It matters how babies are born. Whether the mother is richer, poorer, younger, older, straighter, queerer, single, partnered, polite, mischievous, wild, pious, lucky, struggling, pink, golden, or chocolate, she and her family deserve love, respect, appropriate evidence-based medical care, helpful resources, and support. When a child is born, the future begins, and so does a whole lot of laundry.

Labor pain comes with a gift: the “cocktail of love hormones,” described by Dr. Michel Odent, includes oxytocin, the hormone of labor, lactation, and love, plus an endorphin rush that helps us deal with pain and also gives us a natural high.  It’s like the famous “runner’s high,” that moment after an athlete feels like they’ve “hit the wall,” and then suddenly they’ve got endless energy and they feel wonderful. If we were full of labor endorphins right now, we’d be having such a party.

When the pain of labor stops, the hormones are still there, and we mothers are in the ideal physiological state for falling in love with our newborns.  This bodes well for the continuation of the species.

Not everybody experiences this, but that’s okay.  When my grandpa’s ewes failed to bond well with their new lambs, he had to put them on leashes so they’d stand still and let the babies nurse.  Humans are different.  We can adopt a teenager and bond just as well as if we’d birthed the kid ourselves.  If a mama doesn’t feel an immediate so-in-love feeling with her newborn, she will soon.

Bonding happens through all of our senses, including our sense of smell.  A new baby’s smell is like nectar.  Some parents secretly confess to smelling their kids while they’re sleeping, but it’s not really such a secret — the pleasure in that is a universal human experience.  And our sense of touch is an essential ingredient too.  New research is showing the profound value of skin-to-skin contact at the moment of birth for both mother and baby.  Breastfed babies benefit from enhanced bonding, and their poop smells a whole lot better too.

Dr. Odent notes that love hormones are dampened by labor drugs and anesthesia, and these interventions can also make babies less responsive at birth.  While we can overcome anything on the road to fully loving our children, we have to wonder about the effects of a 75% epidural rate and a 33% cesarean rate on a generation of mothers and babies.

To support optimal bonding, it helps to avoid drugs and surgery unless they’re truly necessary, to make birth a loving event well-supported by friends, family, and/or a doula, to enjoy the miracle of skin-to-skin hugging when that warm, wet, slippery, alive little person first emerges into our hands, and to breastfeed our babies.

Vicki Elson’s film, “Laboring Under An Illusion: Mass Media Childbirth vs. The Real Thing,” features TV character Murphy Brown having a hilarious but less-than-empowered birth.  In a scene that didn’t make it into the film, she’s feeling very unsure about being a good enough mom when at last she is alone with her new baby.  Self-consciously she asks, “Are we bonding yet?”  But soon, she is singing “You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman,” and we know that she is starting to fall in love.  http://birth-media.com/

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Hi Anne, I’d like to start by thanking you for being an extraordinary midwife! My husband and I count our blessings and you’re one of them – we love sharing the joy of our experience.

Anne Hirsch: Thank you Marybeth. Our role as midwives is to assist pregnant women in a way that empowers them and empowers their motherhood – mama to baby. You are the proof of what midwifery can do for a woman, baby, and family.

From a midwife’s point of view, what is midwifery?

AH: I suppose that question might be answered slightly differently by different midwives.  I believe that most would say that midwives support women or families in bringing their child into the world in as gentle a way as possible. We also give thoroughly informed consent and ask parents to make choices about what they want during their care.

Our care is holistic. Not only do we make sure nothing is wrong with mama and baby, we also help them to optimize their development physically, emotionally, spiritually as they progress through maternity, labour, birth, breastfeeding and integration into new family life. We also make it a priority to include partners and daddies in the entire process start to finish if mama so desires.

How many years have you been attending births?

AH: This is my 11th year of practice.

I remember you and (student midwife) Leah listening to my daughter’s heartbeat throughout the entire labour and birth, you both seemed to speak a silent language and it was peaceful to me. At what point in your life did you choose the path of midwife? And was there someone or some event or happening that inspired this calling?

AH: Absolutely, yes there was. At 23, a friend invited me to her home birth. It was such a powerful experience I was ecstatic for days. That quiet, respectful home birth showed me I wanted to help women birth in a natural non-intrusive way. That event was my “calling” into the vocation of midwifery, but I would not find my way into training and practice until I was in my late 30′s.

Many people who work 9-5 jobs in America find themselves in desperate need of vacations or breaks! What is it about living as and being a midwife that has your work view balanced?

We have access to information now faster than ever at our fingertips, yet there seems to be a mystery or shroud still surrounding the work of midwives and midwifery. How would you dispel this to a woman who desires a natural birth but is concerned about complications during her labour?

AH: Our job as midwife is to monitor mama and baby during pregnancy so that only women having normal pregnancies and expected to have a normal labour and birth begin at home or in a birth center. We monitor women during labour and if something is outside of normal we move them to the hospital to birth. Our first priority is safety. National statistics show that 90% of healthy women who plan a home or birth center birth succeed in birthing safely at home. It is important that women eat a healthy diet of whole natural proteins, veggies, fruits, grains, etc., in order to grow a strong baby and healthy placenta. This is an important way to make home birth (or birth center birth) safe.

AH: Each birth is so unique and each one is so beautiful because it fits the woman and family who are bringing a new life into the world.

Your birth was a perfect example of a woman and husband who knew they wanted a quiet birth with little intrusion. It was so gratifying to see you laboring quietly in your room – and me coming in to check on you intermittently, knowing that you wanted space to focus and listen on your own. Then as things intensified in transition having you call us to stay in the room with you, at first just quietly watching and then more involved to encourage you through pushing and birth. I was so touched to be able to be with you in this way because it was clear to me that this is what you needed.

I’ve been at other births with lots of people around. I remember one mama who had her husband, two teen children, a friend and her teenager and another friend all around the tub.  When the baby arrived everyone cheered! That was just as amazing because that is what that mama and family needed.

Another birth, that is especially precious in its own way, was the birth of a baby to a couple who practiced Islam. The woman gave birth with her mother holding her in a standing squat.  Daddy was sitting on the floor beside me as I caught the baby. I handed the baby girl to her daddy while she was still attached to the umbilical cord and he began to quietly chant the verses from the Koran. The little girl opened her eyes and looked into her father’s eyes as he sang. In Islam the first words the baby is supposed to hear are these verses of the Koran.  What a privilege to witness such a peaceful, loving entrance into the world. It was a moment that allowed a family to welcome their child in their tradition fully and completely.

I don’t know if all midwives do this, but you brought and warmed a hearty soup meal for me the night I gave birth, and the dynamic level of health care that you supported us with created a once-in-a-lifetime experience. It seems a midwife temporarily becomes part of a client’s family during labour and birth, so what is your view on women choosing the right midwife for their once-in-a-lifetime experience?

AH: Of course you will want an experienced, well-trained woman. There are many in Washington. It is important that you have a good rapport with your midwife. Midwives will do a free interview so that you can find someone you feel at ease and confident with. This woman will assist you in such an intimate part of your life: maternity care, birth experience and first six weeks as a family. Take your time and trust your instincts.

AH: In this instance my connection to the event was my commitment to making a difference for mamas and babies of African descent. The statistics in Sierra Leone for maternal death during birth are some of the worst in the world. AAPDEP – the All African People’s Development and Empowerment Project – a membership organization of African people from all around the world (those in Africa and those dispersed around the world during the slave trade and since) is about self-determination not charity. I support this organization by raising awareness and money to right the current conditions that are the legacy of historic wrongs done against Africa and her people.

This also includes work in the United States where African-American women still experience more than two times the rate of mortality, sickness and loss of their babies than Caucasian women. It is my stand that we can not be complacent about the fact that African-American babies are low birth weight and preterm much more often than other babies. As midwives we must do our part to change these statistics. So what can people do? Support programs working for change:

Donate to AAPDEP’s tour: Africa’s Future in African Hands

Donate to the JJ Way [JJ Way] – a system of midwifery care that has been proven to reduce and eliminate preterm and low birth weight babies in women of color in the USA.

Donate to scholarship funds for women of color in the USA to be trained as midwives, so that all communities can have a woman of their culture available to them as a midwife should they so choose.  The Midwives Association of Washington has such a scholarship fund.

Is there anything you’d like to add before we end today?

AH: Thank you for spreading the word about midwifery! Every mama wants a healthy baby and every woman deserves the opportunity to birth in her way on her terms.

Anne Hirsch has spanned a decade of midwifery care and prenatal yoga practice for women in Florida and currently practices at Rainy City Midwifery in Seattle, WA. To contact Anne, please email PTVN info@ptvn.org or directly yogimidwife@gmail.com.

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Is this the age of guilty parents? Have mothers always felt this guilty? I don’t think guilt was part of my mother’s generation of parenting—even though she felt plenty guilty…but we won’t go there.

Revolution requires a pendulum swing. We know so much more in the past two decades about brain development and children’s needs that our current revolution is fighting hard to banish traditional parenting modes of fear, pain and suffering to get desired behavior.

The singular idea of a mother breastfeeding her 3 year old doesn’t provoke much emotion anymore. It’s the captured attitude of this casual, hot, hand-on-hip mother breastfeeding a child who looks eight that throws the pendulum and raises all kinds of issues and ideologies (evidenced by the comments on my facebook page).

Inevitably when revolutionary ideas grab for attention, a lot of guilt can result, especially in the arena of parenting. The feminist revolution made us damned if we worked and damned if we didn’t. Many women still feel damned but that swing is beginning to settle.

Now breastfeeding is the gold standard and attachment parenting is the “Oregon Trail”. Time’s cover heightens the guilt of not only the mother who doesn’t breastfeed, but the one who doesn’t for long enough. The question used to be, Are you a “good enough” mother? Now the anty has been upped to, “Are you mom enough?” In other words, can you take it? Can you go all out to prove what a perfect mother you are, no matter what is going on in your life? Taking the question to the extreme—Can you breastfeed for 3 years confined to a wheelchair, working three shifts, as a single mom with four other kids?

Kate Pickert, author of the Time article, hits the nail on the head when she speaks for mothers caught in the middle. “These parents try to achieve [Dr. Bill, father of attachment parenting] Sears’ ideal of nursing, baby wearing, and co-sleeping but fall short for some reason and find themselves immobilized by their seeming parental inadequacy.”

When the dust settles, let’s not settle for feeling inadequate. Connective Parenting focuses on how a parent and child interact, not what they do in order to interact. A mother is equally capable of full connection with her baby (and toddler) when she is bottle-feeding, when she puts her baby down so she can do something, when she allows her baby to reach and crawl for what he wants, when she knows his sleep rhythms so well she can put him in a crib by himself to fall asleep on his own without a tear, even when she can allow him a moment or two of frustration. Connection does not dictate the rules of the game. Connection allows you to play the game however you want as long as all the players enjoy themselves. Sometimes enjoying a game involves anger, frustration, and disappointment but the goal is to come out of it with fair play.

Attachment parenting raises the issue of connection. It does not intend to create guilt. So let’s think of it as a way, not the way. Love and acceptance do not have to pass through skin contact. Eye contact, smiles and laughter, understanding each others’ cues, mimicking sounds and actions, firing those mirror neurons—that is the stuff of connection.

Hopefully when this current revolution wanes, we will have left the punishments and power plays of the old system well behind and can settle for good old relationship building, even if breastfeeding can’t be a part of it.

Bonnie Harris, M.S.Ed. is the director of Connective Parenting and published author. Bonnie has designed and taught parenting workshops and counseled parents for twenty years. She received her master’s degree in Early Childhood Education from Bank Street College in New York City. She founded The Parent Guidance Center in Peterborough, NH in 1990, now  The River Center, which is dedicated to parent education and support.

Read more about Bonnie and Connective Parenting at her website and join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

• Purple violets to make purple violet syrup. Collect a cup full, put them in a jar and fill the jar with honey. The purple infuses into the honey, creating a beautiful sweet “sauce”. You can use it to sweeten teas, on cereal, on toast and on little fingers too.
• Pick dandelion blossoms, peel the green part off so you’re just using the yellow petals. Mix these into your next batch of pancake batter or cookie mix. Important step: watch your babies delight at the little yellow flecks they picked and plucked themselves.
• It’s popsicle season! Make popsicles with herbal teas (sweeten with violet honey if you like). Add an edible flower or their petals. Take your kids with popsicles in hand and let them point out and match the flowers they’re eating with the flowers that are growing.
• Make an eat-your-garden salad: carnation petals (taste before using and watch out for the bitter ones, sweet and a little spicy); pansey (velvety and similar to lettuce); nasturtium (peppery!); bachelor’s buttons (like cucumbers only prickly); calendula (somewhat tangy) – add all the family usuals and favorites, dress and share.
• Soften a stick of butter and combine any of the edible flower petals. Roll into a log with plastic wrap or place in a favorite dish. Refrigerate and use!

When parents are having fun, the family around them are having fun too, it’s the best contagion and no vaccines needed. Parents, taste the herbs and flowers yourself, share the experience, know what causes face-scrunch beforehand (so you can have the camera ready) and be excited about connecting your kids to the earth. It’s the only one we got! If you have any suggestion, recipe, or accidental discovery to add to this list, please by all means share! I can hardly wait to get out there myself.

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Hi Hannah, We are so happy you agreed to share some of your insights with us on Parent Network.

Hannah Katsman: Hi, Marybeth. Thank you for interviewing me!

What qualities have you developed from being a parent and mom?

HK: Patience, most of all. With my first baby, I got frustrated that nursing a baby to sleep took so long. But I gradually learned to enjoy and relish those moments. Parents need to exercise patience hundreds of times a day so you may as well develop that skill right away.

How many children do you have and what are their ages today?

HK: 6 children, ages 8 through 22.

Where do you live?

HK: We live in Petach Tikva, a city of about 200,000 outside Tel Aviv, Israel.  I was born in Cincinnati and have lived in Israel since 1990.

Reflecting on your experiences, what insight(s) do you have for parents who are just starting out?

HK: Be easy on yourself–you don’t have to be perfect. Despite your inexperience, you are the best parent for your baby because you know your baby best and you have the most invested in your baby’s future.  One of my friends called me from the hospital after the birth of twins. She started describing the temperament of each twin. Since most of us have singletons, we aren’t aware of how well we know our babies even after only 24 hours.

Naomi Stadlen, in her book What Mothers Do, writes that the most important job of the mother or main caretaker is to learn how to comfort the baby. You cannot learn this skill without a lot of trial and error. Some children are hard to comfort, leading to a lot of frustration. But by focusing on what makes your unique baby calm and happy, you are building a strong bond for later years.

The other thing that I learn and re-learn is that a child is an independent being with separate wants and temperament. I can’t control my child, but I can control how I relate to him or her.

What motivates and/or inspires you on a daily basis?

HK: I love to make connections with other mothers, especially young mothers–whether they are struggling or thriving. We all need support—mothering can be lonely.

If you could choose a theme song or mantra that best represents your motto as a parent, what would it be?

HK: “I Will Survive!” Raising small children was the hardest thing I’ve ever done yet also very satisfying. Young parents can easily forget that this stage will end, and that they will emerge with new strengths. If you feel that “you” are getting lost, or find yourself mostly stressed or unhappy, think about ways to drop non-essential activities, get extra help, or start a hobby or volunteer job that fits in with your parenting approach.

Who is or was your parenting role model or mentor?

HK: I wish I had had such a mentor with my first child. I didn’t know how badly I needed one. I thought I could learn everything from books. I did ask questions from experienced parents but I didn’t yet know how to properly filter their answers. After I had lived in the same place for a few years, I found real-life parenting mentors. Here I wrote up a list of my favorite parenting books.

What is your favorite memory or incident that makes you smile or laugh to yourself as a loving parent?

HK: When my son was about 11 months old, I took him in for a blood test. He had (and still has) a great sense of humor and was “flirting” with the nurse. She was so charmed that she called a nurse in from the next room to show him off. Let me tell you, I felt like I got an “A” in parenting that day. It made me realize how important it is for health care providers to affirm that the parents are doing a good job. They can say, “What a beautiful baby. You seem so attentive to his needs.” Or they can ask critical questions like “Why are you still nursing?” or imply that the mother is to blame if the baby is underweight or below average at certain skills. This undermines the mother’s confidence. Health care providers need to reinforce what the parents are doing right and respect the parents’ understanding of their own children.

Do you take time to relax and refuel?

HK: I love to read both fiction and non-fiction, and am usually in the middle of two or three books. I recently read, “The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer,” which I found educational and inspiring.

How do you support parents in your day to day life?

HK: I’ve been a volunteer breastfeeding counselor since 1999. I recently became accredited as an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and started a private practice, where I make home visits to moms having difficulties. I also write on parenting issues affecting Israel and the Jewish community at A Mother in Israel. Over at CookingManager.com, I’ve written posts on cooking with kids, bringing meals to a family with a new baby, kid-friendly meals, healthy snacks and starting solids along with helpful ideas for fast and easy healthy, home-cooked meals.

Your words are words of inspiration and we’re looking forward to reading more of your insights on life and motherhood at A Mother in Israel. Thank you again for taking time out of your day to share with us.

HK: Thank you so much for these thought-provoking questions!

Join the Conversation with @mominisrael on twitter or find her words of wisdom on facebook too!

Thanks to Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen’s comment about Ann Romney (stay-at-home-mom and wife of presidential candidate Mitt Romney) for never working a day in her life, the subject of mothering has come to the fore once again—just in time for Mother’s Day. On Mother’s Day we give moms a pat on the back, fulfilling our obligation. And then we’re done with it.

While I believe that parenting, whether done primarily by a mother or a father, is indeed the hardest and most important job anyone will ever undertake, I do not think that society as a whole gives mothering any more than lip service. On Mother’s Day we can give mothers that pat on the back fulfilling our obligation and then be done with it. If indeed it is the hardest job, why do we not feel the need to give parents every opportunity to do the job well?

We certainly consider doctoring a critically important job, hence the years of training necessary to do it. The same can be said of any job. We need education to drive a car, fly a plane, work in a bank, be a neighborhood watchman. But giving birth requires no education at all. We place so little value on the job of mothering that it’s easy for a highly educated woman to make the comment that Mrs. Romney has never worked a day in her life.

Every mother out there, whether satisfied or dissatisfied with her parenting will tell you how important it is to know what to do and how to do it. From understanding child development and individual temperaments in order to know what is appropriate to expect of a child; to understanding child behavior and what it means so a mother doesn’t fly off the handle every time a child screams, “No,” a mother’s day in and day out responses to her children are critical to the future of our society.

I will argue that every abhorrent and dysfunctional behavior that costs our society megabucks as well as lives can be traced back to dysfunctional family relationships—to parenting. We can argue that we have been raising children from the beginning of time and there’s nothing to learn. Oh yeah? How many parents have argued, “I was raised that way, and I turned out just fine.” Exactly the evidence needed to argue for parenting education. None of us even know our potential had we been raised in a better way. And how different is our present day culture from the one we were raised in, our parents and grandparents were raised in? Things change; the need for educating parents on the latest research and in the context of more and more technology is a no-brainer.

As a society, we don’t even understand the meaning of behavior. We react to it at face value. If we like it, we reward it, and if we don’t, we punish it. Never do we look below the surface to see the needs that are provoking the behavior. Rarely do parents even understand what a child’s needs are.

Many mothers do better jobs than others and many children are easier to raise than others. The fit of a mother’s and a child’s temperaments often make the critical difference between raising a healthy child whose needs have been satisfied and an unhealthy child who requires external stimulation (often at the cost of society) to fulfill those needs. Many of our addictions, dependencies, physical and mental health issues have direct roots in parenting. And any parent’s current parenting has roots deeply embedded in their own childhoods.

Isn’t it about time we celebrated Mother’s Day with the gift of government-sponsored parent education free for all parents, with huge tax credits given to a parent who chooses to stay home to raise children, with strict and thorough education for day care workers who are paid well enough to make a career out of it. Imagine if teachers were paid as well as doctors. Would we get stuck in the quagmire of invasion of personal rights or would this save the government billions and help us raise a healthier society?

Bonnie Harris, M.S.Ed. is the director of Connective Parenting and published author. Bonnie has designed and taught parenting workshops and counseled parents for twenty years. She received her master’s degree in Early Childhood Education from Bank Street College in New York City. She founded The Parent Guidance Center in Peterborough, NH in 1990, now  The River Center, which is dedicated to parent education and support.

Read more about Bonnie and Connective Parenting at her website and join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

The word “doula” comes from the ancient Greek meaning “a woman who serves” and is now used to refer to a trained and experienced professional who provides continuous physical, emotional and informational support to the mother before, during and just after birth; or who provides emotional and practical support during the postpartum period. Studies have shown that when doulas attend birth, labors are shorter with fewer complications, babies are healthier and they breastfeed more easily.

A Birth Doula:

• Recognizes birth as a key experience the mother will remember all her life
• Understands the physiology of birth and the emotional needs of a woman in labor
• Assists the woman in preparing for and carrying out her plans for birth
• Stays with the woman throughout the labor
• Provides emotional support, physical comfort measures and an objective viewpoint, as well as helping the woman get the information she needs to make informed decision
• Facilitates communication between the laboring woman, her partner and her clinical care providers
• Perceives her role as nurturing and protecting the woman’s memory of the birth experience
• Allows the woman’s partner to participate at his/her comfort level

Research evidence shows that the quality services of a postpartum doula can ease the transition that comes with the addition of a baby to a family, improve parental satisfaction and reduce the risk of mood disorders.

A Postpartum Doula:

• Offers education, companionship and nonjudgmental support during the postpartum fourth trimester
• Assists with newborn care, family adjustment, meal preparation and light household tidying
• Offers evidence-based information on infant feeding, emotional and physical recovery from birth, infant soothing and coping skills for new parents and makes appropriate referrals when necessary

DONA International is the oldest, largest and most respected doula association in the world providing expert education on doula care and creating a standard of quality and professionalism through their certifciation. They are an amazing community with a shared passion for families that reaches around the world. DONA International doulas and the families they serve are in more than 20 countries.

Caring for children with complex medical needs can be a daunting task, but with proper thought and planning, it can be a very rewarding experience. In a new clinical report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) “Home Care of Children and Youth With Complex Health Care Needs and Technology Dependencies,” in the May 2012 issue of Pediatrics (published online April 30), the AAP describes how to care for children with chronic conditions who are transitioning from hospital to home care. The first part of the report defines how to send a child home from the hospital: ensuring that all medications and equipment have been ordered, follow-up has been arranged with the child’s primary care provider (PCP) and various specialists, and most importantly, parents or other care providers are trained to care for the child at home, often including nursing support. The second part describes how to keep the child at home: what the PCP can do to support and meet the needs of the child and family and provide a comfortable and safe medical home for the patient.

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The American Academy of Pediatrics is an organization of 60,000 primary care pediatricians, pediatric medical subspecialists and pediatric surgical specialists dedicated to the health, safety and well-being of infants, children, adolescents and young adults. For more information, visit www.aap.org.

Can you imagine anything worse than the death of a child? It’s especially devastating for those who have other children, because those children must be cared for, emotionally and physically: the parents have no time to grieve their loss by themselves.

In Parenting After the Death of a Child (Routledge), Jennifer L. Buckle and Stephen J. Fleming point out that parents with children still at home must at the same time deal with two extremes of life and loss. They, like others who contributed to this story, refer to the previous family life being shattered by the loss. Although a family may eventually thrive in a new configuration, it will never be completely restored to its original form and strength.

The authors identify several levels of loss for the parents besides the physical loss, the permanent separation from a beloved child. Other issues include:

• Transformation of the family. With the loss of a child, the family structure changes, and so do the roles of the siblings. In many cases today, the bereaved child is now an only child.
• Loss of hopes and expectations. The parents grieve all the things the dead child will never do: the places never visited with the family, the extended family members never met, the graduations and wedding that will never occur. They are forced to abandon their expectations for the child, and for its relationships with the bereaved or any future children.
• “There is a double anger,” explains Timothy Hartshorne, a psychology professor at Central Michigan University. “Anger that you have been cheated out of your child’s future, and anger that your child has been cheated out of his or her future.”
• Violation of the natural order. Parents expect their children to survive them, and losing a child destroys the illusion that life is secure and that we are protected from tragedy. These assumptions are replaced by perceptions of the world as random, chaotic and cruel. As a result, the bereaved often lose confidence in the people in society who are expected to protect us: police officers, firefighters, medics, nurses, physicians.
• Parents also lose confidence in their competence because they cannot fix this problem, writes Debbie Garber, a bereaved parent affiliated with the Miami Valley (Ohio) chapter of Compassionate Friends. “It is our job to make it all better,” she says, “and the fact that we cannot is devastating and counterintuitive for a parent.”

Hartshorne, another bereaved parent, says that although people are often expected “to get over” a death within six months or a year, the grieving process can be five years long, starting with the horrible year of first holidays, anniversaries, and birthdays without someone. In the second year: “It is harder to pretend it never happened.” By the third year, many people are better at handling special days, and adults at least can deal with insensitive people. By the fourth year, you are sometimes happy again—although that is when some people (especially parents) feel guilty, as if by enjoying themselves they are forgetting the lost child.

Don’t try to alleviate the pain for a bereaved friend or client, adds Richard Hazler, who runs counselor education programs at Penn State. “It’s a natural part of the process, and the more you try to alleviate it, the more people will resist your help.”

Instead, he advises helping the grieving to find ways to work with the pain so their lives will “normalize.”Second, stay involved with the routine parts of the bereaved friend’s life, with school, play, work and social events.

What do bereaved parents need?

• Acknowledgement of loss. Many couples experience miscarriage as death, and a stillborn baby or a child lost in infancy is still a loss, and should be acknowledged as such. Jeri Wilson’s experience is that the loss of an infant is very isolating, because so few people knew the child. “Friends and family thought that bringing up memories of her would cause us great pain, so they never spoke of her. It was devastating to go overnight from being a loving mother to having everyone act as if she never existed.”
• Friendship. Some friends will disappear, explains Hartshorne, because they cannot deal with the tragedy, or can no longer relate to you. What’s valuable are friends who can listen, even if they cannot understand. Stay in touch, even if it’s hard, adds Garber. “Send a card, or place a phone call weeks after the funeral, after everyone else has resumed their lives. Knowing that someone remembers your child and is thinking of you is a great gift.”

Even very young children are aware when something is wrong in the family. Do not lie to them, emphasizes Diane Davis, a counselor and author.

Others advise that we give children concise, accurate and age-appropriate information. Allow them to ask questions, even possibly unsettling ones about the appearance of the body, whether they can touch it, and what will happen to it.

Bereaved kids also need:

• To know they are not alone. Support groups and bereavement camps are settings where every child has experienced a significant loss. Lynette Moore of The Moyer Foundation said the most common comment at Camp Erin sessions, wherever in the U.S. the camps are located, is “I feel so alone.”
• To know that every emotion is legitimate. When a sibling has died after an extended illness, some children feel guilty because they are glad to finally have their parents’ attention again, says Moore.
• Reassurance that the death was not their fault and it is not their fault that others in the family are sad.
• Acceptance of the fact that they will grieve at a different pace and in different stages than the adults and the other children in the family, and that transitions and anniversaries may cause renewed grief for years to come.
• Recognition by parents, teachers and other adults that grief may trigger regression (a toilet-trained child may experience soiling or bed-wetting) or acting out and that these are signals that help is needed, not behavior problems that require discipline.
• The freedom to live full lives, risky as some of their activities may seem. “Now you know that children can die: it’s not a hypothetical possibility,” points out Hartshorne, “and it’s hard not to worry about your remaining children.”

If you have friends who have lost children, or if you work with the bereaved, we hope this article will help you recognize the grieving that is done by both parents and the surviving siblings. It’s also important that we all recognize that grief can re-surface months or years after a death, and that children and teenagers need emotionally safe options for expressing their grief and having it validated.

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