Video: Carly Williams and Martin Sommerville’s son was stillborn in 2013
A couple whose baby was stillborn have spoken of their pride after raising thousands of pounds to create a specialist support unit.
Carly Williams and Martin Sommerville’s first child Zephyr was stillborn at Nottingham City Hospital in 2013.
Both said they were surprised by the lack of space and specialist facilities for parents who had lost a child.
They set up a fund in his name to create a centre at the hospital and have raised more than £20,000. The centre is due to open later this year.
After their loss the couple went on to have another child last year – Sol Sommerville-Williams – who is now 13 months old.
And he has already joined in the fundraising in memory of Zephyr – although he has only just learned to walk he is already enrolled on a five kilometre walk.
I had to give birth to him where other babies were crying
Remembering what happened during her previous pregnancy, Carly said: “I was in early labour and hadn’t felt any movement and so we went into hospital hoping to find out everything was ok to then come back for the home birth that we planned.
“That didn’t happen because he’d already died.
“I had to give birth to him in a maternity ward where there were other women in labour that we could hear and living babies crying, being born.
“We tried to go back for counselling and that was in the maternity ward and seeing couples who are clutching their scan photos and having to walk back through that waiting room was heartbreaking.”
A former flat on the hospital campus has been converted into the new facility which will offer services, counselling and complementary therapies to families who have lost a child or baby.
The couple’s inspiring efforts follow those of Richard and Michelle Daniels – another bereaved couple who set up the charity Forever Stars and opened a similar unit at the Queen’s Medical Centre in April.
Carly said: “The care we had when we lost Zephyr was fantastic; midwives and hospital staff held us with such compassion, doing their best to ease our broken hearts, but the surroundings felt so wrong.
“When you have just lost a child, it is hard to be around the joy of new birth.
“For us, and for many parents we’ve met since, that was the last place we wanted to be so we began to dream of an alternative.”
