Hope Letter
Sara Vrablik
10.3.23
Dear Grieving Parents,
When I first lost my four month old daughter to a previously undetected heart defect in December of 2022 and the loss was sinking in, I thought, “This has not happened to anyone else I know. Our lives are ruined, people don’t come back from this.” Our parents looked at us like “Now what do we do?”. At that moment we felt we became older than our parents.
I’ve always had an example I could look to in almost everything I had ever been through. In the week following her death, my husband and I fled to Key West in the middle of December trying anything to just survive those first days, I was looking over the balcony out at the ocean when I decided I needed to be my own example. I made the decision to find a way to live with this epic loss while still loving life and experiencing true happiness again. I wanted her life to always be an added love to my life, and never have her loss be a “hole”. She left me with MORE. More love, more meaning, more empathy, more grace, more life experience, more wisdom, etc.
I wake up happy and in a good mood most days, not even a year later. I have hope for so many new memories and new beautiful things to come. I feel a deeper connection to people, nature, the world. I believe that my daughter, June, is carrying me through this time (June and really good antidepressants!). I see her beauty in everything, I talk to her outloud, I write to her. She is still in my life.
The waves still come and something will hit me and the tears will emerge and the crushing suffocation of her loss knocks the wind out of me. I trust that the waves always pass. I will always feel light again, that has never failed me yet. The lightness will come. You get “used” to living with this loss. It’s horrible, and it sucks to HAVE to get used to something like this, but you do - I did.
I’m so sorry you are reading this, I wish I never had to write it. I wish I never met any loss parents and I could continue living in bliss with my living baby, but this is one of the only things we cannot change. So here we are, and HERE this whole community is. There IS hope, and I am genuinely happy in life these days. I really REALLY wish this never happened, but it did, and we move forward and honor our girl. You will be okay. It’s not okay, but you will be okay.
Here for you,
Sara Vrablik
June’s Mom