So I am always very humbled and honoured when I get to hear the grief story of another family because I know it can take a lot of courage to be that open about something that society veers away from talking about.
I am honoured to share with you Yvonne's story of why she has joined us for the SiMBA 2014 Great Glen Challenge. Thank you to Yvonne & Alan for allowing me to record this.
"Why I am doing the SiMBA challenge?
Well, since May 2013 I’ve been losing weight, quite a lot of weight, over 5 stone in fact! My health and fitness have improved incredibly as I’ve lost weight and I recently started skiing again, something I’ve not done in over 25 years.
I heard about this challenge from Aileen, who is also doing the challenge. When I looked into what SiMBA was, I knew I wanted to support it as a charity, and since I’ve enjoyed getting back to skiing thought maybe I could try getting back in a canoe.
To test the water, I went along to the Inverness Canoe Club who meet in the swimming pool on Friday nights. After finding out I could still get in and out of a canoe, including when capsized, I knew I was up for the challenge!
So what was it about SiMBA that made me want to support it?
In 1995 we went south to my hometown to visit my brother, wife and their new baby daughter who was a much longed for and precious gift. It was wonderful to meet her and very exciting for Alan and me as we had just that discovered I was pregnant too. We decided not to tell anyone at that stage; it was we thought quite early and we didn’t want to steal any of the joy we were all experiencing in the new life of our niece.
That joy was quite short lived because within a few days of returning from our visit I started to miscarry. We had thought I was about 6 weeks but it turned out to be a 12 week pregnancy. The loss was tremendous, but from what we were hearing was not unusual and the medical staff were confident that the next pregnancy would be successful.
A few months later I was pregnant again but again it wasn’t to be. We were assured that it didn’t mean it would happen in the future. We also discovered that until you’ve gone through this pain 3 times there are no investigations to explore any possible causes of miscarriage.
Sadly we did get to the stage of having investigations. We were not directed to any support groups.We struggled with a grief but yet what were we grieving? We hadn’t had a baby - we’d only had pregnancies, there was probably something wrong and this was nature’s way…...
It seemed like we shouldn’t be grieving; we struggled at times as a couple - it had happened to me - I didn’t think Alan knew what I was feeling and he was struggling to know what to say or do.
Eventually we were truly blessed by the birth of our son, now 16 years old and a lovely young man. His arrival wasn’t without its difficulties. I did have several bleeds and he arrived at 31 ½ weeks, exactly 2 months early! When I held him I couldn’t help thinking about the babies I’d never hold I don’t even know if they were boys or girls …...
Life moves on and we did have another pregnancy after our son was born. That child would have been 14 years old now and he would have been born around the time of his dad’s 40th.
I don’t know if it was a he but I’ve always thought of that child as a boy.
We gave up then, opting to put our emotions into the child we had, rather than experiencing a constant rollercoaster of expectation and grief, and each time the grief seemed to increase.
SiMBA wasn’t around when we were going through all this, but I’m sure that the support they offer would have been a great help not only to us directly but also to our wider family who must have struggled to know how to help us or understand what we were experiencing.
So I’m doing this challenge to help to support others experiencing the loss of a precious child at any stage of their development and to celebrate being slim and fit enough to take part in this kind of activity again!"
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