Eliza's Funeral
We were determined for Lizee's funeral to happen when it felt right.
The last thing on your mind in those first few days is how are we going to bury her. I remember people (midwives/ hospital staff) gently suggesting that it's something we'd need to think about. Lizee died on a Tuesday and on the Saturday I think we had the humanist celebrant, Alison, who had conducted the service for our wedding visit the house and sit with us. I remember the surreal time out in the garden (me in a towel from the waist downwards as my episiotemy wound was in a mess and needed the air to get to it). We told Alison everything, and she listened and helped guide our story. She could do the service for us, but she explained to us we also needed to engage an undertaker.
I remembered I'd passed a shop in town called Green Fuse and had always been fascinated by what they got up to. I called Jane and she was so gentle. She came to the house and talked us through our options. I had been keen on cremation, Simon on burial (I didn't like the idea of the maggots). As it turned out, Jane explained that a baby's bones are too soft to easily produce ashes so burial tends to be the preferred option for parents. I wanted Eliza's spirit to be free and had romantic images of casting her ashes out to sea at a favourite spot on a walk. Despite my disappointment and reservations, we decided to investigate burial. With no connection to a church, we looked at burial grounds of which there are several in the Totnes area. We saw two and decided on the second, if on any. With more thinking and talking we decided it just didn't feel right. We decided to investigate a graveyard in a nearby village where Simon's grandfather was vicar and where his granny and two aunts and uncles, and grandfather are buried. It was a completely random connection, in that Simon is not himself from down here, but he has chosen a partner who lives in the town next to the village where his grandfather was the vicar!
We visited the graveyard and it was perfect. There was even (miraculously) a space under the cherry tree, next to the Outram monument (under which the ashes of the six members of Simon's family are buried). We were extra happy as the site is located away from the church and the 'darkness' of the original graveyard, and is instead next to an orchard and bordered by a high stone wall, looking onto fields of sheep and a hill with a copse of trees in the distance. Suddenly the prospect of a 'traditionally religious' resting place for our little girl seemed viable.
The big stumbling block from my point of view was that in order to have a burial on consecrated ground, a vicar must be present and say the official prayers of internment. This bothered me as I was hoping to have a humanist/ homemade ceremony. We spoke with the vicar and there was just no way around this. As it turned out, again serendipitiously, there was a patch of ground connected to the graveyard which is yet to be consecrated. The vicar agreed to us having the ceremony there, and then us all moving to the graveside for the official words by the priest. Things were coming together.
We set a date for the Sunday 21st April, almost four weeks exactly after Eliza had been born. In discussions with the patient and empathetic Jane and Simon (her partner who runs the funeral business with her), we decided that they would lead the ceremony, and would help us to pull our ideas and wants together. They were absolutely amazing, suggesting ideas, ways to create symbolism and meaning in the ceremony and ways to express all that we wanted to.
All this was happening against the backdrop of a beautiful spring. Warmth was entering the sunshine and the buds were starting to bloom. I can remember sitting in the garden listening to the birds chattering and excitedly going about their business after the long winter.
A big question through all of this was when, and if, we wanted to see Lizee again. Jane was very much of the view that it helps to see the dead as much as you want before they are buried. She deals mostly with adults' deaths, less so with babies', for obvious reasons, and that was her experience. As it was, we felt we'd very much said goodbye to Lizee when we left her sleeping soundly in her Moses Basket in the bedroom at the ICU for babies in Plymouth. I didn't really want to see her again. As it turns out, Simon wanted to, and we agreed to have her in our house the night before the funeral.
It was so weird Jane turning up and Lizee in her beautiful casket in the boot. I remember distinctly Jane motioning for me to lean in and bring her out.
So so sad.
Simon carried her across the threshold and she 'slept' in the wee bedroom in her casket on a chair. We looked at her face and her hand (she was wrapped in a white sheet/shroud). She was beautiful. So beautiful. I can't tell you how beautiful, and so perfect.
My friend Lizzie was staying that evening before the funeral. She brought us food all the way from London so we didn't have to cook, and we tried to behave normally and have dinner together, all the while knowing Lizee was upstairs. I am so grateful for the bravery and courage and beauty of my friends. I wasn't sure if Lizzie would be comfortable sleeping in the same house as a dead body. She'd just had a baby in December and it must have been so upsetting for her. She, and my friend Polly W both wanted to see Eliza, and I'll be ever grateful for the opportunity to share her with them, and for the love and appreciation and respect they showed towards her.
Similarly, I was amazed that my Aunt Gillian and other people there on the day wanted to see Lizee's hand and face. I love them for it.
I remember on the morning of the funeral, Auntie Gillian taking me by the shoulders and telling me how proud she was of us both (Simon and I). I'd never thought of it like that. I'm grateful for her telling us so.
The journey to the cemetry was super weird with Simon and I in the back and Lizee in the boot and Jane and Simon in the front. It was a stunning day. Perfect April weather. Warm and sunny and bright and clear. We had the chairs in a circle in the rough grass and there was a carpet of primroses underfoot - so fitting as primroses were the flowers my mum brought for me from the garden just after Lizee's birth. The blossom was on the apple tree above us, and above Lizee's grave. The sun was warm and Eliza looked wonderful sitting on the wooden logs in the centre of the circle. There was time for people to look at her if they wanted to and Polly W's boys had drawn pictures to give to Eliza and someone else brought a teddy.
Jane and Simon led the ceremony, and Simon, Polly (my sister) and Simon's Dad and me contributed different readings. I remember the warmth coming out of the earth and the love in that circle. We sang the lullaby Dad sang to us when we were small (Tula Tu - a Zulu song) as we all walked to the graveside. Mum and Gilly had tied lots of primroses with ribbon and each person had one to place in the grave on Lizee's casket.
We hugged everyone and thanked them for being there and stood as long as we wanted to, and then it was time to head back to the house for some food and drink.
We'd invited some extra people to the wake, neighbours and the people who'd been involved with Lizee in some way during our pregnancy. At the funeral we had four friends of ours, our parents, Simon's brother and my sister, my brother in law, and my aunt and uncle. We also had Jane and Simon, the vicar, our hynobirthing teacher, Marleen, the midwife who looked after us immediately after Eliza's death, and Julia and Jo from the hospital.
Back at the house it was okay. Not as scary or sad as I might have thought. The weather continued to be glorious and we sat outside and drank tea (thank you Uncle David) and ate food. Quite a few people dropped by. In the end some people stayed for an impromptu dinner and then Pol and Mark started a fire at the end of the garden and we sat up watching the moon. I didn't want the day to end.
Polly W stayed with me and we had a gentle day the next day - lots of rest in the garden, while Polly was amazing in the house, putting on a wash, making me soup, keeping me company, that kind of thing. Simon had had to head off to work in The Hague that day.
The last thing on your mind in those first few days is how are we going to bury her. I remember people (midwives/ hospital staff) gently suggesting that it's something we'd need to think about. Lizee died on a Tuesday and on the Saturday I think we had the humanist celebrant, Alison, who had conducted the service for our wedding visit the house and sit with us. I remember the surreal time out in the garden (me in a towel from the waist downwards as my episiotemy wound was in a mess and needed the air to get to it). We told Alison everything, and she listened and helped guide our story. She could do the service for us, but she explained to us we also needed to engage an undertaker.
I remembered I'd passed a shop in town called Green Fuse and had always been fascinated by what they got up to. I called Jane and she was so gentle. She came to the house and talked us through our options. I had been keen on cremation, Simon on burial (I didn't like the idea of the maggots). As it turned out, Jane explained that a baby's bones are too soft to easily produce ashes so burial tends to be the preferred option for parents. I wanted Eliza's spirit to be free and had romantic images of casting her ashes out to sea at a favourite spot on a walk. Despite my disappointment and reservations, we decided to investigate burial. With no connection to a church, we looked at burial grounds of which there are several in the Totnes area. We saw two and decided on the second, if on any. With more thinking and talking we decided it just didn't feel right. We decided to investigate a graveyard in a nearby village where Simon's grandfather was vicar and where his granny and two aunts and uncles, and grandfather are buried. It was a completely random connection, in that Simon is not himself from down here, but he has chosen a partner who lives in the town next to the village where his grandfather was the vicar!
We visited the graveyard and it was perfect. There was even (miraculously) a space under the cherry tree, next to the Outram monument (under which the ashes of the six members of Simon's family are buried). We were extra happy as the site is located away from the church and the 'darkness' of the original graveyard, and is instead next to an orchard and bordered by a high stone wall, looking onto fields of sheep and a hill with a copse of trees in the distance. Suddenly the prospect of a 'traditionally religious' resting place for our little girl seemed viable.
The big stumbling block from my point of view was that in order to have a burial on consecrated ground, a vicar must be present and say the official prayers of internment. This bothered me as I was hoping to have a humanist/ homemade ceremony. We spoke with the vicar and there was just no way around this. As it turned out, again serendipitiously, there was a patch of ground connected to the graveyard which is yet to be consecrated. The vicar agreed to us having the ceremony there, and then us all moving to the graveside for the official words by the priest. Things were coming together.
We set a date for the Sunday 21st April, almost four weeks exactly after Eliza had been born. In discussions with the patient and empathetic Jane and Simon (her partner who runs the funeral business with her), we decided that they would lead the ceremony, and would help us to pull our ideas and wants together. They were absolutely amazing, suggesting ideas, ways to create symbolism and meaning in the ceremony and ways to express all that we wanted to.
All this was happening against the backdrop of a beautiful spring. Warmth was entering the sunshine and the buds were starting to bloom. I can remember sitting in the garden listening to the birds chattering and excitedly going about their business after the long winter.
A big question through all of this was when, and if, we wanted to see Lizee again. Jane was very much of the view that it helps to see the dead as much as you want before they are buried. She deals mostly with adults' deaths, less so with babies', for obvious reasons, and that was her experience. As it was, we felt we'd very much said goodbye to Lizee when we left her sleeping soundly in her Moses Basket in the bedroom at the ICU for babies in Plymouth. I didn't really want to see her again. As it turns out, Simon wanted to, and we agreed to have her in our house the night before the funeral.
It was so weird Jane turning up and Lizee in her beautiful casket in the boot. I remember distinctly Jane motioning for me to lean in and bring her out.
So so sad.
Simon carried her across the threshold and she 'slept' in the wee bedroom in her casket on a chair. We looked at her face and her hand (she was wrapped in a white sheet/shroud). She was beautiful. So beautiful. I can't tell you how beautiful, and so perfect.
My friend Lizzie was staying that evening before the funeral. She brought us food all the way from London so we didn't have to cook, and we tried to behave normally and have dinner together, all the while knowing Lizee was upstairs. I am so grateful for the bravery and courage and beauty of my friends. I wasn't sure if Lizzie would be comfortable sleeping in the same house as a dead body. She'd just had a baby in December and it must have been so upsetting for her. She, and my friend Polly W both wanted to see Eliza, and I'll be ever grateful for the opportunity to share her with them, and for the love and appreciation and respect they showed towards her.
Similarly, I was amazed that my Aunt Gillian and other people there on the day wanted to see Lizee's hand and face. I love them for it.
I remember on the morning of the funeral, Auntie Gillian taking me by the shoulders and telling me how proud she was of us both (Simon and I). I'd never thought of it like that. I'm grateful for her telling us so.
The journey to the cemetry was super weird with Simon and I in the back and Lizee in the boot and Jane and Simon in the front. It was a stunning day. Perfect April weather. Warm and sunny and bright and clear. We had the chairs in a circle in the rough grass and there was a carpet of primroses underfoot - so fitting as primroses were the flowers my mum brought for me from the garden just after Lizee's birth. The blossom was on the apple tree above us, and above Lizee's grave. The sun was warm and Eliza looked wonderful sitting on the wooden logs in the centre of the circle. There was time for people to look at her if they wanted to and Polly W's boys had drawn pictures to give to Eliza and someone else brought a teddy.
Jane and Simon led the ceremony, and Simon, Polly (my sister) and Simon's Dad and me contributed different readings. I remember the warmth coming out of the earth and the love in that circle. We sang the lullaby Dad sang to us when we were small (Tula Tu - a Zulu song) as we all walked to the graveside. Mum and Gilly had tied lots of primroses with ribbon and each person had one to place in the grave on Lizee's casket.
We hugged everyone and thanked them for being there and stood as long as we wanted to, and then it was time to head back to the house for some food and drink.
We'd invited some extra people to the wake, neighbours and the people who'd been involved with Lizee in some way during our pregnancy. At the funeral we had four friends of ours, our parents, Simon's brother and my sister, my brother in law, and my aunt and uncle. We also had Jane and Simon, the vicar, our hynobirthing teacher, Marleen, the midwife who looked after us immediately after Eliza's death, and Julia and Jo from the hospital.
Back at the house it was okay. Not as scary or sad as I might have thought. The weather continued to be glorious and we sat outside and drank tea (thank you Uncle David) and ate food. Quite a few people dropped by. In the end some people stayed for an impromptu dinner and then Pol and Mark started a fire at the end of the garden and we sat up watching the moon. I didn't want the day to end.
Polly W stayed with me and we had a gentle day the next day - lots of rest in the garden, while Polly was amazing in the house, putting on a wash, making me soup, keeping me company, that kind of thing. Simon had had to head off to work in The Hague that day.