Our Daughter, Matilda was stillborn in February 2019 at 36 weeks and four days. Since then we have been raising money to support several charities who have helped us. We would also really like to raise awareness surrounding the topic of
 stillbirth.

Our ‘empty vest’ project relates to last year’s (2018) stillbirth statistics. Last year 2689 babies in the UK were stillborn and we are creating a large visual representation of these statistics. Each empty vest will represent one of those babies who has been stillborn.

We are now in receipt of all 2689 vests and we will be laying these out by Spring 2020. 

We are asking people to sponsor a vest at a £1 meaning people can sponsor as little or as many vests as they would like! We will be raising money for Bay Hospitals Charity and this will then be channelled down to the maternity bereavement
services.

We are asking the charity to utilise any monies raised for the new Rainbow Clinic which has been set up at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary. The Rainbow clinic opened in September of this year.

This clinic will be a pathway rainbow clinic. The clinic will provide specialist care and support during subsequent pregnancies for parents who have suffered a stillbirth, compassionate induction for medical reasons or neonatal death.

The vests will then be donated on for further use. 

To date we have raised £11000.00 and our latest ‘empty vest’ initiative aims to raise much-needed funds as well as highlight the number of babies stillborn in the UK each year. With the help of family and friends, funds raised have gone to different charities including Tigerlily, Bay Hospitals Charity, Sands and Beyond Bea.

Matilda was stillborn after a healthy pregnancy. This was caused by undetected placental abnormalities. Matilda was our second child, we are also parents to a two-and-a-half-year-old son, Jax. We are super proud of both of our children.
 We don’t get to parent Matilda in normal ways, so we call this part of our ’Matilda parenting. 

Of course we would wish for nothing more than for Matilda to be here with us but she isn’t it so we are trying to channel our energy into positive avenues.

All that we are doing in memory of Matilda is to keep her memory alive. We owe it to our daughter and every other single baby and their families.

‘’Matilda was still born but Still a life, Still existed, Still a baby, Still a daughter, Still a sister.”