Four States Bereaved Parents of the USA

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Joplin, MO
Four States Bereaved Parents of the USA

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Self-help support group for parents, grandparents and siblings of deceased children, of any age.

10/21/2026

The quiet grief...

Sometimes grief is not dramatic.

Sometimes it isn’t tears or anniversaries or the days everyone expects to be hard.

Sometimes it is just this quiet numbness that settles over ordinary life.

You go to work. You answer people. You make plans. You show up. You do the things you’re supposed to do.

But inside, something feels muted.

Things that used to move you barely reach you. Good moments happen, and you know they matter, but you don’t always feel them the way you once did. You can be living your life and still feel strangely absent from it.

That part of grief can be hard to explain, because from the outside it may look like you’re doing okay.

But many grieving people know exactly what this is.

Not just missing the person who died, but missing the way you used to feel your own life.

10/16/2026

💔

Today is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. 🤍

A day I wish nobody had to understand personally.

I’ve experienced pregnancy loss more than once, and something I’ve learned is that grief doesn’t have a timeline.

From the moment you find out you’re pregnant, you start imagining a future with that baby. And when that pregnancy ends, you don’t just grieve the baby. You grieve all the moments you thought you’d get to experience.

Having living children doesn’t make the babies you lost any less loved or wanted. And getting pregnant again doesn’t erase the heartbreak of the pregnancies that didn’t make it.

Today I’m thinking of every mama who has experienced miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss. Whether your baby was here for a few weeks, a few months, or a short time in your arms, their life mattered.

Some of the smallest lives leave the biggest marks on our hearts. 🤍

10/14/2026

This...

I am honored to grieve you forever.

The emptiness I feel day in and day out..

Is because the love you filled my life with.

The pain I feel when reality of you being gone catches up on me..

Is because even after quite a bit of time it still doesn’t seem real.

The uneasiness I feel about the future..

Is because I dread planning things and you not being there for them.

The smile that appears on my face when someone tells a story about you..

Is because each time your name is mentioned… it brings you back to life for that very moment in time.

The sadness that creeps up on me when I see a certain place or smell a certain scent..

Is because I just want you back so bad it hurts.

And. I still need you.

The anger that sometimes catches me by surprise..

Is because I still don’t understand why such an amazing person had to leave a broken world.

You made the world better.

Even though grief is so hard. The hardest thing I ever had to go through.

I am so honored to grieve you.

Because you are loved.

You matter.

And will always be remembered.

Until my very last breath.

10/04/2026

Support group will meet Tuesday, October 6th at 7:00 pm. We meet at the west side of Community of Christ Church in Joplin. We are a small group, so we're easy to get to know.

Time is one of the strangest parts of grief.

I can tell you exactly how long it has been, but that number doesn’t match how it feels. There are memories that are still so clear I could swear they happened last week. Then I’ll realize how much life has happened since my child was here, and the distance feels enormous.

I think that’s one reason grief can catch us so completely off guard. We aren’t always standing in the same place in time. A smell, a song, a photograph, even a random thought can put us right back into a moment we haven’t visited in years.

And then we’re back here again, trying to understand how something can feel so close and so far away at the same time.

Grief has a very strange clock. 💜

— Izzy Roe
Bereaved Parents of the USA

09/28/2026

Grief is so many things!

Grief is rarely just one feeling.

It can be exhaustion, anger, brain fog, guilt, longing, physical pain, sleeplessness, laughter that catches you off guard, and memories that can comfort you one moment and undo you the next.

Sometimes the hardest part is that people see the sadness, but they don’t see everything else you are carrying with it.

Grief reaches into the body, the mind, relationships, routines, celebrations, and even the moments that are supposed to feel good.

That is why grieving can be so exhausting. You are carrying far more than anyone can see. 💜

— Izzy Roe
Bereaved Parents of the USA

09/19/2026

So true! Every day, part of my life is missing. 💔

Some mornings I wake up missing my old life.

Not because everything was better then. It wasn’t.

I miss it because my child was still part of it.

I miss the ordinary version of life when I didn’t understand how precious ordinary was. When everyone was where they were supposed to be. When a Saturday morning was just a Saturday morning and I wasn’t measuring my life by what happened before and what came after.

There are good things in my life now. I can laugh. I can enjoy myself. I can look forward to things.

But I can love the life I have and still ache for the life I lost.

Because when I say I want my old life back, what I’m really saying is—

I want the life where my child was still here.

That’s what I miss.

More than anything. 💜

— Izzy Roe
Bereaved Parents of the USA

09/10/2026

We love to hear their names! 💕

Sometimes people avoid talking about our children because they’re afraid they’ll make us sad.

But there is something they may not understand.

When you tell me a story about my child, mention something they once said, or share a memory I’ve never heard before, you haven’t made my grief heavier.

You’ve given me something new to keep.

And when there can be no new photographs, no new conversations, no new memories made together, that is an incredible gift.

Please don’t be afraid to tell us what you remember.

We want to know.

— Izzy Roe
Bereaved Parents of the USA

08/30/2026

If you know a bereaved parent, this post is for you.

Today is National Grief Awareness Day.

But for those of us who grieve, awareness has never been the problem.

We are aware when we wake up and remember.
When something funny happens and we still think to tell them.
When a song comes on.
When a birthday arrives.
When everyone else seems to have moved on to the next thing.

What we need is for the world around us to understand that grief doesn’t have an expiration date.

That saying their name doesn’t remind us they died. We already know.

That laughter doesn’t mean we’re “over it.”

That years can pass and love can still ache.

So maybe today isn’t about making grieving people more aware of grief.

Maybe it’s about helping everyone else understand how to live beside someone who carries it.

💜

08/13/2026

Yes, Broken Heart Syndrome is real...

Most people know grief can hurt emotionally.

What they may not know is that sometimes, it can hurt the heart itself.

Broken Heart Syndrome is real. Its medical name is Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, and it can happen after intense emotional stress — including the death of someone you love.

The symptoms can look frighteningly similar to a heart attack: chest pain, shortness of breath, a racing heart.

Because grief isn’t only something happening in our thoughts.

Our bodies are grieving too.

The exhaustion. The headaches. The stomach problems. The sleepless nights. The tightness in your chest. That feeling that your whole body has been through something.

It has.

Losing someone you love can affect nearly every part of you.

So when a grieving person says, “My heart actually hurts,” sometimes they mean exactly that.

Grief is emotional.

But it is also physical.

And sometimes, the heart carries more than we ever imagined it could.

07/19/2026

July is Bereaved Parents month.

July is Bereaved Parents Month, and sometimes the smallest acts of kindness leave the deepest impact.

When someone remembers our child on an ordinary day, it reminds us that their life still matters to someone besides us.

You don’t need perfect words.

A simple text. A shared memory. Their name.

Those moments don’t erase grief, but they do ease the loneliness that can come with it.

If you know a bereaved parent, consider sending that message today. You may never fully realize what it means—but they will.

💜 Bereaved parents, what is one message you’ll never forget receiving about your child?

Address

Joplin, MO
64801

Telephone

(417)2142683

Website

http://bereavedparentsusa.org/

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