Lactation After Loss Memorial Quilt

The Lactation after Loss quilt communicates research on experiences, meaning making and management of lactation after infant death to health professionals. The quilt plays a vital role in raising awareness in this gap in lactation care and in affecting real change in healthcare practices. We contribute to the lineage of quiltmaking, a form through which marginalised voices advocate for change by strategically taking intimate practices of caregiving into public space. Drawing on findings from qualitative interview study with bereaved parents, the quilt is made for Australian healthcare professionals, who are time poor and who require gentle, clear messaging and space in which to reflect, discuss and improve practice. In this novel research, supported by Red Cross Life Blood Australia we established a method of using human milk as a modifier in natural dyeing and printing. Together, the human milk (which failed Lifeblood’s stringent screening and could not be fed to babies), verbatim extracts of mother’s interviews, plant colour, mordant screenprint and handstitching on cloth pieces, create a highly direct and personal tool. The academic expert is decentred, enabling healthcare professionals to listen to bereaved parents first person experiences. To date the quilt has been used in 11 workshops with over 100 healthcare workers across Australia. Each group has reflected on their own and their workplaces’ practice and how they could implement changes and improvements in lactation care. We have delivered lectures about the role of the quilt, including to Breastfeeding services to home and beyond ACT and Queenbeyan, Australian Redcross Lifeblood, Lactation Consultants of Australia and New Zealand Conference and Performing Care and Carelessness conference, University of Otago. The quilt featured in Futures: Mapping the Terrain of Creative Inquiry at the ANU School of Art & Design Gallery, the exhibition attracted over 1000 visitors and strong social media attention.