A DAD whose newborn daughter passed away at 11-days-old is set to launch a bereavement hub for the charity in her name.
Daniel Thompson from Newton-le-Willows set up Ava Marie Foundation in 2019 in memory of his daughter who died of Anencephaly, a neuro tube defect.
The foundation soon became a registered charity and is now preparing to introduce a Child Bereavement Hub in the previous Job Centre in Earlestown.
Daniel said: "We founded the charity in 2019. We launched that in memory of our daughter who died at 11 days old.
"What we found was, going through that loss of a child, we found that there was a lack of support there for us so we decided that we wanted to be able to fill that gap that we felt that was there.
"We originally started by providing memory boxes free of charge to families who had lost a child and as we started to talk to people, we found that a lot of people felt there was a decline in their mental health."
The charity helps families across the UK and Northern Ireland deal with bereavement and is now hoping to expand the services it provides through the launch of the hub.
The 34-year-old added: "We decided that we were going to create this community hub that we would support bereaved families and be able to get people together to do monthly meetings just so that people don’t feel that they’re left alone.
"We got the former Job Centre shortly before COVID and unfortunately it took over everything and we just weren’t able to proceed any further."
Ava Marie Foundation has currently received a funding of £5,000 from B&Q and a further £5,000 from Screwfix to help transform the hub.
It was also chosen by Aviva as one of the charities that would benefit from employee donations.
The charity hopes to launch the hub on Saturday October 15, Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day.
Daniel, who works as a Cluster General Manager at AG Hotels, added: "It’s quite a prominent day for child loss and that’s why we’re choosing that day. Once we launch, we’ll be able to offer that place for bereaved families to come.
"We found out that Ava Marie wouldn’t survive from the early days and we were quite busy from day one to raise awareness of the condition.
"It’s allowed us to almost divert our grief into supporting other people."
To donate to the Child Bereavement Hub, visit the Ava Marie Foundation Crowdfunder page here.
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