A Mother's Fight: Breaking The Silence of Stillbirth

WEST ALLIS, WI — Today, Abigail Patricia Mueller would have been an eight-year-old elementary school student getting ready for Halloween. She would have been shopping for a costume, getting ready for a fall concert, and she would already be peppering her mom and dad with Christmas present suggestions.

Abby, as she is known to many, never got the chance to see any of those days. She was stillborn at West Allis Women’s Pavilion on February 28, 2009. She was born full-term and otherwise healthy, yet after months of tests, no cause of death was ever found.

Stillbirths such as Abby's are a common tragedy in the U.S., with one child being stillborn an average of every 20 minutes. At 26,000 stillbirths a year, that figure dwarfs the deaths attributed to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome 13 to 1, "and nobody talks about it," Abby's mother Mindy Mueller said. This weekend, Mindy and husband Jeremy Mueller are hosting Abby's Run/Walk in West Allis, a fundraiser to support education, research and awareness for stillbirths in the U.S. In its eighth year, Abby's Run/Walk has raised nearly $100,000.

Waking Up In A Bad Dream

In 2009, Mindy Mueller was 37 weeks pregnant with Abby, progressing through a healthy pregnancy. A few days before Abby's birth, Mindy said she started to feel warning signs, but "didn't push it" with her doctors after her doctors reassured her that her symptoms were not out of the ordinary, she said.

Three days before Abby's birth, Mindy said she started feeling contractions. She contacted her doctor who reassured her that the number of contractions she was having was not unreasonable. Two days before Abby's birth, Mindy said she could tell Abby wasn't moving as much as she used to. She contacted her doctor again who told her to lay on her left side and count the number of her baby's kicks. If the baby kicked enough, she was reassured the baby was progressing normally.

How to Help: Donate to Abby's Run/Walk, Register Here

On the night before Abby's birth, Mindy said she woke up early in the morning from a bad dream. Her doctor told her to come in to the hospital. "She was born absolutely perfect, but she was already gone," Mindy said.

After weeks of testing, no cause of death was ever determined.

Transforming Grief Into Action

Mindy describes herself as an "academic" and a "data-driven" person. She was not ready to accept the unexplained nature of her daughter's death. "I always think there's a reason, and when I was told there was no explanation, I was not absolutely OK," she said. "There is a reason — they just haven't found it yet."

One year after Abby was born, she and husband Jeremy Mueller started Abby's Run/Walk, a fundraiser to support education, research and awareness for stillbirths in the U.S.

"It was therapeutic for me," she said. "I had to do something with that grief, because I didn't know what else to do. I owed that to Abby. I had to do something because I am her mom."

Abby's Run/Walk has grown steadily over the years, bringing out between 50 to 100 people for the upbeat and family-friendly annual fall event in the Milwaukee area. If all goes as expected this year, Abby's Run/Walk will have raised $100,000 to fight stillbirths.

A New Chapter

When Mindy began looking for organizations to support, she encountered numerous ones dedicated to bereavement and aftercare. Yet when she learned about the Star Legacy Foundation, a national leader in stillbirth advocacy, she found what she was looking for, and helped form a new chapter in Wisconsin. Together with colleagues Rosie Moua, Kristen M. Sharp and Amanda Smyth, they formed Wisconsin's leadership team, and have pushed stillbirth prevention, research and education more squarely into the public realm.

Mindy said one of her most important goals is to get more self-education research materials into the hands of women and families that need them, she said. That means getting education materials into 18 hospitals and birthing centers in Wisconsin.

"We believe that if there were just a handful of things that women knew, we can make a difference just by getting the word out," she said.

Through the Star Legacy Foundation, Mindy is helping push forward legislation on the state level to help families who have a stillborn child. The bill, currently in committee, would create a refundable individual income tax credit of $2,000 that may be claimed by the parent of a stillbirth.

"Wisconsin families still have expenses, an autopsy and funeral expenses. This is recognition that's real — and life insurance doesn't cover these expenses," she said. "For us, insurance wouldn't cover our expenses because they said Abby didn't take a breath."

In July, through the Star Legacy Foundation, Mindy was able to assist in training the first group of doctors in Wisconsin on how to perform an autopsy on a stillborn baby following consistent autopsy protocols.

Join Abby's Walk Or Donate Online

Today, Mindy and husband Jeremy Mueller raise their 7-year-old son Tucker and 11-year-old daughter Kiley as they keep Abby's memory alive while bringing it to others who stand to benefit from it.

"One day we are going to say, 'really, we didn't know about this,'" Mindy said. "We want to talk about, and we want men to know that their wives are at risk. Education is power."

Abby's Run/Walk will be held Saturday, Oct. 28 at Greenfield Park – Picnic Area 3 in West Allis. The entrance is located at 124th St. and Lincoln Ave. The address is: 2028 S 124th St West Allis, WI 53227 The run/walk begins at 10 a.m. Registration starts an hour earlier at 9 a.m.

To register online for Abby's Run/Walk, go here: https://secure.qgiv.com/event/...

For more information, visit starlegacyfoundation.org.

Image via Mindy Mueller, Published With Permission