About Us
Alissa Paulson-Cedars and Melissa Terrill met for the first time in June of 2010 at a SHARE support group meeting for bereaved families who had experienced the death of a baby through pregnancy, stillbirth or in early infancy. Alissa had suffered the loss of her first born and only child, Kennedy Kate, on October 22, 2009 after 22 weeks of pregnancy. Melissa had just experienced the loss of her second child, Mikayla Grace, who was born at 25 weeks on June 13, 2010 and lived for 36 hours before passing away on June 15, 2010.
Alissa and Melissa had attended the support group to connect with people who had experienced similar losses, find a "safe place" to grieve openly for their daughters, and hopefully receive resources that would help them continue on in this journey. All of those needs were met in some way that day. But one other need was met, the gift of friendship. We feel blessed that this gift of friendship has brought us to a place where we can plan this event to give back to the community and help to support others who have experienced the loss of a child.
Proceeds from the Forever in Our Hearts Remembrance Day will go back to a local 501c3 non-profit, Mikayla's Grace, Inc. This charity supports families with a baby in the NICU and those who experience the death of an infant at Madison Area hospitals by providing NICU care packages and angel memory boxes. Mikayla's Grace was founded in February of 2011 by Mike and Melissa Terrill in memory of their two angels, Mikayla Grace 6/13/10-6/15/10 and Chase Gabriel 4/22/11. Mikayla's Grace, Inc. made their first donation to St. Mary's Hospital on June 24, 2011. We have since donated over 100 angel memory boxes and 100 NICU care packages to St. Mary's Hospital and Meriter Hospital.
We plan to use proceeds from the Forever in Our Hearts Remembrance Day to continue to meet the current mission of Mikayla's Grace and to eventually expand our mission to include support for more families, including those experiencing early pregnancy loss. We are hoping to be able to gain enough support to make this an ongoing event for many years to come.
You can read more about Mikayla's Grace at our website, http://www.mikaylasgrace.com/. We also have a Facebook page, www.facebook.com/mikaylasgrace.
