Fear of Losing my Child – Self-Forgiveness (Part 2)

This post is a continuation to the post ‘The thought of Losing My Child’ and ‘Fear of Losing my Child – Self-Forgiveness (Part 1)‘. After sharing my experience during the time Syntia had tickbite fever, I received awesome support from several moms, including Leila’s post ‘The death of my child, the death of me’. After taking everything in and introspecting on my experiences more, I moved myself to write self-forgiveness as an act of taking self-responsibility, deepening my understanding of what happened, and releasing myself from past conditioning.

Self-Forgiveness is powerful when spoken out loud, so I invite you to read this post (or the statements you relate to) out loud – and of course feel free to add your own statements based on your personal experiences!

I decided to post the Self-Forgiveness in two parts because it can be a bit much to process. The first part revolved mainly around my experience when my daughter was ill – this part goes further in taking on the fear of losing my child in general.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to fear to lose my daughter.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to fear that if my daughter dies, that it will be my fault.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to define the death of a child as the ultimate failure of a mother.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to adhere to the illusion that we can control life and death and that it is a mother’s job to remain in control of life and death on behalf of her child.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize the ludicrous implication of believing that a child’s death is always the mother’s fault – because no one has control over life and death, not over our own life/death nor that of another’s.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to fear to be judged as a failure if my child were to die.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to fear my own judgment and the emotional onslaught I would unleash onto myself if my child were to die.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to use emotion as a form of self-punishment, wherein I exist both as the tyrant and the slave, thinking and believing that such a ‘transgression’ as allowing the death of a child deserves nothing less than a living hell and so already be prepared to do that unto myself if that were to come to pass – and so also already fearing it.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to turn against myself in moments of great difficulty and challenge, only making matters worse and more difficult, instead of embracing myself and supporting myself through difficult times as a living statement of unconditional self-love – I am here for me no matter what.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to project fear of judgment onto others as fear of what other people will say and think if my child were to die, not realizing that I only fear others judgments because I know I have judged others in that way, and so, ultimately fear my own judgment.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to judge parents whose child has passed, finding a way to blame the parents for their loss, to try to make myself believe that the child only died because the parents did something wrong, and so that this loss was specific to them and not something that could happen to me or my child.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to see, realize and face that any child can die any die for any number of reasons, and there is no way we can prevent all possible scenarios from taking place and in the end, a day will come when they die – their death was outside my control from the very beginning.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying by choking on a small object.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying by suffocating in her sleep.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying in her sleep when she sleeps by herself, that she’ll roll and in some way block her mouth and nose.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying in her sleep when I am sleeping next to her, that she will roll with her face against me and that my body will block her mouth and nose.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child slipping or falling and having a freak accident where she hits her head or neck on a ledge, an object or floor in such a way that she suffers fatal injuries.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child getting a hold of scissors, a knife or any other sharp object and somehow harms herself with it in a way where the healing is outside of my ability to assist with and her injuries possibly fatal.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child becoming ill and dying of a disease.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of what germs, bacteria and viruses my child comes in contact with, wondering throughout the day what she is being exposed to and whether her immune system is capable of handling it or not.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child drowning in the bath, pool or ocean.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying in a car accident.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of dropping my child and her getting seriously injured or even dying as a result.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to live in fear of my child dying while in the care of someone else that I trusted with my child’s life.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize that another like me is not in control of life and death either, and cannot absolutely prevent my child’s death – I can only take common sense precautionary measures and show another how to do the same with and for my child.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize that the only way I could have absolutely prevented my child’s death is if I had never allowed her to be born in the first place.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize that death is a part of life.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to judge death as something bad and something to be feared, as though it is an ultimate end – when life will always be here, but in different forms.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to think, believe and fear that if my child were to die, me or a part of me would die too.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize that in a way this is so – but it is equally so for every other child, for every human being, animal or plant as we are all a part of each other.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to question why I am not aware of every other being as a part of me, but have only developed my self-awareness to the extent that there is an immediate physical familial bond – where I only perceive the death of a child or loved one deeply and intimately, but not that of others – nor rejoice in the birth of every animal, plant or human being as I did for my own child’s birth.

I forgive myself for not accepting and allowing myself to realize that the intimate and deep connection and awareness we develop of our children as a part of us is but a glimpse through the curtain of separation – showing us what life can be like for and with all, if we were to stand equal and one – equally aware of the process of birthing and dying of each one, an ever changing symphony.