In Memory of Jay
We held a memorial to honor Jay’s short life. It was very hard going to a funeral home to plan services for our son that was stillborn. The funeral home was very compassionate and did a great job getting everything ready for us. We had to pick out various items for the service and make decisions on what was to be done during the services. I remember sitting in the cold, dark room of the funeral home thinking, “I shouldn’t be doing this!”, “Something isn’t right!”, and “WHY!”. We put a lot of thought in to the things we picked and hoped that they would honor Jay. We picked out a bouquet of flowers that were in a red wagon, the wagon reminded my husband of something we might have pulled Jay around in. We picked out a memorial book for friends and family to sign into when coming to the memorial service. We picked out an urn for Jay’s ashes. At this point I was pretty numb.
After getting everything planned out for the service, we went home. I then had to write an email to all of our friends and family. Most of them did not know about us losing Jay yet. It took me all night to write the email. I included that we had lost Jay and we would be having a memorial service for him and would love for everyone to attend. It was hard to find the words to type, because I didn’t know how to share this information with everyone and tears were streaming down my face the whole time.
The day of the memorial service, we were overwhelmed with the amount of love and support we received from our family and friends. So many people came to honor Jay and his short life, it was very touching and sad at the same time. Why should we have to come together for such a thing. I remember waiting in the family room, while we waited for all of our friends to be seated. It was very solemn and quiet in the dark room. I don’t remember walking to the front to sit for the services, but I remember sitting there holding my husband’s arm and crying.
We had a wonderful pastor oversee the memorial service. He was recommended to us, possible by the funeral home, but I don’t quite remember. The pastor called and talked to us that week. He asked questions about us and got to know who we were. The memorial service that he lead was beautiful. I couldn’t have asked for a better way to remember Jay, it was like he knew us so well after just talking with us for a short time. He shared the service with us, word for word. It’s hard to describe how well he did, so here is the memorial service.
Afterwards, all of our family and friends stood in a line as they were coming out of the service to hug us and said how sorry they were. Our friends, who lost their daughter at 39 weeks, were at the end of the line. They understood what we were feeling and knew how bad it felt. They held on to us and assured us they would be there for us if we needed them. They were and to this day, still are such wonderful friends. We hated that we were now part of this club that no one talks about, that you mourn silently over. Being parents to a child in heaven is a heavy burden to carry around.
We came back to our house and had people over for lunch. I usually love to plan get togethers but today was not the day for that. We visited and talk with everyone. Although my body was there that day, my mind was not. My best friend took over getting food for everyone. Several of my girlfriends took it upon themselves to bring in all of the plants for the memorial service and place them around my house. I loved that everyone just took charge, because that day I could not,.
