On my mind.

I wrote this post last weekend and have umm'd and aah'd about posting it. Im not the most controversial of blogger and i would try and be slightly sensitive to the people i know read here but this story is so moving and really made me think about what we can do to help parents in these situations. So please do read on if you can.

Sarahx

This weekend I was watching an amazing baby photography workshop online with Creativelive. It was being run by Sandy Puc, who is an incredibly successful portrait photographer. Being run live from the States meant that time wise for me it was a bit awkward to say the least. Starting at 5pm for me and ending at midnight. 

You can imagine me trying to juggle managing 5 children, tea, bath and bedtime whilst trying to catch what Sandy was saying was a little….um….impossible. 

But i managed to watch a lot of the stuff after bedtime and on the second night a combination of bad nights sleep and hectic, busy day meant that i was starting to struggle to stay awake towards the end and was almost at the point of giving up when Sandy mentioned something that made me sit up.

Sandy shared a story about this charity called,  Now I lay me down to sleep, which she helped to co-found. This charity was borne out of a phone call she took from the father of a baby who was born with an incompatible with life condition and they were desperate to have some beautiful images of their baby before he passed away. She went and took pictures of their baby's last moments and also afterwards once the baby had passed away. You couldn't listen to her without being moved to tears. As she was herself also. Please do click the link. The images shown there are so beautiful. 

If you have never been to my blog before you wouldn't  know that 'my other job' is a NICU nurse in a large regional neonatal unit and over the years i have cared  for families in these sort of heartbreaking situations and it is, even as a professional,  incomprehensible to imagine how parents cope with the stark reality that these moments with their babies will be the only memories they will ever have. 

Think of all the thousands of photographs you have of your children, even if your baby is only 12 months old you probably have a hard drive full of different images that you can look at, if you want to and remember your child as they were, how they are now. You have had time to make those memories, tell stories and preserve them on film or digital. These parents that have had to say goodbye to their babies so so tragically early in their lives will only have, in comparison, milliseconds to build memories, hold onto them and preserve them in their minds. 

Thats why i so love this idea. The idea that local photographers can offer parents this service, for free and give them beautiful images of their child, their beautiful baby, the part of their family that was here but couldn't stay. I particularly like that Sandy mentions that the nurses looking after a very sick baby will mention the service to the parents and show them a brochure and ask them if they wish to contact a photographer for them. The fact that it is offered by the hospital as part of the care given to the parents. Not that its one of those services you have to 'know' about, or have a friend who knows a friend or anything. Access for all. 

I suppose actually realistically parents in this kind of pain may not have the clarity of thought to think 'yes lets get a professional photographer to take pictures of my baby'. They are dealing with such a crushing sad truth and lets face it, at that moment, it might be last thing they want to think of but so many of the parents on the testimonials say that after a time they so appreciated someone asking, offering and having the images done. Even if at the time it was a blur. When they felt strong enough, they have the opportunity to look back and remember the memories like we all do when we look at pictures of our children. 

Im sorry this is a little bit of a sad post and its not my intention. The truth is that babies do die. It happens. It shouldn't, the stillbirth numbers in this country continue to be unacceptable. Its horrible and heartbreaking but it does happen, parents have to somehow face it  and we have to, as a community, ask ourselves how we are going to support those walking through the searing pain of infant loss. 

and im a photographer and this is something i think i can do.