Small Miracles

Description

One in every four Australian pregnancies ends in a loss. The human reality of this shocking statistic is that 50,000 babies die every year. Even more perplexing is the fact that this figure hasn't changed in Australia for the past 60 years. Advances in medical technology are as much a priority as the need to address our collective emotional response to the loss of a baby. Small Miracles offers practical counselling and inspiring consolation for anyone coping with the loss of a baby through miscarriage, stillbirth or prematurity and related issues such as infertility. Based on the grief counselling and support services offered by the Bonnie Babies Foundation for over 15 years, it contains moving stories of Australians (including the author) who have experienced the traumatic loss of a baby and how they coped with this very private tragedy, rebuilt their lives and restored their hopes.

Rachel Stanfield-Porter has known both the grief and the joy of starting a family she has had four children. Sadly though, she lost her first two boys to still birth and miscarriage. Struck by the fragility of life, and galvanised by her previous tragedies and the lack of support available, she founded the Bonnie Babes Foundation. Her mission was to help other families struggling with the emotional pain she and her husband had experienced and to reduce the number of babies that die each year. Fifteen years later the organisation has been overwhelmingly successful in reaching out to the 50,000 Australian families each year who experience the traumatic loss of a baby and providing vital equipment to hospitals to help save the lives of newborns. The Bonnie Babes Foundation is now Australia's leading grief counselling service that Australian women and families turn to after the loss of a baby.