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Life Touches Life: A Mother's Story of Stillbirth and Healing
Although 26,000 babies are stillborn in the United States every year, stillbirth continues to be a taboo subject. Life Touches Life shatters the silence that has hidden a bane as old as humankind. Lorraine Ash met that silence head-on when, after a trouble-free pregnancy, her baby was declared dead on what was to be her date of birth. After a C-section, Ash fought a fever that raged at 104 degrees and she almost succumbed to the silent B-strep infection that had robbed her daughter of life.
Awed by the experience, which was to change her forever, Ash sought solace and perspective in all the old places and found little relief. In her book she tears down the walls of misunderstanding that isolated her in her hour—indeed years—of need. "Shattering the silence is essential if mothers are to integrate their loss into their daily lives," Ash writes. "A child who only existed inside her mother, can continue to spiritually exist there and the two can remain close."
Ash discusses the inner changes she faced after the stillbirth of her daughter and delves into spiritual questions that shook her soul. The final message: Epiphanies emerge from the stuff of everyday experience. Hope is here.
Awed by the experience, which was to change her forever, Ash sought solace and perspective in all the old places and found little relief. In her book she tears down the walls of misunderstanding that isolated her in her hour—indeed years—of need. "Shattering the silence is essential if mothers are to integrate their loss into their daily lives," Ash writes. "A child who only existed inside her mother, can continue to spiritually exist there and the two can remain close."
Ash discusses the inner changes she faced after the stillbirth of her daughter and delves into spiritual questions that shook her soul. The final message: Epiphanies emerge from the stuff of everyday experience. Hope is here.
144 pages, Paperback
First published April 6, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
October 9, 2009
I had no idea that stillbirths were so common today in the U.S. Had I known this fact while I was carrying my daughter I probably would have....I don't know what I would have done. Probably put myself on bedrest for the entire pregnancy. Not that it would have helped because we still don't know the cause of most stillbirths.
Lorraine Ash's book can probably help any mother who has been through this. I've been asked why I wanted to read this since I haven't been through a stillbirth myself. I'm not a polygamist and I read about polygamy. I wasn't in the Holocaust and I read about that too. I love babies and everything about pregnancy intrigues me. As does this subject.
I thought it would be much more "preachy" than it really is which was a nice surprise. At the end there is a picture of Ash and her husband holding their baby daughter- just hours after she was born and while she had already died. What words can even be used to explain looking at a picture of a perfect little baby dead? In the book Ash recalls how someone told her, after hearing that she had pictures of her daughter, "Don't show them to me....it'll make me sick to my stomach." Can you imagine hearing those words? I can't.
Lorraine Ash's book can probably help any mother who has been through this. I've been asked why I wanted to read this since I haven't been through a stillbirth myself. I'm not a polygamist and I read about polygamy. I wasn't in the Holocaust and I read about that too. I love babies and everything about pregnancy intrigues me. As does this subject.
I thought it would be much more "preachy" than it really is which was a nice surprise. At the end there is a picture of Ash and her husband holding their baby daughter- just hours after she was born and while she had already died. What words can even be used to explain looking at a picture of a perfect little baby dead? In the book Ash recalls how someone told her, after hearing that she had pictures of her daughter, "Don't show them to me....it'll make me sick to my stomach." Can you imagine hearing those words? I can't.
June 26, 2007
An uplifting memoir of a mother whose only child was stillborn. She is much more religious/spiritual than me, but I still found hope for myself when reading her words. Everyone's process is different and it is helpful to read them.
September 10, 2014
One of the greatest comforts to me after our loss was reading about others who had unfortunately experienced the same thing. I could really relate to the stories in here. It's sad that this is so common. My eyes have really been opened to this new community of which I am now a part of.
September 22, 2009
Amazingly parallel to my own experience. Better by far than self help books
January 10, 2014
I found myself underlining passage after passage and saying "yes!" So nice to get another perspective on loss that rang true.
July 18, 2010
Well written but completely and utterly depressing. Life stopped at her daughter's death. The room remained untouched. There are no children because they only wanted bio children and she was unable to conceive. What a waste. I am looking forward to her upcoming release "A Sudden End to Seeking: Finding Peace and Purpose Within" because I didn't think there was much healing in this book. So, so sad.
February 23, 2022
Writing is an act of courage in the face of loss, and loss is universal. It has healing powers difficult to articulate, even by those engaged in doing it — experts in putting experience into words. I am moved by this sentence from Herodotus: “In peace, sons bury fathers. In war, fathers bury sons.” It is about how war inverts the natural order. How much less natural does it seem for a woman to carry a child for nine months only to have the baby not live?
In “Life Touches Life,” Lorraine Ash takes us through this experience, unflinchingly and in great depth. We consider it a mark of great literature when it successfully shows us characters who transform. In “Life Touches Life” we feel the transformation of the author herself, page by page, as she offers us insights, struggling with the reality of her experience.
Never, I think, has there been a more tangible description of the relationship of a mother to the developing child in her womb. For those who have never experienced pregnancy, there is enlightenment here. For those who have experienced it with the same difficult outcome, there is solidarity, the chance to feel less alone.
For writers and readers, a significant birth has taken place — this book.
In “Life Touches Life,” Lorraine Ash takes us through this experience, unflinchingly and in great depth. We consider it a mark of great literature when it successfully shows us characters who transform. In “Life Touches Life” we feel the transformation of the author herself, page by page, as she offers us insights, struggling with the reality of her experience.
Never, I think, has there been a more tangible description of the relationship of a mother to the developing child in her womb. For those who have never experienced pregnancy, there is enlightenment here. For those who have experienced it with the same difficult outcome, there is solidarity, the chance to feel less alone.
For writers and readers, a significant birth has taken place — this book.
December 2, 2023
It took me a long time to finish. I had my own personal things going on. I couldn't focus on anything. Finally I did finish. I can't thank Lorraine enough. I have felt so alone in this grief she has validated so many feelings for me. I know my Maverick and I will always be together not in the same sense has other parents and children but in our own way. This has opened me up to share Mavericks short life instead of hide it like I was. I can't shelter everyone's feelings. I have 2 sons. One died.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews