Pretty much every single day a mom comes into my private group and tells me her husband is making her feel worse.
She is sad. He is not.
She misses her baby. He acts like it wasn’t anything important.
She wants love and crying and support. He wants to forget about it.
I am here to tell you that this is normal. There is this law in relationships — only one person can fall apart at any given time. When one is sad, the other wants to fix it, minimalize it, or even bully it away. It’s a rare, rare situation where a couple, and most especially a couple with living children or other types of stresses in their lives, can grieve at the same time.
Your partner may not even realize this law is at play. He or she may be bewildered at his or her own behavior, shocked at the things that were said.
Sometimes they are sad too and just can’t show it. They don’t know how.
My advice is: love and forgive. Recognize that someone has to keep the ship afloat, and their being strong means you don’t have to be.
And just muddle through. Grief is a solitary thing. All you can do is the best you can.
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Deanna is the author of Baby Dust, a novel about women going through miscarriage. If you need help right away, remember she has a secret Facebook group you can join.