Behind the heartbreaking reason this mom shared a photo of her baby that died before birth
In tragedy there can be hope.
— -- Anita and Eric Miron are proof that in tragedy there is hope.
Anita Miron took to Facebook on May 24 to share a photo of her baby boy, Jack, with her almost 30,000 followers. It was a year after Jack's "heaven day," the day he died.
He was at 32 weeks of gestation when Anita Miron didn't feel him kicking and went to the hospital. He was already gone. She delivered his body and said goodbye.
It had been a tumultuous pregnancy for the couple. Early on, they had found out baby Jack had Down syndrome. Though she struggled initially with the diagnosis, she met with families who had children with Down syndrome and soon, she was "excited."
After Jack died from a cord accident, the couple decided to look into adoption. Two months later, however, Anita was pregnant again. But at 20 weeks, their baby had no heartbeat. Again, a cord accident was to blame.
"It was then we decided to focus solely on adoption," Anita Miron said. "I knew I couldn't go through it again." She had been pregnant for nearly two years, she said, with no living baby to show for it.
The couple decided they wanted to focus their adoption efforts on adopting a child with special needs. "We had already planned on having a child with Down syndrome," she said. "We had opened our hearts." Their home was also ready: When they had looked into adoption the first time, the Grand Rapids, Michigan, couple completed their home study, a crucial step in all adoptions.
When Anita Miron decided to share the photo of herself and her daughter Scarlett, 5, holding Jack's photo with her followers, she did it to "honor his life," she said. She said she also hoped to raise awareness for the need for families to adopt children with special needs and asked her followers to consider a donation to the National Down Syndrome Adoption Network (NDSAN).
The organization, its director Stephanie Thompson told ABC News, serves as a "connection point between birth parents and potential adoptive parents."
"We spend about 40 to 50 hours a week counseling birth and adoptive families," Thompson said. "We've had more than 1,000 requests for information this year." The donations to the organization, she said, would go toward operating costs.
And while the Mirons have only recently started working with the NDSAN, they're hopeful their profile will be shown to birth parents in the coming weeks.
"I know now that these kids are the sunlight of their parents' lives," Anita Miron said.
"We have the availability and the freedom to be there for a child with special needs," she added. "We hope give more than one child a wonderful home."
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