Welcome to my blog!

I can quite honestly say that I NEVER expected to be writing here again. It is almost five years since my last post and, although I visit occasionally - to check I can remember the site address, as much as anything! - I haven't fixed broken links or updated my profile or removed posts linked to long deleted videos.

But, my life has changed so much. I'm about to be a student midwife and I'm part of a wonderful Facebook community for aspiring, soon-to-be student, already are student, already qualified, former midwives. (Hope I caught everyone with that!) I mentioned this blog in a post there and the response from those saying they would like to read it was positive. So, here I am, rolling out the welcome mat for a new type of reader. Once upon a time, this blog was only read by other babyloss parents. It was only really written for them too but I hope there might be something of value for those seeking to understand the ongoing impact that infant loss has on those of us who experience it.

This was going to be a thread on the Secret Community but it got Wa--a--a--y too long so I thought, why not make it a gateway to the rest of the blog instead?

So, a few random thoughts. It is an entirely personal set of musings on what losing my daughter, Emma, has meant for me. That means, I make no claims about representing any sort of best practice here. I do speak at Sands 'Improving Bereavement Care' training days for Health Care Professionals likely to encounter infant loss and there, when I tell Emma's story, I am mindful of Sands guidelines and so forth. This is unfiltered. This is me and my thoughts - sometimes they're sad, sometimes they might be vaguely amusing, hopefully they're illuminating but, always, they're honest. I decided from the outset that there was no point doing this if it wasn't real. So, yeah - it's unvarnished.

If you're coming to this from a midwifery perspective rather than a babylost one, then please allow me to give you a heads up. I don't talk a lot about my labour and birth with Emma but it does come up in a couple of posts. We don't have a precise reason for Emma's death so a lot of what I write about is, at best, speculation. Please be mindful that I'm writing here as mother (not a midwife) so if something seems medically imprecise about my understanding of how her labour and birth unfolded then that's why. Who knows, maybe in three years, I'll come back here as a qualified midwife and realise that some of what I said what wrong and edit accordingly but until then, the mother-perspective stays!

So, anyway, welcome and I hope my writing gives you some insight into what is means to be a parent to a child who dies during pregnancy or during labour or shortly after birth.