Archives for October 2013
A Warm Farewell
It is with a heavy heart but with a great anticipation that stillbirthday has accepted Angie Chelton’s official resignation from her role here at stillbirthday as a co-teacher for our doula training.
While Angelique is no long affiliated with stillbirthday, we are reminded of the enormity of pregnancy and infant loss, and the vast and expanding baby loss bereaved community.
While stillbirthday will remain steadfast in being the most accessible, most affordable, most trusted, most comprehensive training to prepare the strongest birth & bereavement doulas possible, we embrace the multiple ways, platforms, and opportunities to shape the minds and hearts of those willing to step into the difficult role of birth & bereavement support, and we recognize that Angie’s decision to provide her services under her own name may be just the right way, just the right program to reach a willing heart who would otherwise not be prepared to follow through with the call to such a role, and we do applaud her for her passion to equip professionals serving the bereaved community. This desire is needed. We are just as surprised as you are by the swiftness of this decision, and we would have loved to have prepared our community for more of a gradual departure, but we are confidently hopeful that her role here at stillbirthday and her exposure to the wealth of information, resources and experiences poured into our community and training has equipped her with the strong foundation of knowledgeable support she will need in her new independent role and that it will show in the love she has to bring and the integrity we hope she demonstrates through her services now and in the future.
Michael Matters
Told by: Shanelle
I lost my 15 week old fetus on February 2nd 2013. The entire pregnancy was very rough on me. I got pregnant 3 months after I had my son via C-Section so I already knew that it may be a touch and go pregnancy.
I started spotting about week 9 and went to the ER and saw that the baby was just fine. They told me that the bleeding was due to my uterus. I was told to be on bed rest but with 2 kids(4 months and 6) that was next to impossible.
I continued to spot here and there and on February 2nd, I woke up feeling off.
I laid down on the couch after talking to my boyfriend. He was out of town and couldn’t be with me. I got up and pored blood. I had to call 911 and I was so scared. At the ER they did an ultrasound and saw that the baby was doing great. They were going to let me go home but I told them I was having pain as well as still bleeding. They moved me to a medical/surgical recovery room and left me there.
I knew I was in labor.
I begged and pleaded with the nurses to give me something to stop my labor but they told me they couldn’t. I went through this all alone because my boyfriend was gone and my mom had to watch my kids. I had the baby at 11pm and they just left him there in between my legs. I looked at this perfect baby and felt so much love and so much sadness at the same time.
The doctor cam in right after and had to take me very quickly to the operating room to do a D&C to stop the hemorrhaging. I got out of the OR and felt so empty. My boyfriend came right after and we just held each other. We named the baby MICHAEL and we wanted to take him home.
The hospital would not give the baby to us because he was not 24 week gestation. We got a funeral home to pick up our baby and we had our little boy cremated. I made him a little place in my room and he is there till this day. This experience was one of the worst in my life and I still think about my lil baby boy every day.
Megan McFarland, SBD
Certified Birth & Bereavement Doula® serving Kansas City, Missouri
email: thebeautyoftheirtinywings@gmail.com
email: meganmcfarland.sbd@stillbirthday.info
Certified in Psychological First Aid
I am a mother of 5 beautiful children – 1 boy, 2 girls and 2 Angels. I lost my first baby to miscarriage and my 3rd baby to miscarriage as well at 12 weeks. At this point in my life is when I knew that this is what I wanted to do – to be there for other women who have and who are going through such pain as losing a child. I felt so lost and alone and I don’t want any woman to feel that way because you are not alone.
The Thought of the Treat
Last year we shared about a mother attaching a little paper note to her candies as a message to reach other mothers at Halloween.
Halloween is in October, still Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month, and instead of being a day that seems to be absent of this awareness, there are ways that we can still bring awareness into the festivities.
Consider the meaning of the candies you choose for your neighborhood trick-or-treaters, and you can bring intention to your gift, without even having to explain it. It can be just a quiet little way that you stand at the threshold of remembering while still engaging in festivities that otherwise could be more challenging to you.
Or, after Halloween is over, could any of these candies you find from others, possibly, be a tiny gift holding a message of encouragement to you?
Here’s a few ideas:
Kisses – sending kisses to your baby
Hugs – embracing childhood joy
Baby Ruth – baby
Dove chocolates – symbol of dove
Galaxy, Sky bar, Milky Way – the distance of your love
Life Savers – because more awareness can also mean more prevention & because you would if you could
Almond Joy, Snickers or Hershey’s Bliss – happiness and laughter can still be attainable even in darkness and grief
Skittles – rainbow
dark, extra dark chocolate – this journey can be dark but we can discover sweetness
pure dark, special dark – describe your baby as pure and special
Princessa – to describe your baby
SweetTarts, or other “bittersweet” candy – marking the mix of feelings of your journey
Sugar Daddy – perhaps to honor your spouse
U-NO bar – you know your intention, even if it’s subtle
York, or anything peppermint – to remind you of snow, perhaps the magic of snowflakes
Zero bar – zeroes count, a pregnancy loss is still a birthday
Taffy – this journey can be messy
Suckers – something to hold onto
Gummy – our feelings can gnaw
Jawbreakers, Rock candy – this journey can be hard
Gum – breathing, stretching, growing
M&Ms – maybe “mothering my mourning” as in, this journey is a difficult one, but I am learning to give my grief both the permission and discipline that it needs
So, what about you? Do you have a candy to add to the list?
This list in no way endorses a certain candy or company brand; it’s just intended to allow us to get creative and encourage us that we can find special ways to participate in Halloween if we choose to.
When Mother Earth is Pregnant
It is just profound, the similarities between a person embedded within the womb and a person buried in the earth.
This amazing piece is called “Healing Sleep”.
Which does this represent to you?
Speak Your Dialect Giveaway
A Giveaway!
Of the entire year, the climactic days of raising awareness of pregnancy & infant loss are upon us.
So I want to challenge you, I want to stretch you, to share about the aspects of your experience that are perhaps the most divisive.
We are all in this together, and we all have a right to healing.
During this week, we’ll be sharing perspectives, photos and stories, both here at the website and at our facebook page. And four random people will be drawn from all stories and photos to receive one of the four giveaway items.
In honor of last week’s Day of the Girl, October 11, a day to recognize justice issues that girls face, I’ll be giving away three tee shirts from Project Rescue, and one copy of their book, “Beyond the Shame”.
Project Rescue serves in India, voted the worst country in the world for women. They rescue women and children from the sexual trafficking of the red light district.
These young women become pregnant, endure miscarriage, stillbirth, give birth and endure forced abortion and all in the most horrendous of conditions.
I share this with you, because there are many differences among our experiences of pregnancy and infant loss: miscarriage, stillbirth, and so on.
These differences can be celebrated, but are too often divisive – becoming dark walls that trap us in and bind us to shame and unworthiness.
Here are a couple of examples:
- A mother gives birth on the cusp of miscarriage and stillbirth. Her baby is called a miscarriage, although she defines her experience as a stillbirth.
- A mother contemplates elective abortion, but then has a miscarriage. Now she feels she is to blame.
- A mother gives birth via elective abortion, but she tells you she had a miscarriage.
There are many, many aspects of our experiences that can seem isolating and even shaming. And it can seem like the furthest thing we want to do is to share these things, but I want to stretch you, I want to invite you, to consider the freeing opportunity there is in speaking into our shame. Daring to share what others may not yet be able to, holding your hand out to them that they can be released from the bondage of isolation, that they can believe in healing, that they can trust in hope.
If there is an aspect to your experience that you say, “That part is just too painful, others will not understand, I am all alone” I want to reach out and take your hand. I want to whisper to your hurting heart that you are not alone, that your dignity is intact, that there is support for exactly that very part of your experience. And I want to ask you, if you’d consider, sharing this part with others. You can even do it anonymously. Our sharing page gives you my email to do so (Heidi.faith@stillbirthday.info).
Please share your story by using our sharing page, and all stories will be entered into our giveaway, which will close and names will be drawn on Sunday, October 20th. This opportunity is open to every share made as a comment below, made in individual stories through our sharing page, and the stories and comments shared through our facebook page. It is also open internationally.
And, if you do not feel there is a specific element of shame hidden in your experience, please, I implore you, stay near to stillbirthday, here and at our facebook page, over the next several days, as the stillbirthday community dares to break free from bondage holding us in darkness. Please, be ready, with a warm heart, with lots of validation, with lots of love. Your encouraging words enter you into the giveaway as well.
Come, let us cast out shame. Speak your dialect.
Let us heal, together.
About the giveaway items:
I purchased the book and 3 tee shirts from Project Rescue. Entire proceeds of these shirts go toward the needs of girls and women in brothels in India. The shirts are red, and are in one of each size: small, medium and large. The sizing is similar to (but in my opinion just a smidgen smaller than) men’s sizes. The first name selected will have first choice, and so on. If a name is selected and the tee shirt sizing does not match, arrangements will be made to get the right sizing, although the color may be different.
If you have already shared a stillbirthday story that includes this element of darkness we are shining light into, you can simply comment below with the link to your story to be entered into the giveaway.
Karen Bradley, SBD
Certified Birth & Bereavement Doula® serving Phoenix, Arizona
email: KarenBradley.SBD@stillbirthday.info
Karen Bradley is a single mother of 8 children, with 21 years separating the youngest from the oldest. Four of her children were born at home (including twins,) and three were adopted internationally. She lost her third child to miscarriage, at 13 weeks, and the following year, she lost her twin daughter during labor, at 39 weeks. She is the founder of The House of Timothy , a non profit 501 (c)(3) organization, that provides free doula support, and parent education to families in the Greater Phoenix area.
website
Facebook
Email: kbradley@houseoftimothy.org
Both On My Heart
Shared by: Erin
Mothering your mourning while mothering your “twinless twin” is HARD. It is a delicate dance of sorrow and joy.
Here is Grace and Baylie, twins, still together.
