Confessions of a Grieving Mother Emma's Footprints

Listen as Tracy and Julie chat with our very own Meghan Slater, Emma's Bereavement Coordinator, and an L&D Nurse for a local hospital in Erie, PA. They dive deep into answering some of our nurses' most pressing questions about how to navigate a loss with their patients.

More about Meghan:

Meghan’s grief story started when she lost her first pregnancy in October 2014. After almost 2 years and lots of emotional healing, she was finally open to talking through her grief with Tracy and other moms.

When Meghan’s rainbow baby Jackson turned a year old she started a course to become a certified birth and bereavement doula and is now a registered nurse for a local hospital here in Erie. She knew in her heart that no mom should have to walk this road of grief alone.

Connect with Meghan at meghan@emmasfootprints.com.

In this episode, Tracy and Julie talk with loss mamas Ashley, Stacy, and Jessica about Mother's Day and how it changes after a loss. We dive deep into the feelings of being a Mother and how that feels even though our children may not be here with us. We wish you a gentle Mother's Day this year.

Type of Loss: Early Term Loss

More about Stacey's Story: After years of trying to conceive, Stacey and her husband, Brandon, decided to foster to adopt in which they were blessed with 6 children. They still had a strong desire to conceive, they turned to IVF, and had a successful pregnancy with their son Owen. They had one more embryo and decided to transfer their sweet girl, Vivian. All was going so well with the transfer and all of her numbers were great. Until one Sunday morning as she was leading worship, she started to bleed on stage and unfortunately lost their sweet girl.

Learn more about Emma's Footprints:


www.EmmasFootprints.com
Facebook: EmmasFootprints

Type of Loss: Early Term Loss, Multiple Losses, Stillbirth

More about Samantha's Story: Listen as Samantha shares her sweet babies Baby Lohrman and Avonlea with us. Samantha and her husband, CJ, were ecstatic when they found out they were expecting their first baby in 2021. Unfortunately, that excitement turned to sorrow when they were told at their first doctors appointment their baby didn't have a heartbeat. Listen as Samantha walks us through the grief she felt experiencing an early term loss. When they found out they were expecting again, they were quite reserved because of losing their first baby. Samantha describes her pregnancy with Avonlea as a textbook pregnancy. At 27 weeks gestation, Samantha went to the hospital because she hadn't felt Avonlea move in awhile. It was there that doctors told her they could not find a heartbeat.

Learn more about Emma's Footprints:


www.EmmasFootprints.com
Facebook: EmmasFootprints

Type of Loss: Early Term Loss, Multiple Losses, Terminating for Medical Reasons

More about Carmen's Story: Buckle up for this episode as Carmen shares her 11 beautiful babies with us. In this episode, she she dives deep into her pregnancies, grief and how she turned her pain into purpose. Carmen wrote A Diary to My Babies: Journeying Through Pregnancy Loss to shine light on the darkness of pregnancy loss, while also showing there is no right way to grieve. And through her incredible journey, Carmen hopes the story of her family and her babies just might help others to heal.

Purchase Carmen's book A Diary to My Babies: Journeying through Pregnancy Loss here:


https://amzn.to/4at4Myb

Learn more about Emma's Footprints:


www.EmmasFootprints.comFacebook: EmmasFootprints

Listen as Tracy and Julie talk more with Shawn Betts, Courtney's Mom. Shawn found purpose in her pain of losing her daughter Courtney, by connecting with other loss moms to form the missing angel bill. A bill that would allow you to get a birth certificate for your baby that died after 20 weeks gestation. Shawn dives into how she worked tirelessly with those moms to get that bill approved by the PA Senate. Today, Pennsylvania Senate Bill 326 CBRS exists which allows parents to get a birth certificate for their baby who was stillborn because of moms like Shawn who found purpose in their pain.

You can listen to Shawn's story here: https://bit.ly/Meet-Courtney-S7

You can find out more about the Stillborn Birth Certificate here: www.emmasfootprints.com/stillborn-birth-certificate