Sex and the Grieving Parent

With apologies to our daughters, this isn't really about sex.

Men and women experience grief differently. I am certain that in a large measure, this accounts for the staggeringly high divorce rate among parents who lose a child to death.

It seems to me and this is NOT scientific; that when men are going through the loss of a child, they want to fix the problem, for everyone who is hurting. For many men, if a hammer would fix it, then they would be on their way back to normalcy much sooner. But women, it seems, want to talk and talk and talk. My husband Mark and I went through this.

I'd tell him that I was extra sad because of some triggering event so he would unload the dishwasher and take out the trash. Then, if my mood hadn't improved yet, he'd mow the lawn and clean the pool. On days, when I was feeling extra bad, he would even fill my car's gas tank and make sure it was washed. Sure all this was nice, but I really wanted to talk about my feelings.

It took some time before I realized that he was listening and responding to how I felt. He wanted to do something to make me feel better. He just didn't want to talk about my feelings again, some more.

I suspect that many women take this difference in handling a situation for lack of compassion. Many men probably think, "OMG, I am trying so hard, why won't my wife see that?"

But you see, Mark and I had been married for a long time when Warren died, 23 years. So our relationship was what it was, solid, lasting. Not everyone has this base to build upon. Still it was difficult because we each grieved in our own way. Mark threw himself into his work. He became the best provider that he could be. I tried to become a supermom. Normally, these aren't compatible, we easily could have both "burnt-out" but we made it work because we wanted to for our daughters.

As far as the sex thing goes, yes, you still have sex after you have children and even when one dies. It is a normal, loving thing. Intimacy helps love grow stronger. I was lucky enough to be married to a man who understood that and hey, he even talked to me about it.