Jasmine Abraham

Being involved with Count the Kicks has given me a place to put all the energy that I had planned to use for my son, Qasem into advocacy in his honor. I didn’t understand what a stillbirth was until he lost his heartbeat, I was admitted into the hospital to be induced, and they handed me a pamphlet entitled “stillbirth.”

I was enraged that I was never warned that this could be a possible outcome of pregnancy. I knew the chances of miscarriage, but after the first trimester, you were supposed to be safe. In my mind, there was no doubt that I would be taking my baby home in three weeks time. So If I, being a first-time mom that read and prepared for everything had no clue, then there had to be others that didn’t know either.

I had asked about kick counting because it was mentioned in my pregnancy apps, and was told if baby was active that it “wasn’t necessary.” That kick counting is saved for high-risk mothers, and I was as low risk as they come. But low-risk doesn’t mean no risk. I’ve met so many others whose stories sound just like mine. So I knew I had to share his story. Others had to know this could happen, and that there was a way to possibly prevent this outcome.

There have been so many times in my journey through grief, re-living moments and thinking “what if,” that drove me crazy. The biggest one being that I wish I had known this was a possibility. We had known a few friends that had gone through this, but I never knew or understood what happened, and I respectfully understood why they chose to keep it private.

That is why I chose to become what I wish I had. I told Qasem’s story to all our friends on social media; I am constantly reminding every pregnant friend to count their kicks in the third trimester (specifically to download the app), and I hand out app cards to random pregnant women I see out and about. All things I wish I had seen someone else do.

Count the Kicks is an incredible organization that has given me the opportunity to speak to nurses, doctors, politicians, and more. They give me a platform to continue to say Qasem’s name and tell his story. To spread awareness of how incredibly important it is to give this information to pregnant women.

The reasoning we’ve heard as to why stillbirth is not discussed with prenatal patients is that it’s “too scary.” We shouldn’t be treating prenatal patients as delicate flowers; we need to arm them with the information they need to feel empowered in their pregnancy, not afraid.

While we never got a chance to raise Qasem, he taught us more in his short life than we could have ever imagined. He made me a mother and an advocate.

Heather Johnston-Welliver

My daughter Lydia was stillborn from an umbilical cord accident in November of 2014. She was the most active of my four babies, until the moment she wasn’t. I’ll never forget saying to my doctor, “She moves so much!” and her response: “An active baby is a healthy baby!” And Lydie WAS healthy — but her umbilical cord was not. Lydie is my second child and I had no risk factors. I wasn’t counting kicks nor were any of my pregnant friends. It never even occurred to me.

The moment we found out Lydie had no heartbeat, my doctor said to me, “This is NOT your fault.” I had a hard time registering her words, still deeply in shock, but I remember thinking that as soon as I could make sense of this, I was going to blame myself. And I did. Who else was there to blame? A mother’s job is to take care of her child, and I failed to do that.

I’ve spent seven years now living with that everyday. Working through that guilt. I know now that if we had looked at Lydie’s umbilical cord on an ultrasound, we might have seen an issue. If I had had just one NST, it would have likely shown a heart rate deceleration caused by her cord. I know if I had been advised to monitor her movement, I would have. And I might have known she was in trouble. 

I also know that I can’t turn back time. 

I can give other parents the gift of knowing what I did not. I can educate them, and help them get their babies here safely. I tell pregnant mamas that they’ll be advocating for their child for the rest of their lives and they need to start during pregnancy. I tell doctors that we aren’t delicate flowers, that we deserve to be empowered with information and trusted with our intuitions. I tell them that stillbirth can be preventable, and my daughter should be seven.

I use my voice because Lydie never got the chance to.

Kate Safris, co-founder

In March of 2001 I found myself sitting in the passenger seat of our minivan, freshly purchased for what was supposed to be a family of four … but there were just three of us. The fourth, our daughter Emma, was born just a few weeks earlier, and passed away after just eight days of life from congenital heart defects. My husband and I had made it home to our driveway after returning from my first postpartum OB appointment. Having sobbed the entire way home I sat motionless in the passenger seat. I was angry, and I found myself snapping at the tiniest of things.

I don’t exactly remember what caused me to snap at that particular moment. My husband said something, probably as innocent as, “Are you ready to go inside?” and that was all it took. Every ounce of anger spilled out in that minivan. My rage spanned the gamut of reasonable to absolutely absurd. I berated the pregnant teenagers I had seen in the waiting room at my OB’s office, the pain of the C-section incision that throbbed with my every twist and turn, the nurse who dared to ask how I was doing, the weather, my hair, the song playing on the radio — nothing was safe from my wrath. My husband sat silently and listened, and when it seemed as though I had choked up every last morsel of anger, he turned to me and said six words that would change my life.

“You can’t be this angry forever.”

I sobbed. Again. He was right. While my life had spun out of control with the loss of our precious baby girl, I realized that I had a choice — a real CHOICE — that was completely within my control. I could determine my daughter’s legacy, and anger and bitterness didn’t have to be a part of it. I had no idea how, but at this pivotal moment, sitting in my minivan, I knew some GOOD would come from my heartache.

Over two decades later, I have found that GOOD in my work with Healthy Birth Day, Inc. and Count the Kicks. Since founding the organization in 2008, Janet, Jan, Tiffan, Kerry and I have had had the honor of hearing from countless parents whose babies have been saved with Count the Kicks. We have looked into the eyes of the babies who are here, happy, and healthy, because their parents knew to speak up if they noticed a change in their movements.

Those babies are our daughters’ legacy and the GOOD I knew I needed to find over two decades ago. I will never stop working to ensure that more parents have these stories to share.

Tiffan Yamen, Co-Founder

May 31, 2003 – this date changed my life forever. That day brought a wrenching heartache and sadness that to this day I cannot fully describe. The weeks and months following it brought dark, scary days of uncertainty. It also delivered amazing, unexpected gifts. A deeper faith, the confidence to speak up, the friendship of four women who understood me and a resolve to ensure no other parent would unnecessarily experience what my husband and I were faced with on May 31, 2003. After an uneventful and healthy pregnancy our daughter, Madeline, was born still at 37 weeks due to a double nuchal cord (knotted umbilical cord).

In those early days I remember telling my family that I wanted Madeline’s life to matter. At the time I had no idea what that meant or what was ahead of me. And then I was introduced, one by one, to the other four founders of Healthy Birth Day, Inc. and Count the Kicks. We met in coffee shops just as five moms, each of us grieving the loss of our baby girls, each of us understanding one another. We pondered two questions: “Why doesn’t anyone talk about stillbirth?” and “Why is stillbirth still happening in this age of incredible medical advancement?”

Our work to advocate for stillbirth awareness and prevention and our work through the mission of Count the Kicks is solid proof of what can be accomplished when we don’t give up on our hopes and beliefs.

“What if we could save one baby?” What started with an innocent idea has become a powerful, life saving movement. Every baby saved, every volunteer who helps us spread our mission, every believer in our work keeps that fuel burning for me. Madeline, my sweet baby, your life has certainly mattered.

Iowa Sen. Janet Petersen, Co-Founder

The first time I heard the word stillbirth, I was just a little girl in the car with my big sister and mom, heading from Iowa to Missouri to visit my maternal grandma. I was excited to share with my mom that I had memorized all 10 of her siblings’ names. When I rattled them off, she informed me that my grandma actually had 11 babies – I was missing baby James who would have been my uncle. She told me he was a stillborn baby, born between my Uncle Huey and Aunt Dorothy in the summer of 1920. I remember how incredibly sad I was for my Grandma, wondering how she lived through that unfathomable heartache and was brave enough to bear seven more kids.

Nearly 83 years to the day after my Grandma Hall lost her baby boy to stillbirth in the family’s farmhouse, my husband Brian and I would experience the same fate. In July 2003, we lost our daughter Grace Elizabeth to a true knot in her umbilical cord when I was nine months pregnant.

How could we have lost our daughter Grace? She was beautiful and perfect. I had had a perfectly healthy pregnancy. I was fully insured. I didn’t have a country doctor; I went to a group of highly educated and experienced OB/GYNs with full access to modern medical technology.

My doctors explained that stillbirths were rare, but we learned otherwise. Brian and I were just two of the 52,000 parents in the U.S. that lost a baby to stillbirth that year. I remember laying in my hospital bed in the maternity ward without my baby, reeling both emotionally and physically … wondering how women could still be losing babies to stillbirth and how the doctors could seem so nonchalant about it, basically writing them off as unpreventable accidents.

I am passionate about preventing stillbirths because I know the pain of losing a baby. I believe wholeheartedly that most stillbirths can be prevented. We are proving just how many babies can be saved just through our fetal monitoring program Count the Kicks. Other countries are doing even better, proving stillbirth prevention safety bundles work.

I’m passionate about stillbirth prevention because I know this problem is solvable. I’m fighting with love in my heart for our daughter Grace and our living kids – Maggie, Charlie and Buck. I’m pushing for stillbirth prevention for women and girls and families I don’t know, because I wouldn’t wish the pain on anyone.

I know our country can do better. We must urge those in power to move from silent complicity to moonshot actions to make stillbirth a maternal health tragedy of the past.