Although we have ‘widow’, ‘orphan’, etc., there is no word for a parent who has lost a child. It seems there are no words. I made a brave attempt to scatter some out there, as a form of comfort – or perhaps recognition – for the exquisite intermingling of love and pain that comes with losing a child

.On 19 January 2015 the world welcomed and farewelled a little baby – our daughter Ivy Valentina van Ras. I kept a blog for the 6 months of her time in the world, and it was a fertile period of joy and mourning that I wish to never forget. It is my hope that the words and whispers on that site will be of support somehow to those parents who have lost a child at any stage of their lives – whether 0, 8, 17 or 37 years of age.