AS a very young 18 year old in 1979 I suffered the heartbreak of a stillbirth.

My daughter Nicole Louise was born at 42 weeks, stillborn due to placental abruption.

How do you deal with that at such a young age? Well, obviously not how this is dealt with today.

I received no help, no counselling. I was told to go home and try for another baby, while I walked out of the hospital with empty arms, no baby.

The hospital dealt with the burial, without any input from me.

I went back to the hospital after six weeks thinking I would be making funeral arrangements for my daughter.

But no, they had buried her, apparently I gave my consent for this but who knows what I did in the days following the stillbirth.

I then found out she was buried at the feet of an adult; they couldn’t tell me where she was buried as this was not my daughter's grave site.

Extract from the certificate of stillbirth for Nicole

I had to go home alone, with no help, no guidance from family members.

I got on with my life, struggling to come to terms with this traumatic time.

Fast forward a few years and I met another partner, and fell pregnant - and gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, Kristie.

Everything was great now - or so you would think. But that’s when the true grieving started, and was not easy.

It’s amazing how much you can hide from the outside world when you are grieving alone.

READ MORE: Baby loss scandal: York mum supports bereaved parents after her own stillbirth ordeal

Fast forward another few years and I decided to investigate further where my daughter was buried.

I spoke to my doctor asking him for help. He sent off for my medical records relating to Nicole (she was born in Preston, Lancashire).

I picked up the notes and one page was missing, page seven. I phoned the recorder's department at Preston hospital explaining the situation, and asked could they send me page seven.

The lovely lady said she understood my situation and did I know what was on page seven. I didn’t know what was on that page. "It’s your daughters plot number," she said.

She told me my daughter had been buried in a communal grave and proceeded to give me the plot number.

To say I was shocked was an understatement. I spoke to my daughter, who was a teenager at this point, and we decided to drive through to Preston at the weekend.

We obtained a map from the cemetery office, and with a torch in hand, found our way to where my daughter was buried. A blank patch of land, and my daughter was buried under there.

It was a very traumatic experience for us both. A mixture of sadness and joy at actually finding where she was.

Kim keeps a photo of Nicole's grave, where she now has a memorial

When I came back to York I found this really difficult to deal with.

I spoke to a friend who was a midwife and she put me in touch with a bereavement midwife, Bev Shelley, and York SANDS - a support group for people who have lost their babies at birth.

Eventually, I plucked up the courage and went to a meeting. It was the best thing I ever did, and it saved my sanity.

People talked openly about their babies, I didn’t feel embarrassed, it was such a release.

The York SANDS that I joined is a fantastic group of people that help one another. There is always someone willing to help another bereaved family. It became another family for me. As we say it’s not a group you ever want to belong to, but boy when you meet these people you’re grateful that you do belong.

I now co-run York SANDS with Bev Shelley. Bev does all the work at the hospital looking after families and I do the work in the community.

Before this pandemic I would do home visits with recently bereaved families encouraging them to come along to a monthly meeting at the hospital hosted by myself.

We would meet informally in cafes. We arranged play dates with families (children need to know they are not the only ones that have lost a brother or sister too).

We also have two rooms at the hospital where families can spend time with their babies, washing, dressing them.

Happier times: Kim with her daughter Kristie and granddaughter Freya Nicole

A team of charity photographers (Remember My Baby) take the most beautiful pictures of the family. All of which is a far cry from when I lost my daughter Nicole.

Thankfully we have moved forward. When I had my daughter, I didn’t get to see her, she was taken away. I didn’t get any photographs of her, and I most certainly didn’t get the help needed to grieve for her.

But today parents get to spend precious time with their babies, they get memory boxes, footprints, a lock of their hair, but most of all they get the help that is so needed.

Why do I do the volunteer work that I do? For my daughter Nicole Louise - you may not be here but you are most certainly remembered in the best possible way by helping others through their journey.

My daughter Kristie helped me through this journey so much and I am so proud of her. But the best thing she did was naming her own child Freya Nicole. It is so nice to say the name in a positive way. She will never be forgotten and will always be remembered.

To find out more contact: sands.org.uk

Neonatal deaths - fact file

The number of babies who die in the neonatal period (the first 28 days after birth) has dropped over the last decade, largely because of advances in medical knowledge and clinical care, according to SANDS.

But recently the mortality rate has plateaued. Around 14 babies die before, during or soon after birth every day in the UK.

Stillbirths:

In the UK in 2018, around 1 in every 250 births was a stillbirth. In total there were 2,929stillbirths. That’s around eight babies stillborn every day

Around one-third of stillbirths happen after 37 weeks of pregnancy

Stillbirths account for more than half of the deaths of infants under one year in the UK

Stillbirth rates remained largely unchanged from the late 1990s to 2011. From 2012 the rate started to fall. But more deaths could be prevented.

Neonatal deaths:

In the UK in 2018, 2,020 babies died within the four week of life. That’s one baby in every 360 births.

Definitions:

A stillborn baby is one who has died before or during birth, at or after 24 weeks of pregnancy.

A neonatal death happens in the first 28 days after birth.

Stillbirths and baby deaths that happen in the first seven days of life, are sometimes counted together and called perinatal deaths.

Source: Office of National Statistics and SANDS