National Bereaved Parents Day 2022
The Compassionate Friends are once again supporting National Bereaved Parents Day on 3 July 2022.
This year National Bereaved Parents Day will take place on Sunday 3rd July to raise awareness of parental grief. On this day and throughout July (Bereaved Parents Month) we will be remembering all bereaved parents and who are bereaved of a child of any age and from any cause.
Please join us to help spread the message, keep that conversation going, raise awareness and show the bereaved parent community that they are NOT alone.
Elliot's ride and red pebbles
We remember my son Elliott Andrew Beddow each year by holding a Memorial Ride on or as near to his birthday.
Elliott was killed on his Harley Davidson a few weeks after his 20th birthday in 2016. Since the age of 14 he had never spent his birthday at home as it coincided with his cadets summer camp and his 18th birthday was spent on a lads holiday. He had promised me that he would be here for his 21st. We knew that his birthday was going to be particularly difficult so the ride gave us a focus.
I also created “Elliott’s Red Pebbles”, his favourite colour for people to take and hide, as Elliott had never travelled much other than family holidays. I have had photos posted on his page from all over the globe and there is a special pebble at the Harley Davidson Shop in New York. It is lovely to think Elliott’s memory lives on in places he never visited.
The Ride has visited Carding Mill in 2017 and 2018, Brean Beach 2019 where a cloud was seen in his image, a scaled down ride to Forest of Dean due to COVID in 2020 and this year his birthday falls on the day he used to host a pub quiz, so his ride is to the pub. I have also created some different pebbles this year to be hidden, which still have the Facebook page details on the back.
I hope this inspires other parents to create ways of remembering their child.
Katie, Elliott's mum
Jeannette's story
My son, Mark Daniels, was stolen by cancer a mere 7 weeks after diagnosis, aged 35. There was still so much I wanted to say to him and still do. So I write letters to him in exercise books. Just a page or 2 every few days; words of love, sadness, old memories shared and new memories made since he was taken that we couldn't physically share. 11 books so far.
When I need to reach out to touch him or give him a hug I have 2 memory bears made from his shirts.
Jeannette, Mark's mum
Fiona's story
Our aim was to build new memories, in our son’s name, for his son.
We set out to raise funds to build a classroom in memory of our son Jason in Gambia and to take his son there in years to come. The picture is of our grandson’s first visit when he was 9. We didn’t do one classroom, we managed to do 2 classroom blocks (4 classrooms in all) enabling approximately 250 children a day to have a better environment in which to learn in (we completed these in 2005). In subsequent years we did a vast amount of project works in partnership with Kiaro Konko (KK) a scout fellowship in Soma and the surrounding area.
Our project manager Lamin Kinteh MBE once wrote in our memory book, “Jason, I’ve only known you since you died, I wish I’d known you before”. We succeeded in his name to make a difference; 17 years on Lamin still oversees our projects all of which have helped individuals, families and the community of Soma. Finding and making this partnership with KK was part of our healing journey. It is still there to this day - on 10th of May 2021 our grandson facetimed Lamin as we gathered by Jason’s grave to celebrate his 50th Birthday.
Jason’s mum, Fiona
Kim's story
Megan’s garden was created not long after my 17 year old daughter Megan died 5 days after a car accident in which she was a passenger. It is a place for family and Megan's friends to visit. It was only able to be created because of funds raised by friends, family and complete strangers who did all sorts of fundraising events. We are eternally grateful to them all.
I've made so many friends through The Compassionate Friends and feel I know our children so I thought it was only fitting that our children have a special spot in Megan's garden. Annaliese’s mum, Clare, has painted a pebble for each of our children gone too soon – so they are all remembered in Megan’s garden.
Kim, Megan's mum
Tom's garden
Tom was born 8th April 1991. He had designs on a career in the Police, and was a Special Constable, a voluntary unpaid role. It was while he was working a night shift as a Special that he had an epiphany and realised that for him teaching would give him more opportunities to have a positive influence on young people. From that moment there was no turning back and he completed his degree in Maths teaching at Birmingham University in 2016, and went to teach at an upper school.
Tom succumbed to depression in the October of 2016 aged 25. He had just introduced me to his lovely Irish girlfriend in the half term, she also a maths teacher. His suicide in December 2016 was a devastating shock, the disbelief, the pain, anguish and all the attendant self recrimination and guilt of being a father unable to save his child.
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