Listen to one mum's story and her fight to get her son recognised by the State.
In this episode, Laura chats to Caroline Smith, one of our MummyPages mums who tragically lost her son Stephen, 20-weeks into pregnancy. Caroline shares intimate details of her family's personal journey of bereavement in the hope that it may help others. Also, a volunteer with Feileacain - the National Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Association of Ireland; Caroline highlights her campaign to get Stephen's short life recognised by the Irish government as he was born outside of the current criteria for a stillbirth. Speaking to Laura, Caroline says; "I gave birth to him. He was Stillborn but he was Still Born."
No one wants to think that worst thing in the world could happen to them and to their precious babies. Unfortunately, it is very real, with more than one in five pregnancies ending in miscarriage or around 14,000 women in Ireland each year experiencing this loss. While stillbirth is much more common than many people realise with around one in every 200 births tragically ending this way and is ten times more common than infant cot death.
In Caroline's own words:
"Miscarriage, Stillbirth and Neonatal deaths are unfortunately still a taboo subject in Ireland. It is only when you are faced with this that you see this. You are suddenly thrown into a world where often you are isolated because people don't know how to talk about it. People feel its best not to mention the baby or offer unhelpful platitudes such as "they weren't ready for this world" or "at least you know you can get pregnant". The pain from losing a baby will subside but it always be there, alongside their memory. Those lines on a pregnancy test which confirm a pregnancy plant the seed for so many of a much-loved bundle, a lifetime of joy. A little life with so much hope."
For all those moments of joy, modern parenthood comes with more pressures than ever before. Talking about our personal journeys and sharing these #mumtruths is our way to help you find your path and our new podcast series aims to do just that.
Find our #mumtruths podcast on iTunes, Spotify or whatever podcast platform you already use. Alternatively listen to it here on MummyPages. Don’t forget to ‘Subscribe’ so that you are first to get notified when each new episode is available.
