Volunteers sew for grieving families

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This article was published 06/04/2023 (944 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A group of Manitoba seamstresses are using their needles to help mend the hole left in the lives of families who are grieving the loss of a child to stillbirth or miscarriage.

Among the volunteers who sew, knit or crochet small dresses, outfits and keepsakes made from donated bridal gowns and graduation dresses, is Killarney resident Brenda Mitchell, who describes the outfits as a way to honour a life that was only with loved ones for a relatively brief time.

“I think it makes the baby almost more real,” Mitchell recently told the Sun. “That it was a real little person and it was special enough that it should have something very special as a keepsake, or something very special to be buried in.”

Mitchell herself has experienced the difficult loss of a child who was stillborn. About 40 years ago, her first child was stillborn at seven months.

“It can be more than 40 years gone and it still touches your heart. It’s still a loss,” said Mitchell, who has since raised a daughter and son.

The Canadian movement of Angel Dresses was introduced in Saskatchewan by Becky Panter, whose son Christopher James was “born sleeping” on Feb. 28, 2014. In less than two months, Panter had received more than 299 dresses and recruited 20 seamstresses.

About two months after that, with Panter’s help, Manitoba Angel Dresses was formed in Brandon and spread throughout the province. The non-profit, volunteer-driven organization provides free hand-crafted “angel layettes” to grieving families who have lost an infant.

There are two types of layettes. A gown layette that includes the clothing, a hat or bonnet, a keepsake pouch, bereavement card, a bracelet and a blanket. The wrap layette includes a six-, eight-, 10- or 12-inch wrap with a keepsake pouch, bereavement card and a bracelet. For boys, angel dresses are fitted with small vests, and sometimes a bow tie.

Manitoba Angel Dresses now has groups based in Brandon and Dauphin, and the organization has about 100 volunteers. In 2019, it expanded its reach by giving angel items to hospitals and funeral homes in the Lake of the Woods area, and is looking at distribution to nursing stations in northern Manitoba.

Since its formation in this province, the organization has received and transformed 1,688 dresses and created 6,984 layettes. Of those layettes, 1,267 have been given to funeral homes and hospitals and 40 directly to families.

Manitoba Angel Dresses director Diane Monkman and fellow director Susan Bruce are among those who revived the organization after it stalled in 2016. Hundreds of dresses had been donated but angel items had nowhere to go.

Bruce, a retired nurse, had connections to hospitals and the organization forged ties with hospitals and funeral homes that could distribute their items. Now, Monkman estimates 98 per cent of hospitals, nursing stations and funeral homes in the province have items to distribute when need arises.

She said it was her own experience in hospital during two miscarriages, at a time when attitudes on the subject were different, that had convinced her of the importance of the program.

“Basically, it was like a surgical procedure and you’d go home. ‘Goodbye,’ that was it … There was no mention that you had a baby, ‘We’re sorry for your loss,’ that type of thing — nothing, nothing,” Monkman said. “It was just taboo to even talk about it, that you had a miscarriage.”

But Monkman said having the dresses, wraps, pouches and other items made by Manitoba Angel Dresses available for traumatized families at the hospital and funeral homes helps them to spend some dignified moments with their lost stillborn child, or allows them to lovingly and appropriately prepare remains for a ceremony or burial. She said loved ones and friends will often approach the service on behalf of families that have had a loss.

Monkman said the program can always use more volunteers to be seamstresses, even though knitting or sewing the first few outfits can be emotionally challenging.

“They find that very hard to start because they think of what it’s going to be for,” Monkman said. “We always try to say to them, ‘But you’ve got to remember you’re uplifting a family. It’s not just the sad part, it’s also you’re helping.’”

Mitchell started sewing clothes for Manitoba Angel Dresses in June 2021. She had learned to sew when she was a young member with 4-H and later, as a 4-H leader and a teacher, she taught the craft to children.

Having retired from teaching in 2013, Mitchell started sewing for Manitoba Angel Dresses for something to do, but said she believes in the program and the items she creates are an acknowledgment that a lost baby was a person and had represented their parents’ wishes and hopes.

The donated dresses are kept in Winnipeg and Mitchell or her husband will travel there to bring them to their home in Killarney where Mitchell has a sewing room. She estimates it takes her about four hours to sew and decorate an angel dress, although she has developed an “assembly line” system and can have four outfits on the go. In total, she has sewn 60 to 70 items for Manitoba Angel Dresses.

The work of the group’s seamstresses can be seen on its Facebook page where photographs of layettes and the dresses they are made from are posted with a message thanking the donor of the original gown.

Mitchell, who loves to sew, said cutting up wedding dresses and sewing little outfits out of them, adorning them with beads and lace, is fun.

“I can’t possibly keep everything I sew,” Mitchell said with a laugh. “So this way, I get to sew something really pretty and then give it to a good cause.”

Mitchell said she believes that giving parents who have lost a child something special as a keepsake or something to bury their child in can help ease the sense of disappointment they might feel, a sense of loss intensified by the fact that parents had planned for their baby’s arrival, perhaps with the purchase of special items like onesies and blankets.

“This is sort of a special item for, really, a little baby angel,” Mitchell said of the angel items, adding she often thinks of the grieving parents she’s sewing. “I just hope it makes their grief a little easier, so that they think that somebody is thinking about them.”

Grieving families or their loved ones and friends can request an angel layette by emailing angelgownrequest@manitobaangeldresses.com or visiting manitobaangeldresses.com.

Mitchell said Manitoba Angel Dresses doesn’t need donations of wedding gowns and other dresses at this time, and updates on the need for such clothing are posted on the group’s website.

» ihitchen@brandonsun.com