Mom Warns Other Parents After Devastating Loss Of Infant

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Mom posts heartbreaking warning after losing her child.

A mother who lost her child when he suffocated in a blanket he had been put to bed with took to social media to spread a very important message about sleep safety. This week, Jordan DeRosier’s 7-month-old son, Sloan, died in his sleep. His face was buried in a blanket his great-grandmother made for him, that he loved and had been attached to since birth.

“I had not wanted to explain the detailed circumstances of his death because of my guilt and the fear of condemnation from others. But I will not allow anyone to try and place blame where it does not belong,” she writes.

“He was last laid down to bed with this blanket made by his great-great grandmother, and one other blanket, a grey one he had been attached to since birth. They took the grey one he had been found with his head in,” DeRosier explains. “He had pulled it through the crib rails somehow and gotten himself stuck in it. You never think it will happen to you. You never think it will be your baby.

“Please do not put your babies to bed with a blanket.”

She explains that because he was a strong seven-month-old — crawling, climbing, and standing on his own — she thought he would be okay with a blanket.

“This is the face of immense, unfathomable grief, the face of longing, of heartbreak, of self inflicted GUILT. I will NEVER stop feeling responsible,” she writes. “I will relive this for the rest of my life knowing EXACTLY what I could have done differently. Please learn from my world shattering mistake.”

She describes in heartbreaking detail the moment she found her son, and the moments that followed, in another post.

Is there anything more heartbreaking than a mother losing her child? Even the thought of such a thing sends most mothers into a spiral of unimaginable grief and anxiety. How do we cope with the idea that something so horrific is a possibility?

We don’t.

We push it out of our heads, and sometimes when we hear stories of tragic accidents we go through a laundry list of ideas why something like this would never happen to us. It’s a coping mechanism. We’ve all done it.

I’d never leave my infant in a carseat unattended, for even a moment!

I’d never turn my back on my child in public!

I’d never put my baby to bed with a blanket!

We make a million tiny decisions every day. Many of those decisions simply rely on our own instinctive judgment. We know our children. We know what they are capable of. Many mothers have made the same, exact decision DeRosier made without tragic consequence. But when these stories make news, there is always a need to assign blame.

If we can point to something a parent did “wrong” — then it can’t happen to us, right?

The terrifying fact is that tragic accidents happen to good people all the time. And all we can do is be thankful that it hasn’t been us — yet. A small part can break off a toy and our child can decide to put it in their mouth. They could at any moment take a spill from a jungle gym and land the wrong way. I’ll tell you as someone who sifts through parenting news every, single, day — there is no shortage of horrific accidents out there. So yes, we can follow all manner of instructions and believe we are doing things “right” all the time — but we can’t avoid the reality that tragic things happen.

Wishing this mother peace.

There are some of suggest doing the following to create a safe sleep environment for babies:

• Place the baby on his or her back on a firm sleep surface such as a crib or bassinet with a tight-fitting sheet.
• Avoid use of soft bedding, including crib bumpers, blankets, pillows and soft toys.
• Share a bedroom with parents, but not the same sleeping surface, preferably until the baby turns one but at least for the first six months. Room-sharing decreases the risk of SIDS by as much as 50%.
• Avoid baby’s exposure to smoke, alcohol and illicit drugs.