As Baby Loss Awareness Week comes to a close, Clare Livingstone, Head of Professional Policy and Practice at the RCM, reflects on what it means to midwives and maternity staff who are impacted.
Baby Loss Awareness Week (9-15 October) is a time for reflection, remembrance and compassion. It’s a week when families across the UK come together to honour the babies they have lost and to break the silence around something that is often deeply personal, difficult to talk about and still seen as a taboo.
For midwives and maternity support workers (MSWs), this week can hold a particular poignancy. Caring for families experiencing the heartbreak of baby loss is among the most emotionally difficult parts of maternity care. The compassion and professionalism our members show in these moments are heartfelt and profound – but it is also important that we acknowledge the emotional impact this work can have on you.
Midwives and MSWs are often the ones who sit with parents in their most painful moments, who find the right words when it feels like there are none. It’s natural that these experiences stay with you and sometimes they can resurface, particularly during Baby Loss Awareness Week.
Supporting families through loss can also stir up personal memories. Many in our profession have experienced loss themselves – whether through miscarriage, stillbirth, neonatal death, or the loss of a baby within their own family. This can make caring for bereaved parents especially challenging, as professional responsibilities touch on deeply personal emotions. It’s important that we recognise this and that those who are grieving, whether recently or from the past, are given time, space and support to process those feelings without judgment.
As candles are lit across the country tonight during the Wave of Light, we will be thinking of the families we’ve cared for and the babies lost. We’ll also be thinking of the colleagues who have stood beside families through those moments.
To every midwife and MSW who has supported a bereaved family, or who carries their own experience of loss: please know that you are not alone and that we stand with you. The care you give matters more than words can express and looking after yourselves is an essential part of that care.
If you’ve been affected by baby loss and need someone to talk to, Cavell offers compassionate, confidential emotional support for RCM members. You can reach out for support on their website.
