#knowourbabies are you aware enough?

The month of October is known for quite a lot of thing's- birthdays , anniversaries, multiple, necessary awareness campaigns such as that of autism, downsyndrome, mental health illness, black history, and many many other campaigns with the most popular being breast cancer awareness of course and because people will often stand up for what they know or may have directly been affected by best-I thought I would add my little bit to the conversation for the black woman all around the world who may have gone through something similar but have not said a word

I have read and follow a lot of blogs on this topic but I was astonished to find that none (well of those I came across ) are by black woman, we really dont tell enough of our stories hey? And this needs to stop. Conversations with black people are Generally hilarious, mind blowing, insightful podcasts waiting to happen. But instead we have these conversations and keep them to ourselves, to our inner circles maybe because not everyone is a writer or that maybe we are too lazy or tired? We just like to keep it moving?

Anyway, so October 15th is National day of pregnancy and infant /childloss awareness /remembrance day and as a young mum to an angel myself, after a year and 10months of the little healing I could scrap up I thought too that I should share and my voice to the conversation that I too, lost a baby. A 6/7 month year old daughter to be exact.


On December 3, 2017 while I was pregnant I fell sick at night and went to the hospital. They couldn't see anything wrong, I was hospitalized for the night and discharged in the am to go for a scan etc. Scan came out fine I went home and cooked and the cramps got worse during the night. I had seen a Dr, so just kept taking my pills till I felt it was too painful to take. No blood. No water breaking, went downstairs and I remembered from some article that this is what happens when you are in labor. As I was texting my mum who had just traveled that I think I am in labor, I went to the bathroom to wee and I felt the babies head and that's when I noticed it was too late, I had been pushing/in labor for a lil over a day and this baby was ready to come. Long story short, I tried to keep her in but my water broke as we where leaving the house and I gave birth, well more like she came on the way to the hospital and just scratched my bumb to signal her arrival. Upon arrival at the hospital the Dr tooks her to the incubator and she survived 5 hours before I was called in to be told her lungs could not survive. And at this time my mum was on her way back from her canceled board meeting to not only see her niece/grand daughter but now to bury her. My child was my gift to her as she had wanted me to have a child for so long, she had even started to name her, nonetheless a name she gave - Lebopo which means earth. And as my friends and family where preparing to have a baby shower, we where now preparing to have a funeral. And we did. A beautiful ceremony with white candles and balloons candles lit around her small coffin at a private cemetery here in Botswana called Phomolong. If you had told me that at 32 year's after a few years of failing at business snd trying to recover from depression that I would also leave my first born child at a cemetery I wouldn't havr believe you, but alas. Here I am

I have just shared the long and short of the story without the intricate details to commemorate all children who have gone today, I don't know how people often raise  awareness but il just share my story for those interested, and those who need the encouragement, the only thing I really want to do is create a safe environment for women who have lost their children and have nowhere to go and I guess perhaps  be a support to family members of mum's to angels who don't know how to support them . It's an EXTREMELY lonely process, people hide/run from you, I think they don't know what to do? 🤔 But it's lonely, not forgetting the expectation for you to get over it quickly. Haha, humans, they are SO interesting

My children on earth from my team to my neighborhood children call me "mama T or Aunty Tebatso ", my cousin neo calls me mmagwe baby LK which just warms my heart, I feel seen not ignored just because my baby didn't make it.

I have kid's passing through my house every day, my neighbors kids just want to visit me, my sister kid's just want to hang and last week after my team left I had a break down. I was mad-and hurt. How do other people's kids find me so great and my own child did not make it? What kind of game was this that God was playing. I cried and pleaded for another. I wanted her and was looking forward to being a mum, but here i am starting again.

Over the next few week's I will share the rest over at my blog - barenaked the blog, I hope I will be able to cover the story in a 6 part series:

-Expound further on what happened. To fill in the gaps.
- The church /religion/ Christianity and children outside of marriage
-The traditional families and children outside of marriage and its effects
-Our health system and women who aren't on medical aid
-The grief process, societal taboos and the spiritual
-Where I am now and my recovery and what I now know for sure - like Aunty Oprah would 😊



If you or someone you care about has lost a child to stillbirth, miscarriage, SIDS, or any other cause at any point during pregnancy or infancy, please join us/me in raising awareness this October for Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month.

To all the mum's out there whose journey like me was cut in short. I am SO sorry, condolences and an arm to cry or talk are all we can offer each other in this harsh harsh world. I am so sorry too because we are not as strange as people like to make us seem. We are just woman who went to the hospital expectant and came back home empty handed so we need to be kind to ourselves and people who don't understand. Forgive them. They know not what they are doing 💞🙏

XOXO - Mmagwe Lebopo aka Baby LK Mummy ❤️