death.

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”
Psalm 139:13‭-‬16

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Faith, Grief

Unshakable Hope

November 16, 2017 by Hope H. Dover Leave a Comment

The air was crisp and the jacket I was wearing did not adequately shield the chill of the wind, but I was being pulled to take a walk. This wasn’t just an ordinary walk. It was a Sunday morning at church during Sunday School and I needed to walk. As I walked down the drive toward the highway, I was led to our church’s historic cemetery.

I have done this a few times over the past year – walked among the final resting place of the bodies of the dead. Usually I walk to the grave sites of my grandparents and aunts and uncles who have made their way to heaven without paying much attention to the others buried there. But this time was different.

Walking by the grave sites, my eye was drawn to the smaller tombs, to the heart-shaped ones, the ones with little concrete angels perched atop them, the ones with lambs etched in the stone. As I noticed the dates on the markers I realized these were all graves of infants or children. Some had the same birth and death dates. Some only had one date. Others had birth and death dates that were only months or a few years apart. So many infants and children gone in the first minutes, hours, days, weeks and months of their lives.

Each of them have a story that I do not know. Each of them left mothers behind. I do not know the circumstances surrounding their deaths. I can guarantee that those mothers did not plan to have to bury their babies. That is not something you plan for when you find out you are expecting a child.

One family was buried together. The baby died in 1947 and the mother died in 2015. That mother lived sixty-eight years without her child. I have lived five without my first child and four without my second. The idea of walking around with a piece of my heart missing for sixty-eight years feels like an impossible task. Sometimes walking around with a piece of my heart missing for five more minutes feels impossible.

As I stood there thinking about all the babies and children and all the mothers left behind, I was reminded that we are not alone. Those of us walking this Earth with pieces of our hearts missing are not alone. Some of us grieve aloud, while others grieve quietly, but we are not alone. We are all missing our babies. God drew me to the cemetery and drew my eye to notice these stones to remind me of this.

I don’t know what it will feel like to live without my children for ten, twenty or even sixty years. I only know what it feels like at five and four years. It still hurts. There is still pain. I still long to hold them, to know them. Sometimes memories come and grief hits as hard and raw as those first days of loss. Other times I am left with a deep appreciation for my first two children. Their lives and deaths opened up the doorway to changes in me that may not have happened otherwise. God used them to change me.

I am still figuring out how to live fully after loss. I imagine I always will be on some level. I am learning that living fully does not mean living void of pain. The pain will always be there. I am learning to be okay with that. I am learning to use that pain for a greater purpose. Learning is the key word here. I certainly do not have it all figured out.

Walking back toward the church, I was drawn to a word in all capital letters on one of the gravestones: HOPE. I think after ten, twenty or sixty years of missing my babies I will be able to say that hope is what got me through. This is not a frail or questionable or unstable hope. It is the hope described in Hebrews 6:19 – firm, secure, confident, unshakable hope.

I had to seek out this hope and grab hold of it. I prayed for it. I studied scripture to understand it. It did not come easily and now that I have it I am not letting go. It is a gift from God in the form of his son Jesus and without it I have nothing. Hope is how I get through the next minute, hour, day, week, month, year. Hope is how I live after loss.

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Faith, Grief

Blooming in Heaven

November 7, 2017 by Hope H. Dover Leave a Comment

“Our lives might feel completely out of control right now, and when it does you gotta grieve. But you also must look ahead…Grieve away. You have every right to embrace those waves of grief. But grieve in hope. Stay rooted in hope, because your little one is blooming in heaven.” (Sarah Philpott in Loved Baby)

I ran out of church Sunday in the middle of the pastor’s prayer. I managed to make it out the door and down the front steps before the tears started pouring down my face. Minutes later as my husband came out and sat down beside me, I muttered the words, “I hate November.” Those words were mostly true. I don’t hate November all of the time, but in that moment, I hated November. It is the month we should have brought our first child into the world. It is a month that still comes with much pain. In that moment the pain was too much and I needed to grieve.

Today as I read the words from Sarah Philpott in the last few pages of her book, I was comforted. Life has become a delicate dance of joy and pain, laughter and tears, since that first due date came and went without a baby five years ago. Knowing our babies are safe in the arms of Jesus waiting for our arrival on heaven’s shore is what has helped me navigate life after loss with hope. But that knowledge – that hope – does not take away the pain of living without two of my children. Due dates and loss dates are still hard. And I am finding that holidays, family vacations and even everyday moments still leave me wondering and sometimes feeling lost without them here. The image of my babies blooming in heaven helps.

Navigating loss is hard and sometimes isolating. Losing a baby during pregnancy is especially hard because it is not talked about often, even though pregnancy loss is very common. The resources available to women beginning this journey are scarce. After my first loss, I was desperate to know what I was feeling and experiencing was normal. I needed to hear from women who had walked this path ahead of me. Sarah Philpott does just that in her new book, Loved Baby.

Even five years after my first loss, this book has been a balm to my aching soul. Throughout the pages of this book, Sarah combines her own experiences with the experiences of other bereaved moms to offer hope to those walking the road of pregnancy loss. She includes truths from scripture and tips and strategies for managing the grief of losing a child in this collection of thirty-one devotions.

Loved Baby offers real talk about real issues that women grieving a child through pregnancy loss are facing. Sarah tackles the topics of asking why, having the right to mourn, depression and anxiety, hurtful words, anger and jealousy and much more. Sarah beautifully uses words to wrap the reader up in a big blanket of “me too,” which is exactly what a bereaved mother needs.

I have added Loved Baby to my short list of books to gift and recommend to newly bereaved mothers. I was fortunate to be able to donate a copy to KinderMourn and give a copy to my Ob-Gyn, Dr. P. I have one more copy to give to a bereaved mother through this blog. If you or someone you know can benefit from receiving a copy of this book, please complete this form by Friday, November 17. I will randomly choose a recipient to gift a copy of the book and ship it by Thanksgiving.


Letting a mother who has lost a baby during pregnancy know that you remember her baby is a gift like none other. If you would like to purchase a copy of Loved Baby for a bereaved mom in your life, you can purchase a copy at most major book retailers. Fashion & Compassion also has a bundle that includes the book and a beautiful “loved” bracelet. The Family Tree Candle Company is offering a “Loved Baby” candle that would make a wonderful gift to a bereaved mom. A copy of the book will be donated to a family grieving a pregnancy loss with each candle purchased.

Photo courtesy of Fashion & Compassion

Photo courtesy of the Family Tree Candle Company

 


Disclosure: I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for my fair and honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Grief

Believing God is Bigger

June 2, 2016 by Hope H. Dover 2 Comments

Believing God is Bigger - www.hopehdover.com

I entered the sanctuary of the church that was hosting my niece’s high school graduation ceremony Saturday morning unaware that we were going to HAVE church that morning. I was expecting the typical graduation ceremony. You know – the welcome, the salutatorian and valedictorian speeches, the awarding of the diplomas, maybe a video montage. But as the guest speaker (a pastor) got started, I was prompted to pick up a pen and take some notes on my program.

This guy was not only speaking to the graduates, everything he said could be applicable to every person in that room. There were so many good things said and so many sweet nuggets of wisdom written down. I really wish I could just post a recording of everything he said. It was that good. One thing that he said really caused me to reflect on the past four years of my life.

“No problem that ever rises up in your life will be the size of the solution that rises in God. Problems will rise up in your life, but no matter what the problem is, it is small in comparison to the solution.” -Joe LewisBelieving God is Bigger - www.hopehdover.com

Looking back at what God has brought me through over the past four years proves this point. Four years ago began a series of some fairly big problems in my life – baby loss, grief, infertility. They were big for me. Sometimes so huge, so overwhelming that I didn’t think I would ever get through it. There was deep grief over the loss of two babies. There were countless fertility treatments and month after month of negative pregnancy tests. There were so many sleepless nights wondering what purpose there could possibly be for all of this pain. There was a pregnancy riddled with so much anxiety that I didn’t even believe we were going to be bringing a baby home until we actually brought that baby home. These were big problems for me, but thankfully, they were not too big for God.

The word problem is defined as something that is difficult to deal with – a source of trouble, distress and worry. Life is always going to bring trouble, distress and worry. Some of the problems we face will seem small, while others will seem monumental. The good news is that there is no problem bigger than God. In John 16:33, Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” We have to believe this. We have to believe in God’s perfect plan. We have to believe that every trouble, distress and worry that we face is going to strengthen us for what God has in store.

This truth has gotten me through many difficult days. This truth kept me from staying curled up in a fetal position in my bed on those days. This truth gave me the push I needed to keep going. And I am so glad that I kept going because life has become so sweet. I know I will still face trials and tribulations. That’s life. When those problems arise, I can look back at what I have overcome and remember that God is bigger and His plan is perfect.

What problems are you facing today? Do you believe that God is bigger? Do you trust in His perfect plan? These verses got me through some tough times. I hope they will do the same for you.

God is Bigger - www.hopehdover.com

Until next time, keep hoping!

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Faith, Grief, Infertility

Redefining May 18th

May 18, 2016 by Hope H. Dover 2 Comments

Redifining May 18thIf you were to ask me to tell you about the worst day of my life, it would without a doubt be May 18, 2012. It’s the day my baby died. It’s the day I terminated a pregnancy for medical reasons. It’s the day I never wanted to be. It’s the day I have relived over and over in my head so many times. It’s the day, months later, that I wished I had died. It’s the day that left me asking, “Is this really my life?” It’s the day that brought so much pain. It’s the day that changed my life forever. It’s the day my baby died.

Every year when the month of May rolls around, I feel it in the pit of my stomach. It’s coming – the loss anniversary. Usually anniversaries bring memories of happy times. But not a loss anniversary. A loss anniversary brings memories of the worst time. And no matter how hard I’ve tried over the years to ease the blow, it hits me in the gut every time.

Memories of pulling over on the side of the road on the way to the hospital because I was sick. Waiting in the hospital waiting room with tears streaming down my face. The sandpaper-like texture of the tissues they gave me as I waited to be rolled back to the operating room. Worrying that my husband had not had anything to eat all day. Crying as they wheeled me into the operating room. Waking up and telling the nurse in the recovery room that my heart hurt.

This year on May 18th, four years later, I’ll be wheeled into the operating room again; only for a much different reason. The thing I’ve fought so hard to preserve all these years (my fertility) will be taken away. I’m having a hysterectomy. It is my best shot at eliminating the pain caused by endometriosis, rather than merely managing the pain for the rest of my life. It is my choice and I know it is the right thing to do. I have two beautiful children and they are my main reason for doing this sooner rather than later. I need to be fully present for them, and I can’t do that if I’m in chronic pain. That doesn’t mean it’s easy.

When the nurse called with my surgery date, I hesitated for a minute. In my head I was thinking, “May 18th is the day my baby died. I don’t think I have room for anything else on that day. Plus, I’m supposed to go to the dentist.” But I went ahead and told her that was okay because it would probably be another month if I didn’t. There are so many emotions wrapped up in this day, in this surgery. But this year, I have decided that I am redefining May 18th. Yes, it will always be the day my baby died. But now it will also be the day that freed me from the physical pain that has tortured me since adolescence.

I’ll never forget the events of May 18, 2012. Why would I want to forget? It’s the day that changed me. Forgetting would mean not acknowledging the precious life that made me a mother. I’ll never forget, but maybe one day this day won’t sucker punch me like it always seems to do. Maybe. Or maybe it will always be hard. That will be okay too. Because looking back at those dark times lets me see how far I’ve come and how joyful the morning really is.

Until next time, keep hoping!

Filed Under: Baby Loss, Grief, Infertility

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