Sunday 24 September 2017

We know from our own experiences how important having memorial things for your baby or child are. They give you the opportunity to make memories together with other family members and give you something/somewhere that you can go to whenever you want to. A family that get to take their child home can go away and make many many memories over the years together and can sit and share them whenever they want to.A family that has to leave the hospital with empty arms are not able to make any future memories together, the memories they managed to share in those brief but important days after their baby's/child's death are the only ones they will have.When you lose a baby or child, whether it through miscarriage, stillbirth, shortly after birth or during early childhood the grief is unimaginable. This can be compounded by not having something or somewhere to go to grieve your child. There is no typical way to commemorate these children and no socially acceptable way to grieve. Parents can feel confused and alone in their sorrow.As a family we were driven by a strong desire to do something to remember Charlie. We all had our own ideas of what we wanted to do and over the years we have all added more and more things to our memorial items. I always buy a new Christmas tree bauble every year, most of the family have had tattoo's in Charlie' honour and we have all found many different things. 

Finding your way to memorialise your child can bring some comfort.The thing many families struggle with is not being able to take any new photographs as your child changes and grows. This makes the pictures you took at the hospital so precious and being able to put them onto canvas or have them framed beautifully can help with the memory making.There are now charities that will come along to the hospital and take pictures for you. They are very discrete and are able to get photos that will be so important for the family.Some families I have spoken with have had the pictures they took put into a video with special songs playing along with some video footage of their child. Whilst it is very emotional to watch it can bring such comfort to them.Other families have told me how they sent out cards letting their friends and family know what has happened. Whilst this may sound strange it can help the family by not constantly having to be asked what has happened.A lot of people I have met have had tattoo's to honour their child, many having their footprints or date of birth along with a poem or a piece of writing they have found comforting. I have a few tattoo's over the years in memory of family I have lost and am proud to show them off and talk about them.

Jewellery is another way a lot of families choose to remember their child. There are so many companies that now do special memorial jewellery and will also place some of the ashes within so they can have their child with them at all times.I think this is such a lovely thing to have and brings so much comfort and love to bereaved families.Some families who lost their child through miscarriage can often feel forgotten as they will not always have been able to take pictures or have any ashes to place anywhere. They still need to be able to grieve and desperately need something to help them honour their child. As a charity we understand how important a memorial gift can be and this is what made us start having memorial gardens made to give to the families we support. They are all unique with no other one being exactly alike. Recently we have delivered quite a few to families and everyone of them has said how nice it is to have something just for their child. Regardless of how grieving parents acknowledge their loss, finding a concrete or symbolic action that is meaningful to their family can help with the healing process and bring comfort over time. We provide our memorial gardens for free to the families we support. We fund them by having a Just Giving campaign that donations can be made to to enable us to keep giving them out to bereaved parents and families.https://www.justgiving.com/…/charlies-a…/memorialgardengifts

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