Saying goodbye to our little boy, Ben was the hardest thing we have ever had to do. Ben only got to make a brief entrance into the world on his birthday, 29th October 2015, and died unexpectedly only 27 minutes old. Although he was with us for only a short time, he will have a space in our hearts forever.

Nothing can prepare you for the grief, guilt, heartache and longing to hold your baby. The time and memories we shared as a family during his 40 weeks of pregnancy and the ones we made after Ben's arrival are some of the greatest yet hardest memories we will ever have.

We are forever and eternally grateful to all our friends and family who have helped with messages, cards, visiting, cooking, being a shoulder to cry on and generally just being there for us. We wouldn't have got this far without you. Our son James has been our guiding strength on the tough days and on a bad day his cheeky smile, infectious enthusiasm and ridiculous intelligence has lifted us even in the darkest times.

The loss of a loved one is a difficult time for anyone. As a parent the thought of thinking of life without one of your children is harrowing but it is happening everyday. We received amazing support from the SANDs charity and the Lily Mae foundation. These are two amazing charities supporting parents, their families and friends after the loss of a baby as well as providing research funding to lower the staggering 100 babies that die just before, during or after birth each week. They both do amazing work and we will be supporting them strongly over the coming years.

We have a long way to go to get to point of accepting everything that has happened and the loss of Ben but want everyone to know just how grateful we are to have such an amazing group of friends and family.

In Loving Memory of our Little Boy Ben, born on 29th October 2015 and who lived for the briefest of moments. But from the briefest of moments we are lucky to have had time to make memories that will last a lifetime. We love you so much xxx