Thankyou for visiting our Donation Page for the SANDS charity. We are Amy and William Searle and this is our story-

On the 27th July 2017 at 1.35am our very much wanted, planned and needed daughter Elowen was born stillborn one and a half hours after her due date passed. This is the second child we have lost, the first being a missed miscarriage at 9 weeks in August 2016. We no longer want our babies to be a secret and we want to keep their memories alive. Losing 'Seed' as we called him/her, although traumatic and the worst pain we'd been through emotionally at the time, was absolutely no preparation for the pain and trauma of losing our Daughter Elowen full term.

We are also so proud of her and don't want her to just be a secret and forgotten. We want to keep her memory alive.

Devastated, shattered and confused doesn't even come close to describing how we are feeling at this moment, we don't know how we are doing it. We can't believe we haven't died of the pain.

We miss her every single second of the day.
We would have given anything to see her open her eyes and look at us just for a second, instead all we have are a few short memories of time spent with her at the hospital and funeral home, her ashes and some cherished photos.

They say you won't know love until you have a child, that much is true and something we have been absolutely privileged to have experienced. You also won't know heartbreak until you lose one. Feeling BOTH those feelings in one moment is unfathomable and completely unnatural.

Stillbirth is not something that's talked about enough in pre-natal care, or enough in life in general. The shock and trauma we are experiencing is immense and something that will haunt us for the rest of our lives. But when you come out of the initial shock and into real life and walk around each day seeing happy families or proud parents sharing photos of their children you want to scream at the top of your lungs "I am a mummy, I've given birth, and I am a daddy, we had a daughter".

The pregnancy was perfect and without a hitch, every neurotic sentence uttered by us to the midwife during each of the routine checkups was wafted away with a 'you're fine you will be fine' and just one day for no apparent reason she just stopped moving, just two days before her due date. We went into hospital where they scanned her and said 'I'm sorry your baby has died' . Just like that all of our dreams were shattered. A sentence that haunts us hundreds of times a day.

We had to go home with her dead inside while the induction pills worked, moving her and willing her to kick like she was only less than 12 hours before, her dead weight like an anchor inside. Two days later she was given birth too naturally, the pain relief didn't work, another slap in the face, we were terrified. The horror of knowing the outcome would be a silent room filled without the cries of our beloved baby.

To then have to organise her post mortem literally hours after her birth and just 2 days after feeling her last kick.

To meet her, terrified of what she would be like, too scared to hold her to see a dead body, let alone a dead baby, our baby.

To hand her back to the midwives when we were discharged, to phone in when the anxiety became to hard to bear at home and make sure they were keeping her warm with her blanket while she she waited for her post mortem, even though she didn't need it. To ask if they were checking on her and cuddling her. They did. 

To register her death 5 days later and be in a car park full of happy parents registering the birth of their babies, to see her name written down for the first time on her death certificate.

To organise her cremation, pick an outfit from all of her beautiful newly washed clothes that we wanted her cremated in, visit her in the funeral home and decide what day to say goodbye after watching her lifeless perfect body deteriorating, holding back with every fibre of our being on the day of her funeral from running away with her and not letting our baby get burnt. To ask the funeral directors to cover her little face with her blanket so she didn't get scared and see the flames engulf her tiny coffin. 

This is something no parents should have to do. Especially ones who've never had a live baby. All of our 'firsts' were destroyed. The first drive home, the first trip out, the first night, the first nappy...the list goes on. Driving home from hospital without a baby to an empty nursery full of things bought with such excitement is horrific. Packing it all away. Feeling excited to be finally getting her home 3 weeks later in ashes given to us in a memorial teddy bear is beyond comprehension. Cuddling that teddy every night sobbing into its fluffy face and squeezing her ashes inside it, wondering how on earth we ended up at this point!!

Waiting until December to find out what happened to her when all her tests come back is agonising, wondering if was our fault or not or how the body failed somehow. We can't believe only 0.5% of people have a stillbirth (any loss after 24 weeks). It's even more rare to have a full term stillbirth.

Each day is getting harder as the reality sets in. Our lives are completely empty as we had expected to be parents. We are lost and broken. We are also mourning our 13 year long relationship while we grieve and who we used to be, the innocence of our pregnancies and how blissfully unaware we were. Seeing happy families and other babies is like torture. Anger doesn't even go deep enough to describe the feelings we have when we think 'why us?' We are terrified someone will ask us do we have children? Do we want children? We have already been in a situation where a stranger was congratulating a pregnant woman on her child and saying as long as it's healthy that's all that matters. Is it all that matters? We thought our baby was healthy? Seeing people screaming at their kids and moaning about them. What we would give to be in their shoes, with a child of our own. Not all people, but a lot of people don't realise how lucky they are. We just want people to be aware of not only our pain but anyone you first meet could be in this pain so please please be careful. The subject of babies and birth and having a family isn't always a happy choice for some people. We are terrified of trying again, of having this happen again, of replacing our beloved daughter.

It won't get 100% better, new children won't fill the hole. Even if we had 10 children we'd always be wondering what our Elowen looked like, what her smile was like, what colour her eyes would have been, what she would be doing now of she were alive. Meeting other children her age will be torture and each one of her birthdays and every would-be milestone will be hell. People presume you'll 'get over it in time' 'another child will help' the list of thoughtless comments go on and on, well it won't, how could it, she's our beautiful Elowen and she's not here with us like she should be. With each child they have taken with them so much of our love and happiness for which we are grateful but never again will we experience the pure innocent joy of finding out we are pregnant, Seed that is your gift and only for you. Never again will we reach full term blissfully happy we'd passed all the 'danger' milestones, Elowen that happiness is for you and only you.

Nothing or nobody had prepared us for this, we will fight in her memory to raise awareness for something that before this happened to us, we knew nothing about. 

A donation to this Just Giving page is for if you were ever going to buy her a gift for her birth, her birthday or Christmas or if you just want us to know you are thinking of her. Its also going to a great cause so perhaps one day Stillbirths will become a thing of the past. The target of £3950 is for the 39 weeks and 5 days she was alive. 

Our families have been our rocks and they too are grieving their own losses of becoming Grandparents, Aunties, Uncle etc. We are lucky that we have each other and our furry girls Daisy and Dilly. We are so lucky to be so in love we have a reason to live another day, but learning to be just us two again with all our shattered dreams will be a tough and long road ahead, we don't know how we will survive this.

When Mummy saw you for the first time Elowen you were worth all of the pain of the birth, just to see your beautiful little face for that short while. When Daddy held you for the first time his life changed forever. Life is so cruel as you SHOULD be here with us. What we would give to have just one day with you, our beautiful baby girl. We love you Elowen and will love you forever and ever with every inch of our broken hearts,

Love Mummy and Daddy xxx