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A baby trauma and bereavement charity has been given a funding boost of more than £100,000 to help hundreds more families.
Making Miracles has been awarded a community fund grant from the National Lottery so it can expand its services in Gravesend, Dartford and Ashford.
The charity was set up by Medway mum Kelly Wells after her own high-risk pregnancy. Her daughter, Summer, was given a 15% chance of survival after she was diagnosed with a rare heart condition while in the womb.
Kelly said: "The new funding enables us to continue to support families who have experienced the birth trauma and loss of a baby. We can now reach out into the new targeted areas, being Dartford, Gravesend and Ashford where we will be able to help 200 new families per year for the next five years."
The funding has also allowed the charity to launch a new follow-on service which will offer continued support after a family receives its six free counselling sessions. They will be assigned a dedicated team member who will provide specialist one-to-one support and direct them to the charity's new face-to-face support groups.
Kelly added: "This will make the whole support service so much more than a stand-alone counselling service. With funding we are limited to six sessions per person because we need to support as many people as we can, however we now can offer even more to our service users and this will mean so much to them in their time of need and grief."
For Baby Loss Awareness Month, the charity will be holding a services in its memorial garden in Borstal Road, Rochester on Friday, October 15.
It will also be displaying 400 pink and blue umbrellas hanging from the ceiling in St Margaret’s Church in Rainham. They will be decorated with wooden hearts containing baby’s names or anniversary dates. The umbrellas were chosen to signify people "standing together in the rain to remember all babies gone too soon".
Kelly said “One in four pregnancies sadly do end in loss and the subject is such a tough one. By enlightening and special events like this we look to bring this subject to the forefront and let everyone know that we are here as a charity to support them through the weeks and months that follow such tragedy.”
Read more: All the latest news from Medway
