What arrangements do we make now?

[ErinH]

My little boy was diagnosed with Edward's syndrome last Friday and on Sunday night I gave birth to him in hospital. Everything I thought I wanted to do for minimal impact on my two other boys has been completely blown out of the water the second I held him. I'm now at a loss and I don't know what to do for the funeral arrangements.
I think we know we want to plant a tree but not sure if we want a burial or cremation and if so by the hospital or done ourselves. We want to show our boy the love and respect he very much deserves and also allow us to move on with our lives and not be sad forever.
Any personal experiences and advice would be very much appreciated at this time. I'm at a loss.

So sorry for your loss ErinH.
We lost our baby 6 weeks ago (at 20 wks gestation), so i know a little of what you are going through.
We decided against having our own funeral and went with the hospital cremation - that was just what felt right for us, but I know lots of people do like to organise their own service.
We are going to plant a tree in March (when our baby was due) and I am also putting together a little keepsake box with scan pic, hand/foot prints etc.

Do you have to make a decision right away?
Everything happened very quickly for us - finding out our baby had no hb to delivering baby all happened in one day and we didn't have time to really think about what was going to happen. We didn't see or hold our baby as that was our immediate reaction and I do regret that now, but I think it was a self-preservation response and at the time was what felt right.

Please feel free to PM me if you need to chat. Thinking of you and your family x

iloveblue, I remember reading your story when I was hanging onto messages on mn over the past few weeks.

I really wanted to treat this as a late miscarriage but haven't be able to since seeing my little boy on Sunday night. I can't say I regret holding him, as I knew I wanted to, but it's made our decisions and getting over the loss much harder. I can understand the choices you made.

I too have a keepsake box and want to plant a tree. What a lovely idea to do it in the Spring when he was due. I hadn't thought of that. I feel that we'll not have a funeral and go with the cremation but not sure whether it will be too much to do our own.

Thank you for telling me your story and I hope you're feeling stronger. x

So sorry this has happened to you too. I lost my little one at 20 weeks. We didn't see or hold the baby. It felt right at the time but now I regret it. The hospital took care of the burial arrangements for us, they have a communal burial every 6 to 8 weeks, we were not informed of when it happened or invited to attend a service and I do feel very sad about that too.

Take care x