'What really wounds and is really hurtful is this assumption that a baby is expendable'
Féileacáin Fathers Cork squad ahead of a charity match in Cobh, Co Cork, earlier this year wearing shirts showing the names of their loved ones who have passed away. Picture: Jim Coughlan
Every Christmas and New Year, Máirie Cregan feels a sadness shared by an untold number of people around the country.
It is a sadness that lingers around missing places at a table, fewer presents under the Christmas tree, the silence of voices never to be heard and one less person to ring in another year with. To the founding director of Féileacáin, Ireland's national charity supporting parents affected by stillbirths and baby deaths, it’s a sadness that never goes away.
It is one that hits anyone who has suffered the loss of someone close to them, including friends, siblings, partners or parents. But the Cork mother-of-six, whose daughter Liliana was stillborn on January 8, 2006, has her own way of dealing with loss.
“There's also a joy, because your missing loved ones are with you in a different way,” she says. “OK, so not everybody has that belief but everyone handles their grief in their own way.”
Máirie’s grandson Darragh died on January 23, 2020 three days after being born and her daughter Mitrutsa — a Romanian orphan who she had fostered at her home from 1992 — died in her arms a year later, on January 31, 2021.
“I am at the stage now where I only want Liliana acknowledged by people who would have been close to me at the time, rather than by someone thinking it's the right thing to do,” she said.
“I'm 20 years bereaved, and my grandson will be five shortly, and my adult daughter will be gone four years in January. I would only want them acknowledged by people who are part of their past, their lives.
“But what I would like is that if I did want them acknowledged, I would hope that they would be able to say, ‘Look, I am so sorry’ or ‘yeah, it must be hard’ and mean it.”
As head of a charity that offers immediate help to newly-bereaved parents, she is calling on anyone who spends time with anybody who has suffered loss, no matter how many years ago, to think about what they say to them, or how they say it.
“It is easy to say the wrong thing, when a few words can be enough,” she said. “We see someone suffering and we want to comfort them, want to make it better, but we can't, and then we don't know what to do.
“But people should remember or at least realise that there's nothing they can do, only perhaps to acknowledge that it is a tough time of the year for them and only be with them.
“Sometimes we try to fill silences and we try to talk our way out of things when, you know, sometimes just the touch of a hand, or a card at Christmas, saying that you are just thinking of them. That can be all it needs to take just a couple of sentences.”
She added: “If you say the wrong thing, then you just say, ‘I'm sorry. That's not what I meant, I was just trying to, you know, to let you know that I'm thinking about you’.
“What really wounds and is really hurtful is this assumption that a baby is expendable.
“You know, the 'oh, you have other children' but what on earth does that actually mean? People don’t usually tell you when your mother dies that you have another parent.”
Máirie said a friend of hers who suffered loss a number of years ago was recently in a conversation with a friend of theirs who seemed surprised that she was 'still grieving'. My friend turned to her and said that yes, she was still grieving, because her baby was still dead,” Máirie said.
“My best advice to everybody this Christmas and New Year if in the company of anybody who has suffered the traumatic and sudden death of a baby or child is to take the lead from the parents themselves.
“This time of year can be really, really hard to deal with. There's ads on telly the whole time about all these wonderful tables full of food and all these presents you have to get.
“There are times when the last thing people who have suffered a traumatic or sudden loss of a loved one want is to involve themselves with anybody. They might just want to try and get through the time.”
She added: “But you also have to consider that they might want a day where they just lay down their grief and put it to one side.”
Like Mairie, Lorraine Reilly has had a mostly positive interaction with people when it comes to Christmas and New Year and memories of her two daughters.
Asha was stillborn at Portiuncula in 2008 and just under two years later, baby Amber died six days after being born at the Galway hospital in 2010.
Her daughters' deaths were two of the 18 cases that featured in the 2018 Walker Review report of adverse maternity-related events at Portiuncula between 2008 and November 2014.
It was initiated because a higher than normal number of babies in a single year were referred by the hospital for neonatal therapeutic hypothermia, a standard treatment for babies brain damaged as a result of oxygen deprivation before or shortly after birth.
On her experience and that of her husband, Warren, she said: “The first Christmases were very difficult — the Christmas music and ads on TV, everyone laughing, enjoying themselves, felt like a stab in the heart at times.
“Writing cards and not being able to add our daughters' names to them was hard, although for family and close friends, we continue to write six kisses from each of us just to make sure we include them.
“Warren had incredible support from family and close friends who always asked how he was and checked in on him regularly. But our outer circle would mainly just ask him about me, which, for him and I, we would find upsetting, as he has gone through the same loss as I have and is heartbroken the same as me.
“We generally found people very respectful and our families were always incredible. For the first Christmas after our daughters passed away, they would say things like ‘we know Christmas will be difficult but we are here for you both’ or not say anything at all and maybe just give a hug.
“We got some beautiful thoughtful decorations for the tree or mantlepiece from the family with our daughters' names on them that we take out every year and are very special to us.”
The couple would mostly avoid social events because they would feel that some people outside of their family and close friends felt uncomfortable around them.
“I think it is important that people do not avoid you, even if they don't say anything about your daughters, “ she said.
“We did have a couple of instances where people would very obviously cross the road to avoid us or just not acknowledge our loss at all, which can be very hurtful, especially at the very beginning of our grief.”
She added: “We have had people saying unhelpful or unintentionally saying hurtful phrases like ‘but aren't you so lucky to have a child already’, or ‘you are young, you can have more’. Thankfully, this happened only a couple of times, and it was with people who were just acquaintances.”
The worst thing that has been said to the couple arrived in the shape of a letter, sent after they had appeared on the .
A woman they didn't know sent them a long letter which included the statement that because they were not Catholic was the reason why their daughters died and that to save their living daughter and themselves — they should follow the Christian path.
Lorraine said: “We just ignored the letter, but for another family, this could have been very difficult to read.”
As to whether people should take their lead from those who have suffered loss, she has her own advice based on her own experience.
“I think it depends on the social setting, but we were mostly happy to talk about our daughters,” she said. “Sometimes, people who did not know us that well but knew of our loss would ask ‘What are their names?' and then compliment their names.
“We found that when people were being genuine, we were happy to talk about them. We also found it helped other grieving families when we were so open to talking. It gave them freedom and space to feel like talking about their loss, too.”
Féileacáin (Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Support) provides a helpline run by trained professionals, and bereaved parents.
The number is 085 249 6464 or 028 51301 and the not-for-profit charity's email is admin@feileacain.ie.
The offices are closed weekends and bank holidays. The website is feileacain.ie.
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