AN ONLINE fund-raiser has been launched to support the provision of self care kits to bereaved parents.
Nicole Bowles, who founded the Our Missing Peace charity three years ago, has been creating the free kits for families who have experienced child loss and she intends to step up the drive by offering 100 packages every month throughout 2021.
To meet the target and cover the costs, a GoFundMe page has been set up, with more than £500 donated so far.
Nicole said: “When I started the charity it was just gaining traction in parliament et cetera and the problem was that all these bereaved parents who I was newly in contact with would plough all their energy into campaigning and then be left emotionally drained afterwards.
“I came up with idea of the self care kits as a way for bereaved parents to take a moment to say ‘we’ve done a really good job here, well done us’.
“Bereaved parents will put themselves out there continuously as a way of remembering their children but it takes a huge emotional toll. I wanted the community to acknowledge just how hard they’d worked.
“I wanted people to look after themselves.”
The kits contain a selection of beauty products, sweet treats and reminders to recipients to put themselves first, even in times of severe stress.
Feedback on the initiative has been promising, with more than three quarters of the 400 packages organised last month handed out in a matter of weeks, and Nicole is keen to extend the offering.
She said: “Every time you talk about parental bereavement, everybody has a story. Somebody knows somebody who has lost a child or experienced a miscarriage.
“I just wish I could do more. I would love to give 100 self care kits away a week, but that’s £20,000, which is a lot of money.
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“I’m hoping I can do 100 a month next year, with the hope that people will get behind it and promote it so we can make a difference and help people who don’t feel like they’re worthy of self care.
“When your child dies, no matter what the circumstances are, you feel like, as a parent, you should have protected them and you didn’t.
“We are really hard on our ourselves as a community and if the outside world could support the bereaved parent community then it would make a massive difference, the isolation they feel would be broken down.
“It’s a way for people who don’t know what to say or how to help, helping. It makes a huge, huge difference.”
To support the appeal go to gofundme.com and search for ‘Nicole Bowles’.
For more information on the charity’s work, visit ourmissingpeace.org.
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