One of the things I discussed with the lady who is going to try to be coordinating a perinatal hospice program is that it's so hard to grieve as a married/partnered couple. You're so lost in your own grief that other than occasionally coming out of your shell to be the strong shoulder for a little bit, there's not much going on. Some people come through stronger, others just come through, and still others don't make it as a couple. I'm personally getting more and more afraid that my husband and I will end up in the second category. After the miscarriage we were quickly forced to come together as a unit again because I got pregnant - now it seems like other than "family" activities with our living son, things are just sort of - stuck. We're not having marital troubles per se, I think perhaps it's just that now we are different people than we were before we found out Aeryn would not live, and we haven't really learned to be ourselves yet let alone a couple. Does anyone have any suggestions or ideas that would be helpful to someone setting up a program for couples?

I've personally tried to "accept the differences" and all that ends up happening is I stay awake crying at night and he sleeps when he's not at work. Obviously some people need some help here, otherwise I guess when our living son turns 18 and goes to college I'll be looking at getting an apartment.

I'm not sure yet if my relationship with my husband has weathered our loss. We grieved together and apart, and our process was and is very different. It has been three years since we lost our son, but still it tugs at our relationship in a bad way. At the very beginning it was a shared grief, and we leaned on each other, but as time goes on, we have dealt with the pain in very separate ways. Sometimes during the past few years it seems as if we just remind each other of our loss, and that it pushes us away from each other. For instance, I can walk down the street with a friend and pass a baby stroller and it does not make my stomach churn, but with my husband we both pause and grow silent, as if the shared knowledge of the stroller and its contents is to much to bear. I have tried to address this pain directly and talk to him about it, as his coping mechanism is avoidance and self-medication. Mine has been therapy and prescribed medication. Who knows whether our ways will meet again. Time will tell.