Grief and Gardening

How our hobbies help after a miscarriage

After my Aunt Terri died, my mother entered a deep grieving period. The type of grief that inspires movies, following the protagonist’s trajectory of intense, life-stopping loss, to an ultimate integrative healing, depicting a new lease on life. My mother’s sister was her soulmate. And without her big sister, she was untethered.

She started doing what everyone in my family has done for generations: she began gardening. We are a family of gardeners! When I was six, my grandmother had me pulling weeds in her flower garden, while teaching me the difference between an annual and a perennial. When I was 16, my great-aunt taught me exactly where to prune a rosebush to promote the biggest flower production. I spent hours in the garden with Aunt Terri every summer. Gardening runs deep in our family, passing down perennials like they were treasured heirlooms. I currently have my great-grandfather’s phlox that bloom every spring, my grandmother’s hostas, and my great-aunt’s daylilies.

After the loss of her sister, my mother spent hours building what she now calls “Terri’s garden.” What was once a patch of dirt, with fallen trees, dead branches, and moldy leaf piles, became a sanctuary of rhododendrons and Japanese maples, accentuated by a wooden step-path (which she built from scrap wood) and a fountain.

And now, I find myself doing the same thing my mother did: immersing myself in gardening to help me through this next month. In May, I have two dates that can mar my month: Mother’s Day, and the loss of our son, Desmond. It’s a month that I could easily allow myself to feel completely untethered. Or, I could garden.