This week is Baby Loss Awareness Week and a time to remember those angels too precious for earth.
Once again, as I do for any sensitive focus week, I stress that it isn't just this single week that those affected will remember, but, what is does do, is create a voice for those affected, a validity for their feelings and a useful way to educate the wider society on the subject.
Baby loss is never simply the loss of a baby, be that a baby born or a lost pregnancy. It's important to realise it's the loss of hopes, dreams, plans. The abrupt end of a future, of many lost memories never to be made, future generations who will also never enjoy a future.
And so for those affected, the loss of all that lost life together, brings countless triggers for pain. Birthdays not made, milestones never reached, personalities and characters never to be known at family parties and celebrations. Events that we know would have been our time are always quietly thought about: first day at school, 18th birthdays, learning to drive etc are all painful triggers that remind parents of what they don't have around them. "What would they have done or said?" "Today would have been...." "We should have been...."
Sadness engulfs. Despair drains. There is something most days that crudely reminds a bereaved parent of what could and should have been, so don't be misguided that this one week a year makes the pain any more or any less.
If you are kind enough to remember them this week, please try to remember them during other weeks of the year too.
So for 2024, when we always say "Remember those babies, say their name", let us also say "Remember those Mummies and Daddies".
Be mindful, this and every week, of triggers they may face. Try to remember the date of loss, the birthday, and other important dates that may enhance their pain.
Can you be more aware of noticing a memorial bauble on a tree and talk to them. Can you send a text, make a phone call or buy a card on what would have been baby's birthday. Can you try to be more natural saying their name, mentioning their existence, talk about how the parents might be feeling from one day to the next.
Their feelings are complex and never ending.
Their memories are painful but important.
Their babies are lost but never, ever forgotten.
Remembering always some very special angel babies always in my heart. Harriet, Isabella, Sylvie, Alfie, Abbie.
#BLAW24 #tommys #miscarriageassociation #SANDS