When Wendy Cruz-Chan was just 19 weeks pregnant, she lost her son, Killiam, due to a rare uterus condition. Her doctors let her keep her son’s ashes in an urn, but Cruz-Chan continued to mourn her lost motherhood.
"I can't dress him, I can't play him, I can't watch him grow. As a mother, it breaks me. It hurts me deeply,” she admitted.
As she was leaving the hospital after her stillbirth, Cruz-Chan made a stunning realization. At this point in her pregnancy, her milk ducts were already developing.
Even though she no longer had a son to feed, she knew there were many other children who could benefit from having her breastmilk.
As Cruz-Chan began to pump breast milk, she also reached out to new mothers over the internet and communities of local doulas to find parents in need of extra milk. "Even though I cannot personally breastfeed my own son, I wanted to do something in his name," she explained. "That's all I can do for him."
The donations began slowly, but surely.
Once Cruz-Chan heard that her breast milk wasn’t just providing babies with necessary nutrients, but also even helping some of their own medical conditions, she was encouraged to donate even more, "Through donating, it gave me a purpose. It helped me not be in such a deep depression."
At times, donating was difficult. When people saw her pumping breast milk (or even just caught sight of her still-swollen belly), some of them would occasionally ask her how old her child was. Those moments were hardest for Cruz-Chan, because she would always have to quietly tell them her son had been stillborn.
It was always her desire to help others and save other children's lives that kept her going.
Cruz-Chan has now donated over a total of 16 gallons of breast milk in a matter of two months.
“I’m just so proud of my boobs,” she joked.
Cruz-Chan is now weaning her breasts from producing milk, but she’s turned her efforts to spreading awareness about donated breast milk and vouching for its benefits – for both mothers and children.
You can watch a feature of her story here:
