Grief

Mission in the Wake of Loss: We Carry You Still

/ chicoinematt

Editor’s Note: Matthew Chicoine interviewed Jocelyn Abyad via phone call on June 26th, 2025. Some of the questions have been rearranged and edited to provide the best reader experience without losing any integrity of the answers given. 

What inspired you to start We Carry You Still, and how did your personal experience shape its mission?

In 2020 and 2021 my husband and I lost three babies due to miscarriage (at 10 weeks, 6 weeks, and 15 weeks). We were blindsided and found there were not a lot of existing resources that were compatible with our faith.

My husband and I did some research on this and found our own journey of healing. I found a local grief support group called Forget Me Not (they later merged with Owl Love You Forever). 

From the work we saw with Forget Me Not, we were inspired to create more Catholic resources for those experiencing loss. My mom, myself and a couple friends started We Carry You Still  as a non-profit in 2024. 

How does your Catholic faith—and the richness of the Eastern tradition—inform the way your organization accompanies grieving families?

I am an Eastern Catholic and my mom is a Roman Catholic, so we had the East and West represented. As we brought my friends on board, they are actually Orthodox, our mission expanded. The Orthodox similarly are not providing enough support on the miscarriage issue. Our faith is an Incarnate one. When you lose a child due to miscarriage it feels like this invisible weight that people are carrying on their own. One of the beauties of our faith is that we have a physical faith. We have our Mother in Heaven. She knows how it feels to bury Her child.  

You mention that miscarriage affects not just the parents, but the entire Body of Christ. What does that communal aspect of grief and healing look like in practice?

Well the name of our ministry reflects that vision. We address this on several levels. First, we know that the parents and immediate family carry the baby that was lost in their hearts, even for years to come.. We offer free Memory Boxes for the women who experience the miscarriage to help them remember their child and process their grief.. 

Similarly, we are empowering the community to show up for the grieving family with this gift box. Sometimes the community wants to help and show up but they don’t know how. This gives them a way to do that. Everybody together is carrying each other in their grief. Mothers, fathers, living children and even parents who had miscarriages decades ago. And helping the community around them support those in grieving their loss. 

What kind of spiritual and practical support does We Carry You Still offer for couples navigating miscarriage or infant loss?

We also offer healing retreats (no matter how long it has been since you lost a baby). 

Our retreats are offered to women and couples. We are in the unique position that my husband is serving as a priest and father who knows the loss of a child personally. 

Our box packing events are an opportunity for people to help pay if forward and put their grief to work. While we do have some people who haven’t experienced this type of loss helping with the grief boxes, it is predominantly those couples who have experienced loss themselves with miscarriages helping to prepare these boxes for those couples who are currently going through the grief of losing a child. 

Many Catholic parents struggle with how to talk to their other children about miscarriage. Do you have any advice for families walking through that?

First off, on our website, we offer informational guides and resources. We have a guide for anyone who is touched by these losses. We have guides in both English and Spanish. On our resources page we have book recommendations for both adults and children. Everything we recommend is in line with official Church teaching. 

Typically, for children it is helpful to keep them informed about the miscarriage, bring them to the funeral, visit the graves of their siblings, and invite them in prayers.

There’s this context by which the children can experience such loss through the lense of faith. There’s a hope in the Resurrection and seeing our babies (and their siblings) in Heaven. 

I think that while my children were very sad at the moment, having them be a part of the grieving process in light of our Catholic faith has been impactful in the healing process. 

How can parishes, priests, and Catholic communities be more supportive to families facing this kind of loss?

I think number one if I speak broadly, this is the forgotten front of the pro-life movement. We do a good job of praying outside abortion clinics and pray to end abortion and euthanasia. And yet we leave faithful couples in the pew who have experienced miscarriage with little to no support.

Burying the dead is a corporal work of mercy. If women are prepared to bury their babies; if people were given these resources they would be more prepared to deal with these crises when they happen. 

I think we can be more sensitive on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Use more inclusive language that acknowledges that there is a range of experiences of motherhood and fatherhood.

Providing information is a key way. In the Diocese of Phoenix, we will be participating in the annual NFP training and giving couples resources if and when they may need it. To at least give them resources in the back of their mind should they experience a miscarriage. 

For those who want to help but aren’t sure how, what’s the best way Catholics can support someone who’s grieving the loss of a child?

I would point back to the guides we have on our website. Don’t be afraid to mention the child. The parents will not forget about their child. If you can remember the child by name it can be very empowering. 

I try to ask open-ended questions to see how they are feeling. And I also ask people to tell me about your family instead of how many kids you have. 

Where can my audience learn more about your work? 

Visit us at We Carry You Still and take a  visual tour to learn more. You can also follow us on: Facebook and Instagram @wecarryyoustill . There are two other excellent ministries in this line of work. One is Redbird which supports child loss of any age and the other is Springs in the Desert, who supports Catholics experiencing infertility.

About Jocelyn: 

Jocelyn Abyad is the wife of Fr. Zyad Abyad and mother of 7 daughters on earth and 3 babies in Heaven. She holds a degree in psychology from Arizona State University and worked as a finance banker for over a decade before choosing to stay home to homeschool her children. Alongside her husband, she serves at St. John of the Desert Melkite Catholic Church in Phoenix, Arizona.Jocelyn shares insights on homeschooling and liturgical living across multiple platforms as Melkite Momma and is a regular contributor to Byzikids Magazine. Throughout her work and personal experiences, Jocelyn seeks to foster faith, family, and community.

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All Things Work for Good: Lessons from Bumping a Goose

/ chicoinematt

My driving experience this morning. I wasn’t speeding at all. I even tried to slow down to avoid the birds.

Three geese just started flying over the road..

And one’s trajectory was lower.

I shared with one of my friends at work and he replied, “Find the message.”

I’m finding the humor in it. I couldn’t help smiling the rest of the drive. 😳😆🙂

The goose also reminded me of the words of Saint Paul…

“We know that all things work for good for those who love God,* who are called according to his purpose.” —Romans 8:28

Everything is connected. If you’re a fan of the TV show Manifest you will know exactly what I’m talking about. For those that haven’t seen it Romans 8:28 means that God can use anything for your good. Even the horrific and seeemingly unpurposely stuff you go through.

In 2014 my view on this verse was much different than it is today. On a November afternoon, I attended my wife’s pregnancy appointment because she was experiencing some pain. I heard my unborn son’s heartbeat on the ultrasound. A mere four hours later my wife miscarried. It was a horrifying experience. Beyond words. The best description for the pain I experience was numbing and like a snake bite. The poison didn’t set in immediately. Not until several months later did I come to grip with the emotions I felt. Losing a child made me question God’s goodness and I struggled to find good in anything.

The phrase “abandonment to Divine Providence” is still probably the most accurate description of how my faith life went. Dark night of the soul is another image I continue to reflect on in relation to my suffering that year. Yelling in anger and sadness at God was my default form of prayer in the months after the miscarriage.

But God truly does use everything for our good. Even the worst experiences. Grief is love that persists. It’s a tangible sign of what remains of your loved ones that passed away. Death sucks. But the more you experience death (spiritually or literally when you lose family and friends) the closer to get to the Crucified Christ. It’s a mystery of pain and love.

God can use anything for your good.

Going back to the Goose

Why did the goose dawdle in his aerial ascent? Why did I almost hit the bird with my vehicle? These are odd questions I still think about months after the incident.

God used the goose to grab my attention. My first reaction was laughter at the strangeness of the event. Moments after the “thud” of the goose against my windshield, I knew I wanted to write a longer article about this experience and what it took me.

I finally got around to finishing this post a couple months later. Everything is connected. God’s gives us signs and opportunities to learn in a variety of ways.

In case you were wondering… the bird is okay.

Take Flight, Let Your Soul Soar Towards God

How has God worked in your life?

How has your understanding of Romans 8:28 changed over time?

Take time to reflect on God’s workings in your life today!

P.S. Spread the Gospel news daily through your actions— even accidentally clipping a goose…use words if necessary. 🙂

Thank you for sharing!

A Letter to Jeremiah

/ chicoinematt

Editor’s Note: Here’ a letter I wrote to my unborn son Jeremiah who left this life on All Soul’s Day 2014.

Dear Jeremiah,

Words will never fully describe the yearning I have to see you again in heavenly bliss. I will try my best with this letter. Life was tough in the months ensuing your death. While pain set in quickly for your mother, I remained aloof from the suffering—for a time—eventually I broke down and trembled at our sudden and inexplicable loss. Though I never blamed God, our Father, for taking you away from us, I did question the good in the situation.

To be honest, I have not fully recovered from our tragedy of you passing from this life to the next, ironically on All Souls’ Day. The pain does get a little bit less each day. Your mother and I were at a crossroads on a cool summer night. You were supposed to be born in June 2015. All around us people we knew were having babies and we were only reminded of our pain and thinking what might have been. I prayed out to God “I just want something good to happen in my life!” Weeks later we discovered your mother was pregnant. Despite this amazing news, we were cautious and often thought of losing you months earlier.

Half-way through the pregnancy we learned that we were having another baby boy and we settled on a name—Josiah. Later we learned that this name means “healer”. I do not think that was a coincidence. I firmly believe God answered our prayers and used you as a powerful intercessor to keep your brother Josiah safe throughout the pregnancy.

Grief is Love that Endures

Thank you for the gift you have provided your family! I’m grateful to have heard your heartbeat before we lost you. That memory gives my daily strength and every milestone Josiah has I think of you. I ask for continually help and intercession in your union with our Heavenly Father.

Your siblings and your mother deeply miss you. We hope to be united with your after our pilgrim journey in this life is completed.

With great love and gratitude,

Your father

P.S. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I dedicated you” –Jeremiah 1:5 (New American Bible)

Related Links

A Letter to Lucia

The Miracle of the Boy and the Wooden Letters

How God Continues to Bring Joy (Out of a Sorrowful Miscarriage) on All Souls Day

The quiet grief of miscarriage

 

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A Letter to Lucia

/ chicoinematt / 1 Comment

Editor’s Note: Below is a letter I wrote to my unborn daughter Lucia Faustina who we buried on 12/19/2017.

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Dear Lucia,

Today, I stood aside a grave of another unborn child. I will never be able to hold you in my arms, or gaze joyfully at your face, or comfort you when you cry. It is not natural for a father to bury his child. This is truly a surreal and somber experience. Hope is the only thing getting me through this day–this week. The virtue of hope will be key to helping me through the next several months as I grapple with the loss of my sweet daughter.

Your name means “light”. Lucia I pray for strength to live out my vocation as a husband and father to your amazing mother and siblings. I guarantee that your brothers and sister would adore you. I am also confident that you are looking over us in communion with Jeremiah, St. Lucy, the Blessed Virgin and all the other saints in Heaven.

Please send our Heavenly Father my supplications for daily pardon and peace. I am reeling from losing you, but I understand that hope can never be lost if I cling to God’s Providence. May the light of God radiate upon your family as you provided light to your mother and I even though it was for what seemed a fleeting moment.

Your siblings and your mother deeply miss you. We hope to be united with your after our pilgrim journey in this life is completed.

With great love and gratitude,

Your father

Saint Lucy Pray for Us

Saint Lucy

Whose beautiful name signifies ‘LIGHT’

by the light of faith which God bestowed upon you

increase and preserve His light in my soul

so that I may avoid evil,

Be zealous in the performance of good works

and abhor nothing so much as the blindness and

the darkness of evil and sin.

Obtain for me, by your intercession with God

Perfect vision for my bodily eyes

and the grace to use them for God’s greater honor and glory

and the salvation of souls.

St. Lucy, virgin and martyr

hear my prayers and obtain my petitions.

Amen.

Thank you for sharing!

What Lessons Can We Learn from Grief?

/ chicoinematt

By: Megan Naumovski

The voice of the navigation system calls out:

Caution ahead. Construction zone on Grief Highway, slow down ahead. Exit now with caution or stay to the left to take the outer belt around the city, avoiding depressing content at all costs. Alternate route suggestion: binge-watch stupid sitcoms on Netflix until you have numbed yourself to sleep.

I want to talk about grief.  This isn’t going be easy! But this topic is important.  In fact, it is so vital I had to consult an expert. According to C.S. Lewis in A Grief Observed,

Bridge-players tell me that there must be some money on the game ‘or else people won’t take it seriously.’ Apparently, it’s like that. Your bid—for God or no God, for a good God or the Cosmic Sadist, for eternal life or nonentity—will not be serious if nothing much is staked on it.  And you will never discover how serious it was until the stakes are raised horrible high; until you find that you are playing not for counters or for sixpence but for every penny you have in the world.  Nothing less will shake a man—or at any rate a man like me—out of his merely verbal thinking and his merely notional beliefs.  He has to be knocked silly before he comes to his senses…

Grief Surpasses Culture and People

Grief

Grief is an odd thing.  A truly transformative thing that should be where we stake our bets on what kind of strength resides within us when we are confronted with a loved-one’s death.

Our old neighbors were from India and became like family to us. The husband told me once of nursing both of his parents through cancer to their deaths, and all as a teenager and young adult.  He explained that in his culture they had something like “the crying”. For days after a loved-one’s passing, they stopped the world, and wept.  “We didn’t sleep; we barely ate…we just received visitors who wept and grieved with us.” It sounded horrific to me at the time, but in a culture where we feign self-control, it would seem contrary to our “togetherness”.

My Grapple With Grief

I was the last to go into my mother-in-law’s hospital room. A moment away from trying to be brave and helpful to my husband, father-in-law and siblings because I knew they had more “right” to be upset than I did.  I also knew that I had to face my own earthly separation from her, and so with a deep breath I entered her room.

Our three aunts were there, weeping together (yet somehow very alone). We greeted each other attempting to comfort one another with tearful embraces.  I approached the empty chair next to my mother-in-law, who laid peacefully on her hospital bed only an hour or two after she had passed. The next moment took my breath away—literally.

Shockingly, a spiritual vacuum seemed to engage and take hold of my soul. Tears, sobs, and the very breath pulled out of my lungs for what felt like an eternity. My stomach knotted and twisted in a way I never thought possible. I sobbed in a way I had never done before.

Grief Engulfs You

As my lungs continued to viciously choke breath forward, my memory mourned every sweet word she had ever said to me. Every stitch she had sewn into my clothing and every bite of every delicious food she prepared as if all meals were a wedding feast.  Mostly, I mourned the way she accepted me as her daughter.  She loved us all so well and united her suffering with Christ.

I think the level of my grief was shocking to me, and to my husband’s dear aunts, who were suddenly silent; perhaps suspended in the shock of what had overtaken me.  I wanted to calm down. To control myself from what was perhaps too dramatic of a reaction, maybe even frightening to them. Yet it was too late! The door opened and grief entered in. I had no other option but to give it a place to rest its feet for a while.

From Grief to Good

It’s difficult to discuss this moment of pain and loss of self-control, but there is love in the offering.  A revelation of grief as C.S. Lewis admits that writing “A Grief Observed” was recognition that “bereavement is a universal and integral part of our experience of love.”

During the event of my mother-in-law’s passing, we all experienced the loneliness of grief. This occurred whether we were together in the same room or not.

Grief is a solitary experience.  People connect with one another in a way that impresses upon the soul.  Our experiences seem to form a linear bond of relation that can never be duplicated by two other people; we can’t even recreate the exact same moment of interchange or experience that we had with another person again.  Each moment of interaction with another person holds its own relevance in time and eternity.

Our actions and relationships help shape us into the person we are today— better or worse.  These are the things that we mourn at separation.  While I was hugging my mother-in-law, I recalled the words she stated at my bridal shower. The same type of care and love her mother displayed all her children.  My father-in-law was remembering sweet embraces of their early marriage. He also endured in supporting in the days before her death.   My brother-in-law missed the way she laughed at his joy. My husband missed his mother who always encouraged him.

Seek Love During Grieving

When God our Father reminds us through his son, Jesus, that the greatest commandment is love. Love God first. Then love our neighbor as ourselves. He knew that every word, look, impression, feeling, condemnation, encouragement and connection built an interior experience that is outside of time and space.

Everything counts. The preciousness of human relationships is entwined in the great tapestry of the Master.  Listen intently, O little creature of His; ask for a pure heart that sees the other with His eyes. Go forward with a prudent pace, a burning heart and a desire to delicately preserve those in your path today with the knowledge that each encounter will be forever imprinted on their soul and yours.

This article was inspired by a recent viewing of the movie Unplanned. I cried a gut-wrenching grief. Such grief has been a rare experience since the day of my sweet mother-in-law’s passing.

Our Lady of Consolation Shrine Carey, OH

Megan Naumovski is on a mission to remind the world of the love God has for each and every soul, and how that love deserves our response. Every day she is a wife and mom in her domestic church, but in the world she helps lead others to Christ though ministry leadership, teaching, speaking and blogging at The Domestic Church of Bosco, http://boscoworld.blog.

Thank you for sharing!

Reality is Undefeated!

/ chicoinematt

Perfection is rare especially in professional football. Throughout the history of the National Football League only 4 teams [the 1934 Chicago Bears, the 1942 Chicago Bears, the 1972 Miami Dolphins, and the 2007 New England Patriots] lasted an entire single regular season with an unblemished mark. Competition is tough. Teams and companies rarely leave unscathed over the course of time. The same is true for individuals. Life will definitely throw you curve balls—many of which hit us!

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I struggle with constantly striving for perfection. Largely, this is due to my obsessive compulsion towards having order. However, the more I strive for control and order the less I possess it! My idea of perfection is imperfect. True perfection, perfect humanity involves seeking out love, truth, and beauty with sincerity of heart.

When I seek a perspective beyond myself , I have learned that authentic personal growth occurs. Over time I have realized that only the truth, taught by Jesus Christ and safeguarded by the Catholic Church has stood the eroding power of time. In other words, truth—that which is real and reality itself will always find a way to win, a way to persevere. Reality is undefeated.

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Venerable Fulton Sheen sums it up best, “Truth does not change; it is only forgotten from one generation to the next. The truth is the truth even if no one believes it, and a lie is a lie even if everyone believes it.” Truthfully, I was going to end this post with the words of the American bishop. I have been struggling with the sin of sloth lately and I am trying to stave off despair due my wife and I’s recent miscarriage of our unborn child. The Holy Spirit inspires in mysterious ways. Tonight, I sensed the movement of God in perhaps the most surreal way–connecting the dots to my family’s story.

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I received a text message at 11:40 a.m. from the funeral home director that he wanted me to call him back about setting up a team for the funeral service. Being in training for my new job, I did not read this message in full until later in the evening. Upon arriving home, I cooked supper for my kids, gave them baths, and my wife and I put them to bed. It was not until almost 9 p.m. that my wife and I were able to eat dinner ourselves. We lounged on the couch watching sitcoms on Hulu. As I said before, I struggled with laziness and tonight was no different. I did not really feel like, nor even wanted to, finishing this post.

Suddenly, my wife told me something that connected the dots. “You know honey, St. Lucia’s feast day is today! I do not think it is a coincidence.” It took me a couple seconds to figure out what she meant. I checked my text message sent earlier today from the funeral director. He stated, “We received word from the hospital, Lucia is no in our care. Please call me back about setting up a time for the service.” Me of little faith.  Reality is undefeated. Truth always triumphs. Circumstantial things only appear like coincidences. It is over the course of time that apparent serendipitous events are revealed as part of a larger Divine plan.

st lucia

We named our unborn child, we believed in our hearts to be a girl, Lucia Faustina. December 13th–the same day we got confirmation that the remains of our child is safe with the Catholic funeral home–is the feast day of St. Lucia. Reality is undefeated. I cannot explain this happenstance except through the eyes of faith. God provided some consolation to my disparaging soul today. Will I be healed by the end of the week? Certainly not. I am further convinced that God has a great plan for both my wife and I and that we should not despair– instead we need to cling to hope now more than ever! Reality is undefeated. Truth always triumphs–it is not always easy and suffering is guaranteed. I will conclude with the words of Jesus in Matthew 16:24-25: “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,* take up his cross, and follow me.25r For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Amen.

Thank you for sharing!