A brave new film gives a voice to the fam­i­lies of still­born babies

Why is still­birth such a con­ver­sa­tion stop­per in a soci­ety that sees 7,000 babies born dead every day? That’s the ques­tion posed in a vital new fea­ture doc­u­men­tary called Still Loved, which inves­ti­gates the mea­gre sup­port sys­tem pro­vid­ed to the fam­i­lies affect­ed by this issue, giv­ing them a much-need­ed voice.

Three years in the mak­ing, the film begins with a can­dle-lit vig­il on Inter­na­tion­al Preg­nan­cy and Infant Loss Remem­brance Day com­mem­o­rat­ing these chil­dren, attend­ed by the par­ents and sib­lings who have expe­ri­enced the tragedy of still­birth. Com­pris­ing inter­views that expose the empti­ness and lone­li­ness that these par­ents felt fol­low­ing their heart­break­ing ordeals, direc­tor Deb­bie Howard seeks to off­set the deaf­en­ing silence that char­ac­teris­es their expe­ri­ences. By doing so, she reveals a shock­ing neg­li­gence of sup­port both pro­fes­sion­al­ly and per­son­al­ly over a top­ic stig­ma­tised by what the stiff upper-lip’s of this world dub embar­rass­ing emotionality.

Still Loved demon­strates that the phys­i­cal loss of a baby is not con­sid­ered in con­junc­tion with the men­tal sup­port these par­ents urgent­ly need in order to cope with the pass­ing of a child they’d cre­at­ed, devel­oped a rela­tion­ship with, and who had died in the hours it was antic­i­pat­ed that he or she would be wel­comed into the world. More than a lack of clo­sure, there is a dis­tinct lack of com­pas­sion for the unex­pect­ed and often sud­den news that their baby won’t sur­vive, even down to def­i­n­i­tions. One woman’s birth was signed off as an abor­tion, anoth­er as a still­birth when med­ical neg­li­gence was the true culprit.

Hope, how­ev­er, pre­vails, as it fol­lows the fam­i­lies in their recov­ery, doc­u­ment­ing the dif­fer­ent cop­ing mech­a­nisms they indi­vid­u­al­ly apply. One starts a char­i­ty, one chairs a char­i­ty, one refus­es to have anoth­er child. The process of mov­ing on is hard, but we wit­ness that too, as the fam­i­lies con­tin­ue to hon­our their offspring’s mem­o­ry. In a time of cel­e­brat­ing an excit­ing new hel­lo, still­birth is a poignant, shat­ter­ing good­bye, and Still Loved rights a wrong in edu­cat­ing audi­ences on the impor­tance of treat­ing the sub­ject with the action and com­pas­sion it deserves.

Still Loved is in cin­e­mas across the UK now. Vis­it stil​lloved​film​.com/​s​c​r​e​e​nings to find out where the film is show­ing near you.