I love reading. For the first while after Odin died I would try to read and would just end up repeating the same sentence over and over again, unable to concentrate or focus (I think at the time I was in the middle of reading something like Gone Girl or The Royal We). So I gave up for a while and only watched Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt on Netflix. I thought reading would be a good escape or a distraction but it didn’t work like that for me and I was sad to be on hiatus from books. Eventually I decided to try a book that my midwife gave me called They Were Still Born: Personal Stories about Stillbirth. At first I found it horribly sad (the title alone is a tear-jerker) and couldn’t imagine putting myself through reading about other people’s losses. But after a few hard cries the stories started to bring me comfort. Reading that book was the first time I didn’t feel alone in my grief. From there I started (and am still going strong) reading everything and anything I could get my hands on about infant loss, death, grief, and healing. If you’d like to recommend a book to me, I would love to hear from you. I add to this list whenever I finish a book (the top of the list is the most recent and all the items are clickable links), but feel free to add me as a contact in Goodreads.
Autobiography/Memoir/Non-Fiction/Fiction/Poetry
Joy at the End of the Rainbow by Amanda Ross-White
Juniper: The Girl Who Was Born Too Soon (TW: this book is about premature birth, not loss)
Expecting Sunshine by Alexis Marie Chute
Option B by Sheryl Sandberg, Adam M. Grant
The Rules Do Not Apply by Ariel Levy
Vessels: A Love Story by Daniel Raeburn
An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken
They Were Still Born: Personal Stories about Stillbirth by Janel C. Atlas
Three Minus One: Stories of Parents’ Love and Loss by Dafna Michaelson Jenet
The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yuknavitch
Walking Distance: Pilgrimage, Parenthood, Grief, and Home Repairs by David Hlavsa
Our Heartbreaking Choices by Christie Brooks
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed
The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman
Grief is the Thing With Feathers by Max Porter
It’s Okay to Laugh (Crying is Cool Too) by Nora McInerny Permort
Self-help/Medical/Workbook/Mental Health/Grief
Empty Cradle, Broken Heart: Surviving the Death of Your Baby by Deborah L. Davis
The Long-Term Project 