Staying Connected to Your Baby
By: Amy Lied
Music has always been an extremely important part of my life. I’ve never been that athletic child. I was always the musical one. I have very eclectic taste and I love singing along to all of the songs.
Music is my hobby, my escape, my life line.
When Asher died in 2017, the music in my life stopped, just like his heart.
I couldn’t bear to listen to any music or do anything that brought me joy.
Why should I listen to music, why should I experience any joy, when my son died?
When you leave the hospital, empty handed after welcoming your child, it’s very easy for life to feel like nothing changed. It’s easy for it to pick up where it left off, like you imagined the whole experience.
Was I even pregnant?
Did I just give birth to a child?
Did I make it all up?!
To combat those feelings, I MADE things change in my life and one of those changes was to no longer listen to music. It was one way for me to control something in my life, to make it seem like something had changed since the birth of Asher.
No Asher, no music.
My car rides were silent, no longer filled with the music as I belted out the lyrics to myself.
As the days without my son turned into weeks, I allowed myself to slowly start listening to music again, but only music related to him.
I had stumbled upon a local loss non-profit’s website, The Queen B Project, that had songs on it with which the founder connected to after the loss of her daughter, Emma. I would sit at work, with that website in the background, continuously listening to the songs through my headphones, feeling like I was connecting with Asher.
Eventually, I connected with more songs from my own library that made me feel close to my son. A few months after Asher’s birth, I created my own “Asher” playlist filled with songs that reminded me of him, the support we received from loved ones, or songs that gave me hope.
Throughout the last four years, I’ve connected with other mothers who have introduced me to their favorite songs that have since been added to his compilation.
During the times that I am missing my boy, I put on his playlist and feel close to him, while usually having a good cry alone in my car, as well.
Losing Asher took music from my life, but the love I have for him brought it back. Music gave me another way to feel connected to my son, to remember him, and to share him with others.
If you are looking for any new songs to add to your child’s playlist, here is the link to Asher’s on Spotify.
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About Amy Lied
Amy Lied is a wife and a mother. Her son, Asher, was inexplicably born still on February 19th, 2017. Before losing Asher, she suffered a miscarriage and struggled with unexplained infertility. After losing Asher and struggling to conceive again, she went back to treatment where she became pregnant with her twin daughters; Harper and Scarlett. She has documented her journey from the beginning of her infertility struggles on her blog, Doggie Bags Not Diaper Bags. She is also a co-founder of The Lucky Anchor Project, an online resource for loss families that houses an Etsy store whose profits are donated to loss family non-profit organizations. Sharing her journey has helped her cope and she hopes it also helps others who are walking on this road of life after loss.