It’s difficult to know what to gift someone who’s grieving. No ‘thing’ is possibly enough to alleviate their pain. Small gestures seem insufficient, while larger ones feel almost grotesque in their obviousness.
This is never more the case than when someone is grieving a life that never was. Their pain is incomprehensible unless you, too, have experienced losing a baby.
“There are no words to describe the horror and sheer devastation of rocking your own deceased child in your arms,” author Bec Sparrow wrote for Mamamia about her daughter Georgie, who died when Bec was 36 weeks pregnant.
“At the time, I didn’t think I could survive the pain I was in. I felt like I was going to be dragged under the waves of grief.”
How to help someone in this hell? When Christmas is here and the world is aglow but every carol and stocking and goddamn-family-Christmas-movie must feel like a kick in the stomach. It should, of course, be their baby’s first Christmas.
What to give someone, whose just lost this hope?
Listen: Welcome back, Monz. A story about miscarriage. (Post continues below…)
Samantha Rowe, founder of Memories of an Angel, works to raise awareness around pregnancy and infant loss and has the best – as best as it can be – Christmas gift ideas for bereaved families.
She knows the pain. She’s felt it herself.
“I am an Angel Mum to four beautiful babies,” her website reads. “Cooper was stillborn at 22wks on 14.02.14. Hudson was stillborn at 20wks on 23.01.15. And Emma and Zoe (identical momo twins) passed away due to cord entanglement on 30.08.15.”
For sale on Memories of an Angel, there are Christmas ornaments that are love hearts encasing a little lost footprint.
There are Christmas cards in the shape of angels.
Wristbands that read: “Mummy of an angel”.
Beaded bracelets with a charm of two little feet.
Key rings that declare: Daughter, forever in my heart.
They are small gestures that show understanding and acknowledgment. Most of all acknowledgment.
They recognise a pain that no Christmas gift could ever heal. A life, felt more potently because it never was. And a beautiful little soul who is, now and forever, an angel.
You can buy Samantha Rowe’s heartfelt pieces here.