Grief Pins [Archive] - Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep Discussion Forum

Estrella

12-05-2007, 03:31 PM

I received an email after ordering...apparently they are not free, they are asking for donations....sorry, for the false information:o I am still ordering one!

Re: About the Grief Pin You Ordered: An Important Message From the Founder and President of griefHaven and Erika Whitmore Godwin's Mother.

Dear all of the amazing mothers and fathers on this beautiful site,

My name is Susan Whitmore, and I am the founder and president of The Erika Whitmore Godwin Foundation and griefHaven (griefHaven.org). On Sunday, my husband, Wendell, and I were conducting an event, and I noticed suddenly that my Blackberry starting buzzing (it buzzes one time to let me know I have one new message coming in). But this time it began buzzing and buzzing and continued doing so for about 20 minutes! I was amazed and decided to check it during a break.

When I opened my Blackberry, I saw about 100 messages from many of you who had read about our beautiful grief pin and had ordered a free pin to wear during the holidays in loving memory of your children and grandchildren you love and have lost. This has continued over the last three days, and we now have over 600 orders for a free grief pin!

First, I want to say to each and every one of you that I am so, so sorry for your loss. I, too, know the pain of losing a child, as I lost my beautiful daughter, only child, my closest and dearest friend, to a rare sinus cancer. Erika was 32 years old and only six weeks away from marrying the man of her dreams, Sandy Godwin, when they found that her sinus headaches were a malignant tumor that had already invaded the orbit of her left eye, causing her to go blind in that eye, and was "kissing the brain." For one year Erika fought a valiant battle, almost dying twice from the intense chemo and radiation they gave her every day. She lost the ability to have children. Erika lost sight in one eye and partial sight in the other. She lost her sense of smell and would never be able to taste food again. Well, you can imagine that it was just horrific in every way imaginable. In the end, despite everything Erika endured, she lost her battle to cancer, but not her ability to be my angel.

Erika died as I held her in my arms on May 30, 2002. Erika was surrounded and held by me, as I lie next to her, facing her and kissing her all over her bald head, promising her that I would find a way--some way--to endure the pain and the rest of my life without her. Her husband, Sandy (yes, they finally did have a small wedding), was lying behind her, and Wendell, her father, was at her feet, while her mother-in-law, Vicki Godwin, was at her head. Erika took many, long, shallow breaths, and then she looked at me with those gorgeous blue eyes, took one final, long breath, and her head fell. She was gone. I had just watched my only child whom I had brought into this world die. I couldn't believe it. I was sick. I was shocked.

I wanted to die. I couldn't imagine my life without my best friend and only child in my life. I started looking everywhere to try and find something--anything--that would help me with the pain. All I could find were some support groups and books. I needed more--much more--than that just to be able to get out of bed or even sleep at night. That is when I decided to start a foundation that would offer a huge variety of support tools from which to choose, since everyone grieves differently and needs different types of support. And that is when The Erika Whitmore Godwin Foundation and its subsidiary website, griefHaven, were born.

Today we receive over 50,000 visits a month on our website, and we support parents in 11 countries. However, we are a small office, and I currently work over 90 hours per week with volunteers just to keep up with the orders and speaking engagements (and I am 57 years old--not a young woman any longer). I work day and night raising the funds to be able to give any parent in need the love and support they so desperately need, which is why we don't even put a price on our amazing DVD, Portraits of Hope. By the way, you might want to order that DVD, as there is a mother, Misty Rowe, who lost her baby at nine months' gestation talking about her loss.

I came up with the idea of designing a pin that could be worn by people all over the world, but especially in the United States, as a way of portraying that we are grieving. After all, every country except ours has a way of showing they are in grief. It is time to change that in our country. So I designed the grief pin. We decided to offer it for free to parents, and so far that has always worked out.

Until now, that is. We have never received such a massive order. Oh how I would love to have the funds and resources to fill every order, but we simply do not. We rely on volunteers and me.

You have found and created such an incredible place of support and love, and I am so touched by all that you give to one another. The loss of a baby in gestation or just after giving birth is not understood by our general society as a painful and gut-wrenching loss, so your losses are unique, and you need one another to hold each of you up. But we at griefHaven know that your pain is just the same as ours. What we always tell people when we educate the public at large about the death of a child is that the pain of losing a child is the same, regardless of the age. What is different are the memories with which we are left and to deal with for the rest of our lives.

We have received over 600 orders for a free grief pin in the last three days, and that number continues to rise. We simply do not have enough pins nor the resources to fill all of those orders. If we did, we would be completely out of pins all at once, and you would never receive your pin before the holidays, because each pin has to be packed, a label with your name and address has to be printed, your have to be added to our database, and then we have to manually pack the envelope and take it to the post office. I wish we could do it, but we cannot. One day I dream that we will.

In the meantime . . .

I have been trying to figure out what I can do to help you. I prayed/meditated about it the last two nights, and I spoke to our loving board members, who have also lost children. Here is what we've decided.

If you would still like to receive a grief pin, we need you to go back to the website at griefHaven.org, click on the "Store" tab, and then the "Grief Pin" tab. That will take you directly to the page where you can order the pin for a donation of $10. The cost of $10 will cover our cost of each pin, the cost of mailing, and the cost of having a shipping house handle the shipping of each pin. That way, you will get your beautiful pin by Christmas.

Here is one other idea: If you are all planning to get together before Christmas and have an event or something like that, one person could order a certain number of pins, we could give you our price to ship that number in one package to one location, and then that one person could have them for all of you.

Please discuss amongst yourselves and let us know how we can send you the greatest amount of support so that it works for everyone. The grief pin is very beautiful and will be selling in stores for $30 (we are looking at having it in stores nationwide). So please understand that $10 covers our cost to ensure that you will receive your beautiful pin right away.

In the meantime, I pray that you will utilize all of the love and support we offer on our website, including our amazing DVD, Portraits of Hope, and our music page, chat board, and so much more. We care, as we are all parents whose children have died. We are all in this together.

I send lots of love and hugs to you all this Holiday season,
Erika's Mom
Susan Whitmore
President & Founder