Memorial Walk for lost babies helps with grieving

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Greta Rozell never got to see or hold her stillborn baby daughter 52 years ago.

She left the hospital without so much as a blanket to remember Carol Ann, her second child, whom she carried to full term before she developed placental abruption, where the placenta is torn from the uterus wall.

In an emergency Caesarean section, Rozell’s daughter was stillborn.

Although close friends and family understood how much the loss hurt Rozell and her husband — who got to see the baby while Rozell was too sick — society didn’t get it.

“People are uncomfortable and they don’t know what to say,” she said.

The loss of a stillborn child is still something that families are often expected to bear in silence.

“I think there’s not much understanding about where this grief is coming from,” said Michelle Mosca, co-founder of Angel Names Association, a nonprofit group based in Saratoga Springs that provides grief counseling to families of stillborn babies and grants to help with burial and funeral costs.

“It’s also about mourning the life that you’ve lost with that child.”

Rozell has never forgotten the life that Carol Ann could have had with her older and younger sisters.

So two years ago when Rozell, of South Glens Falls, heard about a walk to remember stillborn babies that Angel Names holds, she knew she had to go — for herself, and for Carol Ann, who would have been 50 that year.

“I had always felt that there wasn’t anything that I could do,” Rozell said.

Rozell was one of 150 people who walked that year; last year the attendance grew to 220.

Besides families who have lost babies, health care workers also attend the walk.

“I think the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do is say to a patient, ‘I’m sorry. We don’t have a heartbeat,’ ” said Bernice McLellan, a midwife at St. Mary’s Hospital in Troy and a board member for the Angel Names Association.

Mosca, of Corinth, said nearly 2,000 babies are stillborn every year in New York state, a number that is likely to surprise some people. It’s more than the number that die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

A baby is considered stillborn if it dies in the womb at 20 weeks gestation or more.

Despite the sad topic at the heart of the annual walk, Mosca said the event is a happy occasion that includes fun activities for children.

“I cry very easily, and I have yet to [cry at the walk]. It’s just wonderful to be surrounded by so much support.”

Mosca’s first child, Nicholas Angelo, was stillborn eight years ago after being in perfect health in the womb for 37 weeks.

“I felt my son hiccup and turn and kick. I dreamed of him all my life,” Mosca said. “I knew him. I could tell you when he was awake; when he was kicking. I could tell you a book full of things about him.”

When he was delivered, the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck.

Now Mosca tells people she has three sons, two of whom are living. Jovanni, 6, and Carlos 4, know about their big brother who looks down on them from above.

“The grief journey is really lifelong. It will never hurt less that my son’s gone. I learn to find joy despite my son’s absence,” Mosca said.

Angel Names Association’s programs are offered free to the community at a cost of between $6,000 and $8,000 a year to the organization.

“It’s not much, but there’s now a resource out there, and there are multiple groups nationwide to provide support for couples that do not have the expected outcome for their pregnancies,” McLellan said.

The services include:

* The Securing End-of-Life Expenses program (SEOLE) gives families money toward an autopsy, funeral, burial, cremation or memorial. Mosca said the organization gives between $500 and $1,000 to each family that requests help, or about eight families a year.

* The Grief Recovery Assistance Program (GRASP), gives money to families that want counseling services after their baby is stillborn but can’t afford it.

* Memory boxes are provided to families and include a handmade baby blanket, camera and photo album, journal and supplies for making hand and footprints.

* A Workplace Support and Information Program gives employers information about how to express support and what to expect of a grieving parent.

* The association this year gave $2,500 to a researcher at the University of Michigan who is studying causes of stillbirth and what support bereaved families typically get.

* Materials from a lending library are mailed to families who have lost a child.

* A Still Parents Luncheon is held between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. “That gives us a chance to honor their parenthood when so many others failed to do so,” Mosca said.

If you go

The third annual Memorial Walk for families who have lost babies in miscarriage, stillbirth and infant death will be held from noon to 4:30 p.m. Oct. 18 at Saratoga Spa State Park.

Registration begins at noon at the Columbia Pavilion, and the walk starts at 1:15 p.m.

Participation is free, and anyone whose life has been touched by the loss of a baby is welcome.

The walk will proceed along paths easily navigable for strollers and wheelchairs.

A nondenominational memorial service will begin at 3:30 p.m. in the Columbia Pavilion field.

For more information or to register, visit www.angelnames.org, e-mail mmosca@roadrunner.com or call 654-2411.