Pregnancy Loss Awareness & Support
After our son, Zachary, was stillborn, we had to find some way to put the pieces of our life back together. After dealing with the immediate shock and devastation, you are not only grieving for your baby, but also for all the hopes, dreams and plans that you had for your life with your child. We were lucky to have the support of our family and friends, but we also needed the support of other parents who knew what we were going through. I found an online support message board for stillbirth at ParentsPlace.com and met many wonderful women there that shared my grief. I owe much of my healing to that board and the women I met there and will be forever grateful to them. Knowing you are not alone is so very important.
Unfortunately, most people do not understand the parent's need to talk about, grieve for and memorialize their babies' short life. We are expected to 'get over it', 'move on' and not 'dwell on the past'. While people are able to grieve for and memorialize prominent figures, whom they did not know personally, such as John Lennon, Princess Diana, JFK Jr., etc., we are expected to leave our babies in the past and not acknowledge their existence.
Many of the Moms that I have met that have also suffered a pregnancy loss have become involved in promoting pregnancy loss awareness. I talk about my son, I have created a web site in memory of him and we have a garden in our yard planted in his memory. We acknowledge his birthday and celebrate his short life. I hope that if I can help others to understand that it's ok to talk about our babies and it hurts more if people pretend they never existed, then I have done something positive with the most devastating experience of my life.
I hope to expand this page into a resource for parents who have suffered a loss and friends and family looking for ways to help them. I have links to some support pages below as well as a link to my Resource and Remembrance page on Zachary's site. I will be adding a list of what to say and what not to say to grieving parents, a list of ways to help and also things to do if you know you will be delivering a stillborn baby.
Thank you for taking time to read through this. Please visit again to see the additions to the page.
Listed below are links to resource pages for Pregnancy Loss:
Parents Place Stillbirth Board
A Place to Remember
Angel Babies Forever Loved
SHARE
Empty Arms~Heavy Heart
Unspeakable Losses
WiSSP
Click on the button below for more support links listed
on the Resource and Remembrance page on Zachary's site:
If you know of an additional resource site, please email the link to me and I will add it here.
Graphic and background source for this page:
