Random Act of Kindness - Today Maeve Gave a Stranger Flowers

Maeve's birthday flowers last year.

Yesterday Jess sent me the following to be posted and shared here - I won't say any more because, as usual, Jess's eloquence communicates itself beautifully:

"I used the first of my Maeve cards today! I don't know why it has taken me so long. It took me ages to remember to put them in my wallet and then, although I often thought about them, I couldn't seem to come up with a good enough idea for how to use one. This has been quietly bothering me. ..it really shouldn't be that hard to spread a little kindness, to randomly help a stranger. I have tried to trust the process though and believe that an opportunity would present itself when the time was right.

I have been feeling sad today, struck I think with the nostalgia that came with a special anniversary yesterday....3 whole years since I found out I was carrying Maeve...a magical moment, now tarnished with the 'if onlys' that accompany her loss. And so I thought it might help to feel I was doing something positive in her memory.

I visited my favourite local florist,  one I often use to source special flowers to take to Maeve's memorial at the crematorium. The owner is always so kind and accommodating. It was lovely to tell him about Maeve today and he didn't  hesitate in agreeing to help me to spread a little kindness in her memory. So I gave him a small donation and a card explaining our mission. He plans to create a special bouquet and leave it somewhere in the village for someone to find, with the Maeve card attached. He called it an 'adopt a bouquet' and plans to post on their Facebook page that it's out there for someone to find and enjoy. 

So I am feeling a little brighter, as if Maeve and I have a tiny secret, a wee plan to brighten up someone else's day. I am so grateful to my wonderful friend who created this blog and the kindness at its heart. My wee Maeve might just change the world, one beautiful act at a time. 

Please let me know if you would like to join us in remembering my baby girl and growing the Maeve  Effect."


If you live in or near Stewarton in Scotland, maybe you will be the one to adopt Maeve's bouquet??


Here it is :-D

The florist shop in question, Bloomingwales, writes on their FB Page:

"Some days you meet people who make you take a look at yourself. Yesterday was one of those days. A young lady came into the shop and commissioned us to create a bouquet and, at our discretion, give it to someone we felt would benefit from it. The only request was that we include a small card which reads as follows:

'Hello! Someone has just performed a random, small act of kindness for you in loving memory of Maeve Elizabeth McCormack, born sleeping 16/4/2013. If you can, please return the favour by doing the same for someone else - or simply say her name aloud xxx.
http://themaeveeffect.blogspot.co.uk/'

So in respect of this request we will take the commission and create another adopt a bouquet which will be left somewhere in the town today. The only request we make is that you like and share this post in the hope that it will make us all take a small look inside and make us better people - if only for a little while."

And as good as their word, that's what they did, later posting:

 "If you've managed to drag yourself out of the house on this miserable "summers" day then be on the look out for our lovely adopt a bouquet, which will be placed somewhere around Stewarton after 4 o'clock today. Keep your eyes peeled and let us know if you spot it or even better if you take it home!"

At the time of writing, their post about this bouquet has 52 likes and many lovely comments!

If you would like to join us in remembering Maeve this way (or in any other ways you would like shared here,) if you have ideas about small kindnesses that we could do in her name, and especially if you would like to receive some of Maeve's calling cards, which will cost you nothing, please email themaeveeffect@yahoo.co.uk.

(If you would like to receive cards please do include your full postal address, which will not be shared with any third parties and will be kept very safe and confidential.)

Maeve Day - The Escalator - By Jess McCormack (Originally posted on A Bed for my Heart)

Many people don't want to think about what it might be like to live with the loss of a child. That's understandable, I guess, in a way... Perhaps that is why so many people avoid the subject and are keen for those living with this kind of loss to 'get over it' and 'move on'. Perhaps if people could take a minute to imagine what it might be like, or listen to someone who is living with this kind of grief, they would be kinder and more patient with bereaved parents.

This is a post Maeve's mum, Jess, wrote for the site A Bed for My Heart back in April 2015, you can find the original post here.

I won't say too much about it - I think Jess speaks for herself far more eloquently than I ever could.

I hope that when you have read it you will see why I'm so keen to get people saying Maeve's name - I want to help Jess as she struggles to walk up that escalator...

"Sometimes living with grief is described as like being on a roller coaster. But a roller coaster has both ups and downs, highs and lows, excitement, anticipation, that moment when everything stands still and then a terrifying, exhilarating rush. For me grief is more like a treadmill and I am stuck facing the wrong direction. Or an escalator, a crazy long one like on the London Underground, where you bravely step on without being able to see where it ends. My escalator is moving down, and down, and down, but I am trying to go up, climbing and climbing, but getting nowhere.

I can see a glimpse of where I want to go, I can sense the light, the happiness, the freedom. But I climb and climb and never seem to move up. I climb until I am exhausted, my legs beginning to feel numb, my lungs burning, my head too tired to keep looking up at where I want to go. I am still in the same place, in spite of all the work, all the effort to move up. But I can’t stop climbing. Because if I stop, the escalator will quickly send me downwards, back to where I started. I can’t look back, I can’t think about what is behind me because it was too dark, too painful.

 . . .

I don’t know how I got through it. I don’t remember when the sobbing stopped, the involuntary, desperate crying that came from the depths of my soul and felt like it would never end. I was so afraid, because the world I thought I knew was suddenly ripped away from me and replaced by a world in which anything could happen, the worst thing imaginable, even though I played by the rules. I dare not even glance down to briefly remember how that felt, because it might make me lose my balance and fall backwards into the darkness. But to keep looking up is taking all that I have. I wish I could stop, stand still and just hold my girls, one in my arms and the other forever in my memory. But grief doesn’t stop, it keeps trying to move me down and down and down.

 . . .

Sometimes I feel so alone, like I am the only person on the escalator.  And then suddenly someone is beside me, holding out their hand, climbing with me, keeping pace, saying “Maeve, Maeve, Maeve”, reminding me why I need to keep going, helping me to believe I will one day reach fresh air, bright, clean light. Sometimes I am surrounded by so many people, the warmest of hugs, holding me so tight that I can stop climbing for a while, while others do the work for me.

 . . .

I know I have come far from those dark days in the raw depths of early grief. It has been a hard, hard climb, with many stumbles, shins crashing onto metal, bruised and scarred. But I got up again and again and I am still climbing.

. . .

I stop to take a breath, I close my eyes, and in my mind, I am holding my baby girl. I remember how it felt to kiss her soft cheeks, how she fit perfectly in my arms, where she was meant to be forever, not just for a day. I want to stay in that moment, but I’ve stopped for too long, I am starting to go down. I need to climb again, but it’s so hard. I could just stop, let the escalator carry me down into the darkness, to a place where there’s nothing, where it won’t hurt any more. Or I could put one foot in front of the other, just one step, just one will lift me up, away from the dark. One step and then another, not further from Maeve, but towards a future with her in it, not in the way she should have been, but in beauty, in memory, in love. And so I climb, for Maeve, because of Maeve, because I owe it to my baby girl not to give up."