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Days After My First Son Was Stillborn, I Started Blogging

1
Days after my first son was stillborn at term, I started writing. I emptied the fast paced thoughts in my head on the Pages app on my iPad and it became my immediate comfort blanket. In those first few weeks, I had to just silence it all – the heartbreak, the questioning, the devastation. It had to get out of my head. It was all just deafeningly loud.

I remember going for a coffee in one of the first outings in public with family, and just hid in my phone – tapping away. What was I doing there? How could I go to a coffee shop in the weeks after my son

SelfishMother.com
2
had died? Why was the world so, so loud? Why was it so busy? How on earth were all these people laughing, chatting and casually enjoying each others company… when my son laid in a coffin, awaiting his funeral?

Still, to this day, its the much needed escape that my thoughts need. In the early days, the tapping on my phone slowly found its way to a private, unpublished blog that became social media accounts and poorly written blogs ranging from bitterness, anger, and the darkest and deepest of sorrows – a virtual unloading of every single aching

SelfishMother.com
3
thought that fired in my head. Slowly, over the past two and half years my writing is a touch more considered, revised and a little less knee-jerk – although I try and keep it honest, and to do that, I have to just let the thoughts flow. Too much revision softens the reality. And its the reality that I feel needs to find its way out into the world.

Two and half years later and the use of writing and blogging after baby loss is fast becoming more and more the norm. As every new account pops up, my heart breaks, thinking back to those early days when I

SelfishMother.com
4
really wasn’t sure what I was doing – all I knew was that it felt right. The internet really has allowed, in many ways, for communities to come together and collectively hold each other through different periods of their life. Be it baby loss, cancer, disability, body positivity, fitness, mental health or motherhood. Its serves a vital purpose for people – for those who share, and those who absorb.

The first things I wrote in the Pages app, were the details that we had of him.

“Leo Phoenix Clasby-Monk
Born sleeping on 17.01.16
Weighing 6lb

SelfishMother.com
5
4oz; born at 2:33am
Measuring 45cm. With feet measuring 5cm.
37 weeks and 4 days”

That was all we had of our son. That was his story. A name, a date of birth, a weight and length. Surely, that couldn’t be it, right? Thats just the beginning of everyone else’s story. The details to fill the first page of a baby book… and then nothing else. Blank pages.

I wrote, soon after:

“I want to do good in his name, create Leo’s Legacy. Once this is all done with, I want to find a way to document it all. I think it’s important to know his

SelfishMother.com
6
true legacy. I need to feel like it was all worth it, like going through all of this, after everything else, to have him, so cruelly taken from us in this way, was worth it. Like we’ve utilised it for something other than wallowing. I guess you can become obsessed with it, but is that a bad thing? I don’t know if I’d be any good at formalising it all but even if it’s just a little bit of help towards making sure families don’t have to go through this, or at least get the support they need if life has to be so cruel to other people.”

And thats

SelfishMother.com
7
what its always been for me. Slowly, blogging has become a somewhat daily activity. And yes, at times, an obsession. Like a desperate need to hold my son materialises into a need to do something and the outlet is the blog. Its a chance to document the grief, the impact, the journey, the legacy. A way to let us look back and know that we survived this. But above all else, to help others. Just one other person. I know we have achieved that – the messages I receive tell me that. My account isn’t massive, I’m hardly breaking the internet. But its is never
SelfishMother.com
8
and will never be about that. This isn’t about likes, comments, engagement, fame, or awards. Its about preventing baby deaths, and supporting people when the unthinkable does happen.

As more and more accounts pop up, it highlights to me that the internet is a place of safety that people have in the early days, weeks, months, years after devastation. It might reflect the lacking support for families, the quick discharge from any health care and the silence that surrounds baby loss in society. But either way, people find their way and they do what is

SelfishMother.com
9
passionate to them in honour of the love that they have for their baby. Tommy’s Fundraising – Go Ape

People say that there is no right or wrong way to grieve and so, with that, there is no right or wrong way to express your grief either. Some accounts are large, some are small. Some interweave everyday life, some stay focused on the loss. Some existed before, some started after. Some straight away, some take time. Some show positivity, light and hope, some show despair,

SelfishMother.com
10
grief and darkness. Some show how volatile grief is and flip-flop between the two extremes. Some show action, some show self-care. Some are private, some are public. Some document fitness, or learning, others reflect and reminisce. Some inspire with quotes, others create their own inspiration. Some develop into other things, others stay fixed on their initial aim. Some people are stuck, others progress. Some go on magical adventures, others aren’t able to. Some break the echo-chamber of loss, others talk directly to it. Some are anonymous, others are
SelfishMother.com
11
over-sharers.

Whatever it is people do with their accounts or blogs, it helps. It more than helps. It help those that do it, and more than anyone can ever know – it helps those who see it. The problem with baby loss and the silence that surrounds it, is we rarely have a list of those we know in real life who have experienced it. The unhelpful 12-week announcement ‘rule’ often means people don’t share about early losses – despite them being unbelievably common. And later losses, are rarer. They happen though. Its reality – and so people are left

SelfishMother.com
12
isolated, unspoken to, and unable to speak themselves.

So when you are left unable to speak, there is a safety in browsing the internet. Its 24/7, anonymous and controllable. It far more comforting than the unhelpful, unsolicited advice to go on holiday/go back to work/pack up the nursery – its about reading or hearing something that is essentially your mind echoed back at you. Is there anything more validating and comforting than that, when all around you, the world suddenly makes no sense anymore?

Whatever people do with their voice – it is

SelfishMother.com
13
helping someone else. Their voice matters. It matters because their baby matters, their pain matters, their experience matters, their future matters. And with that, others feel less alone. And for those who haven’t experienced it and are willing to dare to understand – they will feel more confident in dealing with the issue. And maybe learn enough to avoid another loss, or support a charity to research prevention, or be able to shatter the silence around a devastated friend or family member.

Part of the battle in baby loss is to bring it to a level

SelfishMother.com
14
where it can become normal, everyday conversation. Not acceptable as a thing that happens, by any means. But acceptable to talk about. For people to be able to go “My baby died, and its shit, and I hurt, and I need you right now, but I don’t know what I need, I just cant do this alone” and for that person to turn around and say “its okay, I got you, you aren’t alone in this so I’ll hold you for a while until you can hold yourself again”. And by talking about it those two parts of the conversation can happen – they don’t work unless they
SelfishMother.com
15
happen together. People have to be able to talk, and if we can get to a place where people can talk equally to those who have experienced it, and those who haven’t, then maybe, just maybe, people will feel more able to deal with the shit blow that life has dealt them and be able to see the light. The small, flickering light in the future. Because it is there. Somewhere.
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By

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- 8 Sep 18

Days after my first son was stillborn at term, I started writing. I emptied the fast paced thoughts in my head on the Pages app on my iPad and it became my immediate comfort blanket. In those first few weeks, I had to just silence it all – the heartbreak, the questioning, the devastation. It had to get out of my head. It was all just deafeningly loud.

I remember going for a coffee in one of the first outings in public with family, and just hid in my phone – tapping away. What was I doing there? How could I go to a coffee shop in the weeks after my son had died? Why was the world so, so loud? Why was it so busy? How on earth were all these people laughing, chatting and casually enjoying each others company… when my son laid in a coffin, awaiting his funeral?

Still, to this day, its the much needed escape that my thoughts need. In the early days, the tapping on my phone slowly found its way to a private, unpublished blog that became social media accounts and poorly written blogs ranging from bitterness, anger, and the darkest and deepest of sorrows – a virtual unloading of every single aching thought that fired in my head. Slowly, over the past two and half years my writing is a touch more considered, revised and a little less knee-jerk – although I try and keep it honest, and to do that, I have to just let the thoughts flow. Too much revision softens the reality. And its the reality that I feel needs to find its way out into the world.

Two and half years later and the use of writing and blogging after baby loss is fast becoming more and more the norm. As every new account pops up, my heart breaks, thinking back to those early days when I really wasn’t sure what I was doing – all I knew was that it felt right. The internet really has allowed, in many ways, for communities to come together and collectively hold each other through different periods of their life. Be it baby loss, cancer, disability, body positivity, fitness, mental health or motherhood. Its serves a vital purpose for people – for those who share, and those who absorb.

The first things I wrote in the Pages app, were the details that we had of him.

“Leo Phoenix Clasby-Monk
Born sleeping on 17.01.16
Weighing 6lb 4oz; born at 2:33am
Measuring 45cm. With feet measuring 5cm.
37 weeks and 4 days”

That was all we had of our son. That was his story. A name, a date of birth, a weight and length. Surely, that couldn’t be it, right? Thats just the beginning of everyone else’s story. The details to fill the first page of a baby book… and then nothing else. Blank pages.

I wrote, soon after:

“I want to do good in his name, create Leo’s Legacy. Once this is all done with, I want to find a way to document it all. I think it’s important to know his true legacy. I need to feel like it was all worth it, like going through all of this, after everything else, to have him, so cruelly taken from us in this way, was worth it. Like we’ve utilised it for something other than wallowing. I guess you can become obsessed with it, but is that a bad thing? I don’t know if I’d be any good at formalising it all but even if it’s just a little bit of help towards making sure families don’t have to go through this, or at least get the support they need if life has to be so cruel to other people.”

And thats what its always been for me. Slowly, blogging has become a somewhat daily activity. And yes, at times, an obsession. Like a desperate need to hold my son materialises into a need to do something and the outlet is the blog. Its a chance to document the grief, the impact, the journey, the legacy. A way to let us look back and know that we survived this. But above all else, to help others. Just one other person. I know we have achieved that – the messages I receive tell me that. My account isn’t massive, I’m hardly breaking the internet. But its is never and will never be about that. This isn’t about likes, comments, engagement, fame, or awards. Its about preventing baby deaths, and supporting people when the unthinkable does happen.

As more and more accounts pop up, it highlights to me that the internet is a place of safety that people have in the early days, weeks, months, years after devastation. It might reflect the lacking support for families, the quick discharge from any health care and the silence that surrounds baby loss in society. But either way, people find their way and they do what is passionate to them in honour of the love that they have for their baby.

Tommy’s Fundraising – Go Ape

People say that there is no right or wrong way to grieve and so, with that, there is no right or wrong way to express your grief either. Some accounts are large, some are small. Some interweave everyday life, some stay focused on the loss. Some existed before, some started after. Some straight away, some take time. Some show positivity, light and hope, some show despair, grief and darkness. Some show how volatile grief is and flip-flop between the two extremes. Some show action, some show self-care. Some are private, some are public. Some document fitness, or learning, others reflect and reminisce. Some inspire with quotes, others create their own inspiration. Some develop into other things, others stay fixed on their initial aim. Some people are stuck, others progress. Some go on magical adventures, others aren’t able to. Some break the echo-chamber of loss, others talk directly to it. Some are anonymous, others are over-sharers.

Whatever it is people do with their accounts or blogs, it helps. It more than helps. It help those that do it, and more than anyone can ever know – it helps those who see it. The problem with baby loss and the silence that surrounds it, is we rarely have a list of those we know in real life who have experienced it. The unhelpful 12-week announcement ‘rule’ often means people don’t share about early losses – despite them being unbelievably common. And later losses, are rarer. They happen though. Its reality – and so people are left isolated, unspoken to, and unable to speak themselves.

So when you are left unable to speak, there is a safety in browsing the internet. Its 24/7, anonymous and controllable. It far more comforting than the unhelpful, unsolicited advice to go on holiday/go back to work/pack up the nursery – its about reading or hearing something that is essentially your mind echoed back at you. Is there anything more validating and comforting than that, when all around you, the world suddenly makes no sense anymore?

Whatever people do with their voice – it is helping someone else. Their voice matters. It matters because their baby matters, their pain matters, their experience matters, their future matters. And with that, others feel less alone. And for those who haven’t experienced it and are willing to dare to understand – they will feel more confident in dealing with the issue. And maybe learn enough to avoid another loss, or support a charity to research prevention, or be able to shatter the silence around a devastated friend or family member.

Part of the battle in baby loss is to bring it to a level where it can become normal, everyday conversation. Not acceptable as a thing that happens, by any means. But acceptable to talk about. For people to be able to go “My baby died, and its shit, and I hurt, and I need you right now, but I don’t know what I need, I just cant do this alone” and for that person to turn around and say “its okay, I got you, you aren’t alone in this so I’ll hold you for a while until you can hold yourself again”. And by talking about it those two parts of the conversation can happen – they don’t work unless they happen together. People have to be able to talk, and if we can get to a place where people can talk equally to those who have experienced it, and those who haven’t, then maybe, just maybe, people will feel more able to deal with the shit blow that life has dealt them and be able to see the light. The small, flickering light in the future. Because it is there. Somewhere.

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I'm Jess, married mother of two - one who got to come home, and one who didn't. Creating a legacy of my little lion, Leo, because he couldn't do it all on his own. Blogging, fundraising, chatting and creating community at The Legacy of Leo.

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