News Loly Ghirardi shakes the literary world with her 'embroidered' book about the grief of not being a mother: "I had built my life around the idea of motherhood"
Lifestyle More dogs than children under 14 years of age. This is the boom in homes with pets: "They give pure love in exchange for nothing"
Fertility The journey of a pregnant woman thanks to a donated embryo: "If I had known, I would have frozen my eggs sooner"
Darío died when he was four years old. These five words were enough to tear a family apart and leave it hollow. A
tree fell
in Madrid's El Retiro park and killed him. He was with his father, with the skates, with the puppets, with the ducks. The normal. Nearby, Virginia Froilán del Valle (Madrid, 1979), 38 years old that day, was finishing some errands with her mother and her second daughter, barely a month old. The planned plan was to finish those efforts and spend a beautiful day together. But Virginia never saw her child alive again. She died on the spot.
Almost six years have passed since that fatality and this wounded mother has published an unexpected book.
'Mom, you are the love of my life'
(Ediciones Luciérnaga, 2024) has
500 pages
, which she needed to put on paper the process she has experienced after the five words at the beginning. We say that it is unexpected because it speaks of hope, serenity and
recovery
, 'a priori' nouns incompatible with the sting that was inflicted on him the day Darío died.
In these years, Virginia, a graduate in Political Science and Public Administration, has cried every day and has had another daughter. She always refers to hers as "a family of
five
." Her book, released this week, takes her from interview to interview. Isn't it exhausting to relive everything so much these days? "I'm very calm. I do it to help other people and writing it, as well as a tribute to Darío, has been very healing," she says. On the other side of the phone her voice does not sound fragile, but sweet and determined.
Have you felt judged as a mother for writing a book like this? I don't know if they will judge me. I have written it because after the death of a child you can learn to be in the world in a different way. I am aware of my history and my experience in these years and I don't care so much what others may think. And even less if there is morbidity, something I stay away from. I am on another plane, vibrating in the love that I have felt towards my son and that he feels. Is he a religious person? Rather spiritual. When a child dies, death is in front of you and you have to look for answers. I have only accessed them through spirituality, understood as a space in which I can be myself, know myself and take care of myself. She has been my great support and thanks to her I have explored the concept of the afterlife. Life is much more than I thought. Before I was afraid of death, but not now, because I have understood that life is a continuous wheel of death-birth. That's what Dario has taught me, that life is constantly being born and dying. Religion works as an external resource and it is very good, but it has not worked for me. Spirituality, on the other hand, does, because it comes from within. He has trained in energy therapies, a controversial concept. Why have they helped her? You have to be brave to enter them. That they generate disbelief is superfluous to me. I only see benefits in them. I have trained self-taught. I started with body relaxation, conscious breathing, and then I delved into meditation. I have connected with my whole self and discovered who I really am. It has been medicine for my soul. The body of the grieving parents is exhausted, the fatigue is brutal and the suffering generates very severe ailments on a physical level. You disintegrate so much from life that you don't eat well, you cry a lot, you don't take care of yourself... You just survive. If there is something that works for you, it doesn't matter what others think. They have opened the door for me to achieve the peace I need. Have you gone to conventional therapy? Yes, at first. It is necessary because your mind is not coordinated with actions compatible with life. I went to two psychologists at different times of grief, who have helped me recognize my pain and transform it.
Virginia Froilán del Valle, with a copy of 'Mama, you are the love of my life'.
What phrases should not be said to a mother or father in mourning? Good intentions are not always valid, but I understand mistakes because there is no culture of death. I would invite everyone to do an exercise before speaking: what would you like them to tell you if your child has died? "You have to move forward" is a painful phrase because in those moments I thought every day about how to leave with my son. That's why it doesn't work in that situation. The death of a child is not comparable to anything. In short, don't tell him what he should do, because he is still in his body, yes, but he has to build a new personality, not continue with his life. In the first moments we are so vulnerable, we are so in 'shock', that we just need a hug, company and to be allowed to talk about our children. I know that it is not pleasant to be next to grieving parents because suffering encompasses everything. And if you don't know what to say, silent company is better. They usually tell you that you have to get over it, but the death of a child is insurmountable. You have to live the grief, chew it. I cry for my son's death every day, but I put myself together and live with his love. He has said that in these six years he has learned to throw away "useless things." What are they? Grief is a very slow process. The first decision you make is to learn to live again. And you start from scratch to create your new personality, for which you decide what things you want in your life. No more putting on autopilot, pleasing everyone, living in a hurry, always being polite and discreet... You allow yourself to be sad or angry, because you respect your new life. Nor do you get involved in superficial discussions that do not contribute to you. It doesn't mean that you become antisocial or that you don't enjoy friends, but from another position. Don't let what's not important drag you down. When Darío died his baby was one month old. Have you thought about how I would have grieved without her? I thought of many ways to go with my son. Grieving parents are potential suicides and my daughter grabbed me for life. If she hadn't been there, I probably would have had a worse time. I am amazed at the strength of parents who go through the same thing and don't have other children. How do you see yourself in a few years? Grief as a process to integrate your child into life without him never ends. This death cannot be overcome. It is difficult for me to position myself in the future and I live in the short term because I am aware that life changes in a second. The past doesn't torment me, but I don't think about the future either. At this moment I am excited, I have conquered a land of peace and tranquility where I can be me. This book is about love and hope and in my own way I am happy. I hope it helps other parents. What does her daughter know about her brother and the other girl who was born after her? Gabriela is going to be 6 and Alma is 3. The former had to live with devastated parents and a baby perceives that. Luckily, she was always very cheerful.We always talked about Darío in front of her and when she was 5 years old she asked me what happened to him. She chilled me, but she just wanted to know how she died, there was no pity on her face. Alma also knows that she has a brother, even though she can't see him. Every night she sends him a kiss. The girls understand that if we cry maybe it is because we have remembered him and how happy he made us. We are a family of five.
Maternity