He Was Here (season 2, episode 9 re-release)

For this week's summer re-mix we're sharing an interview we did during season 2 with our friend Shafina, who lost her second child when he was stillborn. This is a heavy topic but - as we discuss in the episode - it needs to be discussed. Each year about 21,000 babies are born stillborn and because we live in a society that says some kinds of grief are bigger than others (e.g. "stillborn child is not as painful as losing a child later in life"), that's 21,000 families with disenfranchised grief and no one to hear their story.

Shafina does a beautiful job helping us step inside her story, get to know her son, and experience her loss, pain, and eventual understanding of what happened to her and her family. Years later we still get chills when we think about this interview.

From Megan on her choice to release this episode: I decided to choose this episode to re-release because it hits close to home for me. I had a brother, Daniel, who died the day he was born. He wasn't stillborn, but my parent's experience was very close to Shafina's. Growing up I thought a lot about Daniel. I wanted to know him, I wished I could talk to him... but I at least wanted to be able to talk about him. I think my parents didn't quite have the words to help us understand who this baby that came before me was for them, and I wanted to re-share Shafina's story for other parents and families who might be feeling lonely in this loss in the same way I remember my family feeling.

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