Genelle Aldred was excited as she went into the hospital to give birth to her first daughter, Sade-Rose, despite the enormous impact it would have on her life. Just 19 at the time, the mum-to-be had bought the pram, painted a room in her home, and put herself second - halting her career plans and hopes for the future.
But a few days later she returned home from the hospital empty-handed, having lost her baby at the last possible moment of her pregnancy when her placenta ran out - even though she'd seen seven midwives in a single week. Now, 21 years later, Genelle has shared her story to help others going through similar experiences, and explained how the trauma has impacted her life ever since.
Have you ever been through a similar experience? Let us know in the comments...
Genelle, 40, a broadcaster and author who has worked with the BBC, ITV, ITN and 5 News as a newsreader and journalist, said: "One of the issues with stillbirth is that in this country, in terms of the developed world, we're not doing well - we're one of the worst countries. It's not just black women but other ethnic minorities and working-class women, who are disproportionately affected by stillbirths.
"It almost seems that the further away someone is from a typical family set-up, the more likely they are to have a stillbirth.
"Like mine, there was no medical reason for it - it was nothing to do with the baby or nothing to do with me, she was just in there too long - my labour was left to go on for too long, that's not down to any physiological reason.
"I saw seven midwives in one week so it's not down to me not reaching out and saying, 'I think there's a problem', it's down to the midwives' attitude to the person in front of them.
"Because of the stats it's hard to separate the fact that it happens to people who don't fit a certain majority demographic, it does happen to them too but in terms of the rates, black women are twice as likely to have a stillbirth, Asian women are one and a half times more likely, and with the working class it was around there too.
"There's obviously something about the treatment of people in the margins, they're not getting the same care as other people.
"The midwives looking after me had opportunities to intervene and speed up my labour. In the end, my placenta ran out and Sade ran out of oxygen, she was in there far too long. You can progress labours, but because I wasn't ten days over they wouldn't do anything and I think the joy of modern medicine is that you can intervene if there's a problem.
"My sister at that same hospital several years later, about 15 years after I was there, nearly had a similar incident but luckily a change of doctor meant that she had an emergency caesarean, but she could have suffered the same thing so there's something about the care.
"I think the hard thing about the NHS now is they're under so much more pressure, there are fewer midwives and to me, the dangerous thing is when you are under more pressure you go more with your instincts and that's where our biases often live - in our instincts.
"I think when people are pushed for time they will more heavily lean on stereotypes around race and class, and that's the dangerous thing. Could my stillbirth still happen today, I think it could."
Genelle, who is now an ambassador for Sands, a charity working to save babies’ lives and support anyone affected by pregnancy loss or the death of a baby, believes that communication in hospitals is key and that pregnant women, or their birthing partners, need to be able to speak out and seek help if they feel like things are going wrong.
She continued: "What would make a difference is birthing partners feeling more able to speak up - one of the things I'm interested in is advocacy, when you're in labour you're tired often, you don't have the energy, you're emotional, your body is being flooded with hormones and I think it's easy for people to dismiss the things you're saying and dismiss you.
"I think what would help is stronger advocacy. Birthing partners, whoever they are - it could be your partner, it could be your mum - if they understand what the signs are, know when things aren't going right, and can speak out - that could make all the difference.
"Doctors study for a long time and they know more than we do, but you know your body and you're more passionate about your outcome. I think it's a question of how we enable people to work together, midwives working with birthing partners - we don't want it to be a negative conflict but people should feel empowered to speak up.
"When people were batting me away I didn't feel like I could go as far as I wanted to go to say, 'I'm scared, I don't think this is going right'. My mum did all she could, but in the end, I was just told all mums feel like this, and this is just how it is, it just takes time - that's what they said to me.
"It's just a way to keep you quiet and send you away, and in the end when all of this happens and they send you home, it's you that gets the terrible outcome that you fear.
"I lived with it. I think that's a thing for health professionals to recognise, they might feel badly but they'll never feel as badly as me, they'll never understand how that's impacted my whole life, impacted the things I've done and the things I haven't gone on to do, the time it takes to heal from that kind of grief of losing a child, the trauma of the experience.
"They'll never live that, I'll be long forgotten by them when I still remember this intimately."
Genelle lost Sade-Rose in 2002, 21 years ago, and she still feels the impact from the trauma in her day-to-day life.
She added: "I'm 40 now, I was 19 when it happened, and I can still see the ways it's impacted a lot of the decisions that I've made, a lot of the things I get fearful about.
"I was young, when you're 19 you think you know everything but you don't know much about life and even yourself. That happened to me when I was still growing into being a woman, growing into an adult.
"It put a lot of fear into me about not being listened to, I'm still funny around that now - If I feel like I'm going to have a bad outcome and someone is not listening to me, I become hyper-sensitive about it - I'm hyper-vigilant because I've keenly felt that bad outcome in my life and I don't want to experience that again.
"Some people go out and have children straight away, but I was terrified that it would happen again.
"You hear of people with miscarriages and then feel they can relax after three months of pregnancy, but I know I'd never be able to relax because I did the whole thing and there were no problems during my pregnancy with me or Sade, and I still didn't take a baby home.
"I was full-term pregnant, 40 weeks and ten days, I'd gone full-term which means I'd have to go through the whole thing worrying about the outcome.
"I think what that leaves in your mind, the feeling of never really feeling sure that things are going to work out the way you think they are, it's very tough.
"I had the pram, the cot was up, the room was painted, and everything was ready because I was full term. I took some things back, I gave some things away. It was challenging, some things I didn't give back for months - that was a very slow process.
"Life is often like that. There are surprises, but to be terrified of them can be crippling sometimes and it has been crippling for me to do things.
"Because I've had a decent career people think I'm fine, but a lot of the time I wasn't fine.
"I had to give the cot back but it was hard because I'd already put it up. I'd called ahead so I didn't have to explain in the shop, but I still had to explain that my baby was dead when I went in - I didn't want to have the conversation like that."
To help her cope with her grief, Genelle wrote a blog about her experiences with stillbirth and spoke to other parents who had been through similar experiences.
She continued: "I wrote a blog about it, and so many people message me saying it happened to them but they never told anyone and they'd carried it with them for such a long time, never mentioning it, never talking about the grief or the loss they felt, and now I think people do talk about it and it's better that way.
"It's like the last taboo of grief, baby loss. I get it, it's a challenging one - people don't want to hear about losing a baby when you're thinking about bringing a child into this world, but I know it's the knowledge and advocacy that will help there be fewer stillbirths, people being aware of the signs and feeling confident enough to speak out to midwives, I think the two have to go hand in hand.
"I think in a weird way it helped more in the beginning to speak about it than it does now, at the time I needed to talk about it.
"It's a really tricky thing when you lose a baby. Because I was young and I didn't have another child - I think if you have another child people know what to do with the story when you tell them, because they say, 'oh well, it's ok because you have a child now'.
"You've righted the wrong, so to speak, you've had your redemption story. When you don't have another child I think people find that very difficult because they don't know how to sit with that loss, and you have to often make that conversation more positive for them."
Jen Coates, director of bereavement support at Sands, said: "The situation Genelle describes is sadly all too familiar to many bereaved parents supported by Sands.
"We are so grateful to Genelle for sharing her story and raising awareness of the challenges and impact of grief following pregnancy loss and the death of a baby.
"It is vital that the voices of parents are heard throughout pregnancy and after loss, so that the reasons can be identified and changes made.
"Support is available via the Sands Bereavement Support Line 0808 164 3332 and helpline@sands.org.uk as well as on our social media channels and support pages."
If you are dealing with sibling loss, stillbirth, or neonatal death, support is available from Sands here.
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