Volunteers Week - Jess shares her story.

25/05/2023

Watch Jess' Video here and hear her story

Jess says: 

"Hi, my name is Jess, and I have been a volunteer for Aching Arms for about seven years and I started volunteering for Aching Arms, shortly after our son, Leo, was stillborn at term, at 37 weeks pregnant.

We discovered Aching Arms through my sister in law, actually who had heard about it through friends at work. She arranged for us to get our Nora Bear who was just hugely, hugely helpful for us at that time and in that period of really early, dark grief, and it enabled us to really connect and value, the purpose and the concept behind Aching Arms, as a charity. 

I really felt compelled that I wanted to help make sure that our hospital and the people that were going to be using the bereavement services at our hospital, which was to John Radcliffe in Oxford, were able to also connect and benefit from Aching Arms and receive bears, so I reached out and it was only about four months after Leo had died. So earlier than perhaps would be recommended to start getting involved in stuff but it really was what was saving me and compelling me forward.

So I'd reached out to Leanne and had a really powerful conversation that is still really, really beneficial for me. She helped us become volunteers for Aching Arms, and we contacted our bereavement midwife and got bears into the John Radcliffe and that's a hugely powerful moment in our journey. 

It's been lovely to hear from people who have benefited from those bears at John Radcliffe. We've since moved, so in that time, we also supported getting Bears at Basingstoke hospital, and now I just focus on being a postal volunteer, and send bears direct to people's homes.

It's a wonderful thing to do every few weeks or so, to package up 10 Bears to write their names and often I get to write Leo's name, which I always love, and send them off to homes in the hope that they comfort those families just as well as our Nora Bear did. 

It's been really lovely to share that experience, with our second son, and enable him to have a conversation around baby loss, bereavement and grief and what Aching Arms do and how it helps and the power of volunteering, I hope that inspires him one day to get involved in a course that matters to him as well."

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