Would you click your mouse 3 times a day for 2 weeks if it meant helping OC Walk to Remember earn $10,000? Beginning today, November 19th through December 3rd, Orange County Walk to Remember is participating in the Vote Your Thanks campaign through the Connect OC/Non-Profit Central. The non-profit with the highest number of votes will receive $10,000!
1. Click the link below.
2. Click the “Vote Your Thanks” logo
3. Search for ORANGE COUNTY WALK TO REMEMBER
4. Click to cast your vote!
It’s that easy. And remember, you can vote once per day through December 3, 2013.
All funds raised by the OC Walk to Remember are used to provide grief support for families who have lost a baby due to miscarriage, stillbirth, SIDS, pregnancy loss or other infant loss.
*Thank you for your help! Please make sure to leave a comment here on the blog letting us know that you have voted and you will be entered into a random drawing to win any three prints from the Small Birds Studio Shop OR a set of any 5×7 five cards. Shop link – http://www.etsy.com/shop/smallbirdstudio
You will be contacted via email. The contest will run through Dec.3rd and the winner will be announced on Dec.4, 2013!
Close your eyes and let your mind be free. On November 16, 2013, the 1st Yoga to Remember class was lead by Rachel Gray. It was a chance for mom’s who have lost a baby to unwind and re-build positive energy.
“I will not be broken”
“The best time to start was yesterday. The next best time is NOW.”
“When your body changes, your breathing can be changed. When your breathing changes, then your thoughts can be changed. And when your thoughts change, then you can be changed.”
“Today is full of possible”
“A strong woman is one who feels deeply and loves fiercely. Her tears flow just as abundantly as her laughter. A strong woman is both soft and powerful. She is both practical and spiritual. A strong woman in her essence is a gift to the world.”
“Sometimes it’s okay if the only thing you did today was breathe.”
“There is no need of any competition with anybody. You are yourself, and as you are, you are perfectly good. Accept yourself.”
“The spirit within me honors and respects the spirit withing you.”
Reminder to mark your calendars! Yoga classes will be held every 3rd Saturday of each month. If you forget, there will be another message posted on our Facebook page for the next upcoming class.
We hope everyone who came out enjoyed the new yoga class.
OC Walk to Remember relies on donations to help the thousands of Orange County families who have lost a baby or will lose a baby. We need your support to reach our 2013 fundraising goal.
Our campaign ends tomorrow, October 15, which is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. Thank you to those of you who are working so hard to raise funds in memory of a baby or babies. The funds raised go directly to support families who have lost a baby to miscarriage, stillbirth, SIDS, pregnancy loss and infant death. OC Walk to Remember supports 28 Orange County hospitals, Orange County support groups, and national pregnancy and infant loss organizations. To learn more about what OC Walk to Remember does in the community, watch this video.
Donations are used to:
Provide medical professionals with bereavement training, so they can help families through their loss. So far in 2013, OC Walk to Remember has educated 79 doctors, 130 nurses, and 270 medical office staff.
Purchase books for local hospitals, so as mothers recover from delivery or surgery they have a way to read about other women like them that have survived the heartache of loss.
Print informational brochures in English and Spanish, so families that have experienced the loss of a baby know where to turn for support once they leave the hospital.
Purchase memory boxes, so families can have something to hold in their empty arms. The only keepsake we will have of our baby is the box we receive in the hospital.
Provide cameras, photo printers, printer ink, photo paper and other supplies to local hospitals so parents will forever have photos of their baby or babies.
Provide iPods and docking stations so medical staff can provide music therapy to families going through a loss.
Provide Orange County support groups that help families grieving the loss of a baby with funds to: hold reunions, distribute books, give small gifts to parents who have lost a baby, and pay rent and other operating expenses.
Run the OC Walk to Remember Balancing Life & Loss: Parenting After Loss Group for families parenting a living child while grieving the loss of a baby.
Provide families who have lost a baby with small notebooks, which become keepsakes where they can write about their baby.
Run the OC Walk to Remember phone, email, and website, so parents seeking support always have a place to go. Requests for support are answered by a social worker.
The funds will also be used to support a brand new program we started this year in conjunction with UC Irvine Medical Center: The Perinatal Palliative Care Program. This program will provide care for families who are given a poor prenatal diagnosis, meaning the baby they are carrying will die at birth or shortly after birth. The program will provide counseling, spiritual support, pain management, coordination of care from all medical professionals involved in the pregnancy, and more. Families who receive the heart-breaking news about their unborn child with life-threatening or life-limiting conditions are faced with difficult choices and have many questions as well as emotional, social and spiritual needs. The program will guide the family through this traumatic experience of learning their baby is going to die. It is our hope to partner with many more hospitals to expand this program.
Your donation will change the life of families experiencing the loss of a baby.
We thank you so much for your support.
Kristyn von Rotz, Cofounder/Board of Directors
Elizabeth Pagliarini, Chairwoman of the Board of Directors
Catherine Steen, Board of Directors
Kari Poucher, Board of Directors
Kristy Cornell, Board of Directors
Ryan Farnsworth, Board of Directors
Kristin Cyprien, Executive Director
What does the OC Walk to Remember do throughout the year? With the 9th Annual 2013 OC Walk To Remember Memorial Service, 5K Walk and Celebration of Angels event just around the corner, we want to fill you in on all the wonderful things that have gone on this past year. First off, thank you to each and every one of you because this organization is powered by volunteers and families. You are part of the OC Walk to Remember family. There is something really special that the community gives each other when they work together, talk to each other, and collaborate.
Meet Angie Bailey, a volunteer who has taken on a new role for OC Walk to Remember as Director of Community Education. In 2010, Angie silently gave birth to her first child, Aiden Kenneth Bailey. He was full term and the pregnancy was healthy and uneventful. Aiden was perfect in every way, no reason was ever found for why he was born still. She and her husband continue to mourn their loss every day. Since losing Aiden, working with families grieving the loss of a child has become her passion. Before moving into her current position, she began working with the OC Walk to Remember in 2011 organizing volunteers for their annual 5k walk.
Tell us about being Director of Community Education. Why is this role so important?
I took on my volunteer position of Director of Community Education in November 2012. Kristyn approached me with this opportunity and together we came up with my duties. Which mainly consists of the planning and implementation of educating the medical community. I visit OB/GYN offices and meet with doctor’s and their staff to teach them about resources that are available to their patients and ways to better care for women during and after the loss of a baby. I also visit nursing schools and attend teaching seminars for nurses and other hospital staff. Since the organization first began, OC Walk to Remember has had strong relationships with local labor & delivery and neonatal intensive care units. This is the first time we have made such connections within medical offices. It’s so important that we continue to educate outside of just the hospitals because doctor’s offices see the most broad types of losses, not every woman who endures the loss of a baby is treated in a hospital.
My husband and I got married March 5th 2011. We knew we wanted to start a family and knew we would need assistance in doing so due to my health history. I was diagnosed at 18 with stage 4 endometriosis and chronic ovarian cysts. After months of fertility treatments we became pregnant. Sadly we miscarried shortly after. We continued our journey, crushed but not fully aware of the true ache that would consume us. We became pregnant again after another round of treatment.
This pregnancy seemed to be going well and then one Sunday I woke up to bleeding and abdominal cramping. We shortly lost that baby too. A year of more painful fertility treatments passed with nothing to show but empty arms and heavy hearts. We decided to try again and this time became pregnant with twins. Grace and Wyatt. We were beyond hopeful but still so full of fear. We had lost all of our prior pregnancies so we cautiously watched the days pass. The babies looked wonderful and we had a due date of December 21 2012. We couldn’t have been happier.
On July 16th our happiness turned into terror. We had a routine Dr. visit. It was discovered that I was having contractions and that my cervix was too weak to support a pregnancy. We pleaded for a cerclage, a stitch that is sewn into the cervix. It helps to support the weight and prevent shortening. It doesn’t promise anything but it can provide a few more weeks. Our team sadly refused to place the stitch. We were heartbroken. We were sent home on strict bed rest, and medications. One week later my cervix went from 2.5 to .98. We were devastated. The team still didn’t have any options for us besides continuing bed rest and hoping we made it to viability. We were 17 weeks at the time. We would have done anything to bring our babies home safely so I never once complained about being bed ridden or my lack of control. I relied on my husband, family and amazing friends for everything. I was allowed to shower every 3 days, but had to remain sitting and had to be quick. The days passed and we were getting closer to viability.
Hello there! I’m Holly Waterfall, and I write for the blog Happy Food Healthy Life, where I normally share food, eating disorder, positive body image, and health related issues. I am a recovered eating disorder sufferer, and I strive to share my experiences, thoughts, and inspiration with others who may be struggling. Lately, I have kind of veered from the norm and have been writing about a topic that has been effecting me personally. There have been a lot of pregnancy/IVF/Loss topics come up in my life that I have shared with my readers, and when I was contacted by OC Walk To Remember to share my story of loss and hope, I thought that I must get my feelings out. You see, I lost my baby only a couple weeks ago, and the emotions are still so raw.
My wife, Tiffani and I have gone through quite a roller coaster to get to where we are today. It hasn’t been a fun one, to say the least. Here is how we started and where we are now.
Back at the beginning of this year of 2013, Tiffani and I decided that we wanted to expand our family. I have a 7 year old son from a previous relationship, but this was something new that my wife and I wanted and still do to bond over and experience together. And besides, Tiff wanted to have a little one that was directly related to her. The thing is, she didn’t want to be pregnant. Good thing I have no problems being pregnant! So, we decided to do something that is so awesome and the best of both worlds for a lesbian couple. After months of preparing emotionally, physically, and financially, we went through a reciprocal IVF cycle in July 2013. We harvested 14 of Tiff’s eggs, used an anonymous donor (only 6 fertilized successfully), and were able to transfer the best looking little guy to me on July 26th. 10 days of waiting for that first blood test was brutal, but we made it through.
