Babyloss Awareness Week 2020
Babyloss Awareness Week isn’t for me.
It isn’t for Mr L.
It isn’t for Big Bro or Boo.
Babyloss awareness week isn’t for any of us, because we miss Rhianna every single day.
We miss her every waking moment.
We miss the girl she would have / could have been.
We miss where she would fit in the family.
We miss her personality.
We miss the extra space, the extra clothes, the extra toys, the extra shoes.
We miss everything about her.
All day every day.
We don’t need a special week to remember her.
We don’t need to be reminded to remember her.
We do it every waking moment.
And a lot of sleeping ones too.
We live and breathe babyloss.
Even her little brother born after her misses her.
We don’t need to be reminded we live this nightmare.
No babyloss awareness week isn’t for us.
We live it all the time.
To me babyloss awareness is for us to be able to live it peacefully.
To feel OK to talk about our daughter and their sister.
To mention her and not be stared back at like we are an alien.
To not have an opinion or judgement made about us and our feelings as we are ‘still grieving’
To feel OK to talk her about her when we want to.
To not have to gage a room to whether it will be OK to mention her.
Whether her name will be met with a response of affection, love, sorry or met with avoidance, judgement and opinions.
Babyloss awareness week is breaking the stigma.
It is allowing all of the mums, the dads the brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncle, and cousins to be able to talk about the babies that have been lost freely and if they want to.
Do you know what it is like as a mummy and daddy not to freely say your child’s name, not to talk about them when you want to as you are worried about the response you may get. If your a babyloss mum or dad you will probably know what I am talking about.
Do you know how many times I have wanted to mention Rhiannas name in the past and thought it wasn’t appropriate!
No parent should think that.
No parent should feel that.
Do you know how often I have mentioned her name and I see the persons face change?
I see them flounder, not know what to do, they don’t know where to look, they don’t know what to say.
They change the subject.
They feel awkward.
They will look anywhere else.
And I feel deflated.
Yet again she is the elephant in the room the person no one speaks off.
The one we should be silent about.
Do you know how that makes me feel?
Do you know what it feels like that your baby is a stigma. They are a name that people don’t want to hear, an area of your life people don’t want to mention.
And people honestly say, but I don’t know what to say.
I don’t know how to respond, babyloss is so personal.
Which is great they are being honest and telling us.
But that’s why we need babyloss awareness week.
Because if we were grieving someone else people would know how to respond. We would get sympathy cards we would get messages of love, people would remember with you on anniversary and birthdays. They would talk about that member of your family, they would share moments with you, memories.
But that doesn’t happen with babyloss.
And I know it’s different.
But it also isn’t.
We are still grieving just like we would be for some one else.
Grieve is a personal thing.
It doesn’t mean we can’t still have sympathy, people can’t remember anniversaries or birthdays or even remember your babies at Christmas or your birthday, or mothers or fathers day.
They are still important days to us.
We haven’t stopped being a parent, a sibling, a grandparent, auntie, uncle or cousin.
We still are all of those things.
And if we want to talk about our babies who aren’t here we should be able to freely, without judgement, without fear.
That’s why babyloss awareness is so important.
1 in 4 of us are affected. How many of you have 4 in your family, its not a big amount of people is it.
It’s a high percentage of people in the world that have had a miscarriage, had a stillbirth, lost a new born, lost a baby. Had multiple losses.
1 in 4 people experience babyloss.
And still it’s a subject that when it is mentioned people suck in the breath look anywhere but at you and don’t know what to say for the best.
Let us 1 in 4 feel OK to talk about this when we need to talk about it.
Let us feel its OK to mention our babies.
Let us feel like we aren’t burdening you.
We aren’t making you uncomfortable.
We aren’t going on about it again.
Let us talk about our babies freely and openly if we want to.
Let them be part of our worlds, in every way, not just hidden away silently.
Let them not be a stigma.
Let them not be hidden away.
Let us be mothers, and fathers.
Let us be siblings.
Let us be grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.
Let us be our full family.