When  you say to someone who has lost a child, "You must put this behind
you and move on with your life",   I  am wondering in what way do you mean
that?   Perhaps it is something that we need to start asking you.  We are
continuing to live our lives,  so  it should be explained to us in terms
that we can understand.  "Put this behind you", is the part that I really
have a problem  understanding.  What are we to put behind us?  Our  life?
Our memories?  Or the fact that we had another child?  The fact that they
have died? Are you telling us we must  totally  forget those things and go
on as if our children  never existed?

I think it is time to ask you to define exactly what you are saying.  You
want us to go back to the past and return to being happy?  Give us back
our children  and we will do that.  But since you cannot return the things
that made us happy,  how do you expect us to do that?  Forget  them?  That
would be to say  they had no value in our lives.  For me,  what you are
saying is they lived for no reason.  Their  lives  had great value,
whether you choose to recognize it or not.

It is a thoughtless and insensitive thing to say to someone who has lost
the most important part of his or her life.  When you see someone who has
lost a leg, or an arm,  would you say "You  must forget this and move on
with your life"?   No matter how much time has passed  would you believe
this is an appropriate thing to say to them?  Why then when we have lost
something more important to us  than our arms, legs, or our  lives,  would
you feel it is appropriate to say it to us?  Don't  you realize we would
gladly give those things to have them  back again.   Or  to say it to
someone else,  when you are talking about us,  as if you must find some
way to blame us for our grief;  that is even worse.

This is one of those senseless statements made by people who do not  stop
to  think of how  ignorant and how foolish it is. If  you must speak that
way, at least think it through and define what you are saying.  Is that
person holding a job or raising other children?  Are they sharing a
marriage and doing  the normal things in their lives?  Then  how are they
failing to move on with their lives?  Is it because they are still
grieving?  That does not stop us from moving on with our lives ~ ~  Life
continues whether we want it to or not.  We have not stopped living!!

Put what behind us?  Have you forgotten any one of your children?  When
they have moved away from home do you stop remembering them?  Have you
forgotten all the special days of celebration or the foods they enjoy when
they come to visit?   Why would you believe we should and how are we to do
that?  Explain it to us.

I believe it is time for some honesty  and that we need to examine  what
is being said.  I believe the truth is that YOU  cannot deal with our
unhappiness.   You are still looking for  that person that you knew before
tragedy  hit our lives.   Can you return to the person you were two years
ago? Or  four years ago?  Or any time in the past?   No,  none of us can.
We are shaped by the circumstances of our lives  and there is no going
backward.   We do move on with our lives.  Forever changed and forever
different but still we are moving on.  We simply cannot move
backward......  back to who we were before.  We can no longer be the
joyful ,  happy people  that we once were.  We have suffered pain that you
can never comprehend  and we pray that you never do.

We are forever changed and if you feel that you must  say things "for our
own good",   at least  think it through and define what you mean by them.
That statement makes no sense and is only something you have heard and
something people believe is appropriate.   Those words have no meaning.