Nine months into her pregnancy, Alison Duffy lost her son to stillbirth. “I felt like I was the only person I knew who had a full-term stillbirth,” she said. And she experienced many mixed emotions, including guilt.
“We had a full funeral for our son,” she said, “and I felt so much guilt thinking, are people going to even want to come because he was not born alive? What about my friends who have had miscarriages and they don’t get the full funeral?”
Bernadette Gockowski
Duffy attended some “secular small groups” for women who lost babies to miscarriage or to stillbirth, or as infants, and said, “there was always something missing.” “I felt a little stifled in what I could say,” she said. “People had such different values and opinions than I did.”
Duffy later attended and gave a talk during the first miscarriage retreat hosted by Bernadette Gockowski, a member of St. Agnes in St. Paul. The retreat was held at Epiphany in Coon Rapids in 2019. Having mothers who suffered miscarriages or stillbirths together at a retreat “was beautiful, because our babies had all passed before birth,” Duffy said. She said it also was beautiful to share their stories, bring faith into the experience and be with a group of women “who all believe the same thing and hold the same values.”
Gockowski is hosting a second retreat, “Known by God: A Retreat for Mothers Grieving the Loss of a Miscarried or Stillborn Child,” on Saturday, Nov. 20, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at St. John the Baptist in New Brighton. She and Duffy recently shared their experiences with loss and the value of the retreat during a conversation with “Practicing Catholic” radio show host Patrick Conley.
Gockowski said she lost her first baby to miscarriage early in her marriage. Not finding resources for healing that she desired, and after losing two more babies, she decided to offer a faith-based retreat for women who experienced loss of an unborn child. She wasn’t sure who would attend, but a dozen women came “with some incredible stories,” she said, “and it was truly incredible.” Some of that retreat’s attendees are helping with the Nov. 20 retreat.
Losing an unborn child raises a host of issues, said Gockowski, such as knowing some people who believe “there’s something off spiritually about you” for this to happen. She also recalled the time she spent in an emergency room when losing an unborn child, and the physician kept referring to “your products of conception,” phrasing she finally realized meant her baby.
And family and friends might, with good intentions, say “you’ll have another baby,” which she finds dismissive of the pain of losing a child. “There is healing that comes for sure with the blessing of another child,” Gockowski said, but some women don’t experience that. And losing a child can affect women throughout their whole lives, she said.
To register for the “Known by God” retreat, visit stjohnnb.com. To hear the full interview, listen to this episode of the “Practicing Catholic” radio show. It airs at 9 p.m. Nov. 12, 1 p.m. Nov. 13 and 2 p.m. Nov. 14 on Relevant Radio 1330 AM.
Produced by Relevant Radio and the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, the latest show also includes interviews with Archbishop Bernard Hebda, who describes his partnership and friendship with Bishop Andrew Cozzens and offers thoughts about a new auxiliary bishop; and Father Leonard Andrie, pastor of St. Therese in Deephaven, who previews a series of talks he is giving: “A Walk Through the History of the Church.”
Listen to all of the interviews after they have aired at
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