HEALING after heartache

Facing Christmas without her little one wa as once unbearable, but now Jane Oundjian is helping others through the grieving process

- MISHAAL KHAN

It’s the time of year when new parents look forward to sharing magical moments with their bundles of joy. A baby’s first Christmas is one to be remembered, and after dreaming of it for years, Jane Oundjian was finally able to experience it for herself, only for it to be cruelly snatched away. She knows too well how overwhelming grief can feel at this time of year, having lived through it herself.

Jane, now 73, married her husband Nick, 78, in 1968, and a year later, they decided to start trying for a baby. Aftereight years of fertility problems, while Jane painfully watched her friends’ families grow, their first son, Jeremy, arrived in March 1977. ‘The first Christmas with Jeremy was joyous. After so many years of wishing and waiting, it was surreal having him there with the whole family. All that uncertainty we’d felt washed away,’ she smiles.

Jane, Nick and Jeremy spent their first Christmas as a three with Jane’s family in West Sussex, with Jeremy dressed in a traditional red and cream romper suit.

‘He was a big, bonny, beautiful baby,’ she says. ‘He was crawling around, trying to get under the Christmas tree, and his older cousins were so excited to spend time with him.’

For the first time in years, Jane felt at peace, and that finally, with Jeremy in their lives, everything would be OK. But just five months later, in May 1978, Jeremy became poorly with gastroenteritis.

Struck with sickness and diarrhoea, he ended up in hospital and died five days later. ‘We thought he’d be OK but everything happened so quickly. We were in shock.’