Family tree

There is an heirloom tablecloth that Grandma would bring out on special occasions. At birthday parties, Christmas and Boxing Day dinners, any gathering that required two tables to be pushed together: the tablecloth would be brought out and take pride of place.

Originally a bed sheet, from when Grandad was in the Royal Navy, the cloth is good-quality cotton and has been laundered many times. After Grandad left the Navy and became a Coastguard, Grandma re-purposed the sheet as a tablecloth and embroidered her family onto it. Ma and Freddy (her parents, my great-grandparents) are at the centre and spiralling out from them are three generations of names - their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. There are some place names too, around the edge of the cloth, indicating how the family has spread across the globe, from Canada to Australia.

After Grandma died, my mother sorted through all her possessions and passed the tablecloth to me. I think she wanted me to continue updating the family tree but I've never felt able to - I wouldn't want to spoil it by not stitching as neatly as Grandma did. Besides, there are so many names to add now (the next generation is growing rapidly!) that it would take a lot of research for me to gather all the missing data. Finally, Grandma would unpick the names of people who died and re-stitch them in white and I can't bring myself to do that to her name. So, the tablecloth is wrapped in blue tissue paper and stored in my 'treasure box' in the bottom of my wardrobe.

I have been thinking about Ma quite a bit recently. She died when I was about a year old. There are a couple of photos of me, sitting on her knee. Her name was Mary Annie Giles. She married my great-grandad, Frederick Smith, and they had nine babies. There were 18 years between their eldest and youngest children! Six children survived to adulthood. Leonard and twins, Donald and Florence Mary, were the babies who never grew up. I wonder how Ma coped with the loss of three newborns? I wonder how she found the strength to go on to have more children? I wonder how she coped, years later, with the loss of a grandchild, Annette, who also died in early infancy?

I find it comforting that, within living memory, I'm not the only person in the family to lose a baby. I am glad that Leonard, Donald and Florence Mary, who were born more than 80 years ago, are not forgotten. I want the same remembrance for Monty, which is why his photo is on the windowsill, why I talk about him often, and why I will make sure my daughter knows about her brother. I have a memory box with photos, hand and footprints and a lock of my baby's hair - did Ma have keepsake mementoes of her babies, too?

Perhaps, one day, I'll feel ready to update the tablecloth and include the names of my children and nephews and fill in the rest of the gaps? Until then, the cloth will remain frozen in time, as it was nine years ago, when it was passed from Grandma to me...

(Pictured above: Ma, Grandma, my mother and me on my christening day)

The best laid plans...

I'm one of life's planners. I'm organised and always have been. I used to be embarrassed about this (as a child, my family teased me for setting lots of rules for the games we played) but I now see my planning skills as a huge advantage and I try to exploit them to maximal benefit at work and at home. I'm ESTJ and proud!

The disadvantage of being a planner is that I find it hard to deal with chaos and spontaneity. I prepared, before going on maternity leave with my daughter, so that I wouldn't expect too much of myself. It was hard to let go of my routines but I positively embraced the freedom of my year as a SAHM and learned a lot from the experience. My mantra was: any day on which we all get dressed and eat is a good day!

The last two months have challenged me in many different ways. I'm dealing with the emotional response to bereavement and my physical recovery from giving birth. I have felt alarmingly unsettled, to the point that I haven't known how to think about the future. The baby I longed for, planned to conceive and carefully gestated was stillborn and we may never know why. The coming year was supposed to be a second year at home with my young family.

It has only been 8 weeks since my son was born, which isn't very long, but I've had a nagging feeling that I should be doing something. I have imagined a question mark hanging over me - who am I now and where do I go from here? The bereavement pack we were given at the hospital contained some excellent advice: don't make any big decisions for at least a year. However, I need focus and cerebral challenge, I can't just sit at home all day, watching daytime TV, knitting and convalescing. My GP is right - I need to get out of the house and find social things to do to fill my time until I am fit to return to work.

Thankfully, over the last couple of days, I have started to feel calmer and less panicky. Perhaps that is the benefit of finally getting a good night's sleep? I can still work towards some of my goals but more flexibly and in a different order. I can make new plans; some of them may come to fruition. Most importantly, I don't have to rush into anything. I'm suppressing my J.

Although I don't make New Year resolutions, I am resolved to give myself a bit of a break this year. I need to adjust to the 'new me' and take time to enjoy the family I have.

After The Storm

A friend told me this story shortly after my son died. I don't know who wrote it but it has provided some comfort and perspective. I read it as a message of hope...


When a devastating storm comes, an area is often completely laid waste. There may be a warning, but even then, the intensity of the storm often takes everyone by surprise. Nothing can stand in the pathway of the storm, and everything that was held sacred or precious may be lost or ruined. Trees are uprooted, buildings are wrecked, possessions can be swept away; the landscape looks completely unrecognisable. Those who live there can choose to stay, to try and protect what they hold dear from the storm, or can go whilst the storm is at its fiercest and return afterwards to assess what happened. Whatever they do, they cannot prevent damage.

But given time, the devastation seems to settle. Where the ground was ravaged and empty, new plants start to grow. Often these are plants which would never have been able to grow before the devastation of the storm because the older plants were too well established. Some of the wrecks and ruins are removed, others may be left as a reminder or memorial to what happened. Parts of the wreckage may be used to build new and different buildings, possessions are repaired or replaced.

And some time down the line, though a stranger may look at an area and not realise the utter devastation that occurred there previously, those who live there, and lived through the storm will know that the area has been shaped to be what it is because of what happened during and After the Storm.

Christmas: past, present and future

Nine years ago, in memory of our grandma, my sister and I started a Christmas tradition: the exchange of baubles. Grandma had a small, artificial Christmas tree, which she decorated with coloured fairy lights and tinsel. She also had a collection of mis-matched ornaments that she had accumulated over the years. I have some of them on my tree now. There were always two pots of sweets under the tree - one for me and one for my sister. Grandma would buy us a present each to open on Christmas Day and a dozen or so small presents (crayons, hair clips, puzzle books etc), which she would hide around her house for us to find on a Boxing Day treasure hunt. After she died, my sister and I wanted to continue the childhood magic of grandma's Christmas, so we decided that each year we would buy each other a Christmas decoration.

We have now extended the tradition to our children. I buy a bauble for each of my nephews and my daughter receives a bauble from each of her aunties. The idea is that each child will have a unique set of Christmas decorations to take with them when they have grown up and leave home. This year, my daughter received a fuzzy seal pup, a rag-doll angel and a wooden Santa.

I also buy a bauble each year for my daughter. The year she was born, I ordered a glass bauble with a Christmas tree inside, personalised with her name and birth year. It's too precious to put on the tree at the moment, in case it gets knocked off and broken. When she's older, I will give it to her. I'm hoping she'll take good care of it and put it on her own tree. This Christmas, I gave her a little snow globe.

This year, I ordered another personalised bauble, in memory of my son. I thought about buying a glass one but I decided against that because I wanted to put it on the tree and not worry about it breaking. So, I bought a silver one, with his name and birth year engraved onto it. It has taken pride of place, high up on my tree, alongside a similar ornament, engraved with his sister's name and birth year. I like being able to see my children's baubles together on the tree.

Christmas is normally one of my favourite seasons but this year I haven't felt like celebrating. We have had a nice time with family but it was not the Christmas I had planned. However, continuing the bauble exchange has reminded me how lucky I am to have close family and to be able to pass new traditions on in memory of those who cannot be with us.

Mum's the word

I am so grateful to our family and friends who have donated funds to the Mum's the Word appeal in memory of Monty. Together, we have raised over £700 (not including the gift aid!) and there's more to come as we have a promise of sponsorship from someone who is running the London Marathon in 2013. I am proud that we will have a hot air balloon dedicated to Monty's memory on the hospital's fundraising wall.

We feel so grateful for the kind and tender care we received when we found out that our baby had died and would be stillborn. All the midwives, doctors, and hospital staff made us as comfortable as they could and were sensitive to our feelings, needs and wishes. I can look back and remember the very special (albeit heart-breaking) experience of giving birth to my precious son and am glad to have received such excellent care.

I hope that our contribution will go some way to helping ensure that high-quality care will continue to be provided to other mothers, babies and families at Southmead Hospital...

...and, perhaps, one day, we will be lucky enough to receive their care again?

A Dancing Star

A friend shared her story with me and gave me a book that had provided her with comfort and strength. The book is called "A Dancing Star". It is an anthology of quotations: 'inspirations to guide and heal'. It is a welcome gift.

Having looked through it only once, so far, I have already found words that help to assign context and meaning to my grief. I am not the first person to have loved and lost. I will not be the last.

These two thoughts have helped me today:

"Life is not the way it's supposed to be. It's the way it is. The way you cope with it is what makes the difference."
Virginia Slater

"Truly, it is in the darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow, then this light is nearest of all to us."
Meister Eckhart

This book will be my handbag companion for some time to come...

Festival of light

We have invited family and friends to join us today in remembering our baby boy. Since they are geographically dispersed and the weather is not great at this time of year, we have decided not to ask people to travel to Bristol for a remembrance event. However, we want to mark the date on which we were hoping to welcome Monty to the world and give those who care about us and have been affected by his loss an opportunity to say their own goodbye or prayer for him.

So, we're holding a Festival of Light this evening. We will be lighting candles and, if the weather permits, we will send up a few Chinese lanterns. Our friends and family will join us, from wherever they are across the UK and overseas, in lighting candles and spending a few minutes thinking of baby Monty.

I'll be thinking of my delight at discovering I was pregnant again, the plans I had made for another year on maternity leave, how my daughter practised at being a big sister, and how I was looking forward to being a mum of two. Although we never had the chance to develop a postnatal mother-son bond, Monty and I did a lot together in the 34 weeks that we co-existed. We climbed Skiddaw, rode on a Ferris Wheel, visited Weston-super-Mare, performed at Proms in the Meadow, competed at LABBS Convention, applied for several jobs (and got one!), and enjoyed a lot of cake! Monty would have recognised our voices and felt us stroke him through my bump. We have special memories of those 34 weeks that we can share as a family.

I will treasure the keepsakes in Monty's memory box and look at his photo on the windowsill. I will be reminded of him each time I look in the mirror and see my heart pendant. I physically carried him with me for nearly eight months and will carry his memory with me forever...