Pagina
Susana wilde haar zoontje Walter op een mooie manier eren. Ook wil ze een taboe doorbreken. “Ik wil de bezoekers van het Empty Photo Project laten zien dat het verlies van een kind pijn doet. Het is een beetje eng, maar het is goed om het onder ogen te komen,” vertelt ze aan Huffington Post.

Foto’s
Op de foto’s zijn vrouwen te zien met een spiegel voor hun lichaam. Dit verbeeldt de leegte die het verlies bij hen heeft achtergelaten. Bij elke foto wordt het verhaal van de moeder op de foto verteld. Het zorgt voor een indrukwekkende serie.

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"Losing a child is something that nobody wants to talk about. Even myself most of the time, if I’m being honest. I was a little over eighteen years old when I found out I was going to be a mom. I was still a kid trying to figure out who I was and who I wanted to be. I wasn’t sure if I could handle the daily job that is being a mother. I had voices in my ear telling me to take the easy way out. But there was something inside me telling me I could do this. Even if I had to do it on my own. I had the support of a few family members and a couple close friends which made everything seem like it was going to eventually be okay and work itself out. I was just getting used to the idea of being a mother when I received news no parent ever wants to hear. My daughter Sophia Lynn had a neural tube defect which would keep her from being able to survive outside the womb. I was given the options to carry her to term or to be induced for early labor. What kind of choice is that? I didn’t want to make that decision. I wasn’t ready to play God and decide how she would enter and leave this world. But I had to move forward somehow, and the best choice I could think of was to deliver as soon as possible and save her from a difficult full term delivery that would most certainly cause her more harm that good. There was no doubt in the doctors mind that she would struggle for life as soon as she was born and that was something, as her mother, I couldn’t bare to watch. I was scheduled to be induced a couple of days later due to overcrowding at the hospital. I had to carry my daughter in my belly for 3 more days. I can’t even begin to describe the kind of pain I felt in those three days. Knowing those were the last times we’d spend together as mother and daughter. She was still physically attached to me but I had never felt so empty in my entire life. Time seemed to drag on and fly by all at once. I was ready for it all to be over and begging whatever God was listening to just let it all be a bad dream. The day finally came to deliver her and it’s honestly one giant blur. I don’t remember much of the time I spent in the hospital. […] (Continue reading in comments…)

A post shared by Sue Butterworth (@emptyphotoproject) on May 16, 2017 at 8:21pm PDT

Onderwerp vermijden
Susana merkte tijdens de begrafenis van Walter een “ongelofelijk verschil” in de manier waarop mensen haar behandelden en met haar spraken. “De meeste mensen vermeden de onderwerpen ‘kinderen’, ‘familie’ en mijn verlies volledig,” vertelt ze.

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"June 30th is a day that I will never forget, the day that I lost a part of me. I never imagined or thought that becoming a mother would have been the hardest time I would ever face. I just remember thinking the day I was being prepared to go into surgery that I hoped God would let them both live and be healthy. I got the facts and let reality sink in that they could possibly not be okay. When I got back from surgery and was told they were critical but stable, all I wanted to do was rush to them. I didn’t get to spend time with them their first full day of birth. Maddox was the more stable twin at the time and didn’t seem to be having any trouble. So that night I was confident and sure that I would see him later. It was the first night that I went to bed early, at around midnight I got woken up by my nurse. At first, I was confused and the look on her face made me panic. She whispered, “Brenda one of your babies needs you right now can you get up and come with us.” I got transported by a wheelchair to the NICU, and I'm being surrounded by all of these nurses, it was all a blur. Then they sat with me and explained that Maddox was having problems and they couldn’t stabilize him. I just remember staring at the ground and just not knowing what to say or do I was just numb. Then they asked if I wanted to hold him, he was still alive. At first, I was too shocked and just speechless I didn’t give an answer, but when I saw him in there and the numbers on the machines were dropping, I just asked to hold him. I held him and thought that I was in a dream and that it wasn’t really happening to me. At 2:15 am Maddox Gray Ursua took his last breath, I know he felt my love until the last second. I felt angry with God, why did this have to happen to me, why my son, why my family? I couldn’t come to terms with it for a long time. I would see others with their kids and would just get so mad. Having people come up to me or even text me things about how sorry they were would make me mad because no one understood my pain or anger. The worst was the comments I would be told, everything happens for a reason this wasn’t meant to be for you." (…continued in the comments)

A post shared by Sue Butterworth (@emptyphotoproject) on Jun 18, 2017 at 11:50pm PDT

Verwerken
Susana: “Ik creëerde dit project om het gesprek te starten. Het verliezen van een kind is een onderwerp waar over gesproken moet worden. Mensen die dat hebben meegemaakt kunnen het niet verwerken als ze zich alleen voelen en niemand hebben waarmee ze erover kunnen praten.”

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"27 years after your short life, I still remember it like it was yesterday. I was just a 24-year-old kid, newly married and excited to welcome a new baby into our family. I named you Brittany Dianne. You came early, 23 weeks along, without much warning and fought as hard as one could fight to stay here on this Earth with us. I had those 23 weeks with you and a short 4 hours of life. Those moments spent with you, my sweet Brittany, were the ones that made me into the person and mother that I am today. I keep a box with your things to remind me that you made me a mother. Your tiny little hat, handprint and footprints and even your hair are kept safely in your baby book. Two pictures are all that I have of you and that hurts. You are hooked up to machines in those pictures. I can’t help but think that you were in so much pain. I wish that I had pictures of when your dad and I held you in our arms. You were a perfect size baby doll, 12 inches long, with perfectly formed features. For years, I have searched for the reasons why you are not here with us. Now I know that God had a better and bigger plan for you which someday will make perfect sense to me. I am not the same person as I used to be and that is a good thing. I know that life is precious and should never be taken for granted. With every sad story of pregnancy loss that I heard after you were born, I know that many other things could go wrong. I have felt guilty and depressed that I could not help you. Incompetent cervix is the reason you came early which to me meant incompetent mother. I still to this day do not understand some of the reasons people gave me for your death, and I don’t think I ever will. Hurtful comments such as you are young, you can have more babies, just think of all the money it would cost to keep her alive, etc….. None of those helped work through my grief. Journaling, praying and trying again helped. Two more baby girls followed you, and they are terrific. However, you are still my first born daughter, Brittany, and someday we will be reunited. I know that reunion will be the best day ever. It will make my heart whole again." (Continue in comments…)

A post shared by Sue Butterworth (@emptyphotoproject) on Jun 29, 2017 at 8:59am PDT

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Emptiness: emp·ti·ness noun 1. The state of containing nothing. This definition hits straight on of my emotional state most the time. I went from creating a life, to mourning it days later. My miscarriage occurred back in November 2016. This was mine and my husbands planned baby; as our first, our amazing son, was a surprise that the Lord knew we needed. My husband and I were gleaming sitting at my first doctor's appointment, knowing that we get to hear and possibly see our baby for the first time. I WAS SO EXCITED; up until our world came crashing down beside us. They couldn't hear a heartbeat; and when they did an ultrasound they couldn't find a baby. My miscarriage was a little different than most. It's called a blighted ovum miscarriage; where I had gotten pregnant, formed a pregnancy sac, but for some odd reason my baby stopped forming early on. I couldn't wrap my head around what was going on; why was it happening to me, to my family? What did I do wrong? If you know me; you'll know i'm research freak. I researched if there's some way I could still be pregnant, why blighted ovums happen, and most importantly why miscarriage happen to women all around. In my case, I read that blighted ovum miscarriages occur when the baby's chromosomes align, and there was something off. Whether it be a mental or physical abnormality, and our bodies stop the baby from forming. From there I felt some sort of ease as I knew that the Lord had a reason behind all this pain we were experiencing. But with that ease I still feel empty. Now that my due date is around the corner (June 5th, 2017); I feel it more and more especially when I see others who were pregnant around the same time as I, get ready to have their babies. I'm so happy for them all, but resentful, and once again empty because I don't get the chance to meet my baby, other than in heaven. […continue reading in comments]

A post shared by Sue Butterworth (@emptyphotoproject) on May 6, 2017 at 10:15pm PDT