http://www.alexandrawallace.co.uk/

Alexandra Wallace Photography, 586 queens Road Sheffield, Sheffield (2026)

24/08/2026

“I was grieving the loss of a future that could have been.”

Sarah got pregnant fairly quickly and she experienced some early bleeding so went for a scan.

“We were happy to see a baby in there and everything seemed to be okay.”

But at the 12-week scan, everything changed.

“I will always remember the atmosphere in the room.”

Their baby was diagnosed with an exomphalos, a condition where some organs develop outside the body. Sarah and her husband, David, faced months of specialist appointments, tests and scans, holding onto hope with every result.

Then, at 23 weeks, Sarah stopped feeling movements. She attended the family clinic where staff tried to find a heartbeat with a Doppler monitor but couldn’t.
She was sent to the labour ward.

“I think it still hadn’t clicked in my head at this point what might have happened.”

Then came the ultrasound that changed everything.

“I’m really sorry, theres no heartbeat. Your baby has died.”

“My whole world just crashed down on me in that moment.”

A couple of days later, Sarah gave birth to her son, Asa.

“Probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.”

In the midst of heartbreak, the kindness of the hospital staff left a lasting impact. The midwives took handprints and footprints, a photographer captured precious memories, and Sarah and David were able to spend time with their son, even taking him into the hospital garden.

The months that followed were filled with tears, reflection and learning how to live with loss.

“I remember crying like I never thought it would never stop.”

They had huge amounts of support from loved ones that really got them through some tough days.

Today, Sarah says one of the most meaningful things people can do is simply remember Asa. She loves it when people mention him naturally in conversation. It reminds her that he mattered, and that he is not forgotten.

“The bond grows way before you give birth. The real connection begins when you’re pregnant, and those are the memories I keep.”

To honour Asa, whose name means “healer”, Sarah has a tattoo featuring a healing hand symbol with an A at its centre.

Asa Jordan 12/05/2023 1.33

13/07/2026

“Baby loss changes you.”

Melissa tells me why baby loss is so different from any other grief. It’s not just losing your baby, it’s losing every milestone that should have come with them. The first cuddle at home. Sleepless nights. First birthdays. First day at school. Life keeps moving forward without them, and the grief grows alongside it.

Now she measured time differently. He should be 18 months old now. He should be walking and babbling. She noticed boys his age everywhere and each time the thought came, sharp and immediate: I should have two children.

Melissa’s pregnancy had been completely normal. At 32 weeks and 2 days, she attended a routine appointment alone, expecting everything to be fine. But the midwife couldn’t find a heartbeat.

She drove herself to hospital still believing they would tell her everything was okay.

Instead, the sonographer said:
“I’m sorry, there’s no heartbeat.”

There had been no warning signs. No pain. No bleeding. The next day she was induced and gave birth to her son.

The midwives at chesterfield hospital made her feel incredibly supported during this time. She spent a week in hospital with him, he was in a cold cot, holding onto every second she could. She went to see him in the chapel of rest but that final memory stayed with her in a way that brought more pain than comfort.

In the months afterwards, life around her kept moving. Friends were announcing pregnancies while she was trying to survive her grief. She was angry at the world, questioning why it had been her son.

“The messages became less and less. I think people just expect you to pull yourself together.” Is what she thought.

Melissa found support through bereavement midwives, counselling, and . Talking about her son became one of the things that helped her most.

She struggles with birthdays and anniversaries. “Im not very good at the remembrance things because it just makes me angry that we have to do it.”

Asante Stephen Osei
17th August 2024 – 23:23

08/07/2026

I will always remember that phone call: you have a little boy.

I had known loss before. I had experienced a 6 week loss at home while hosting friends for dinner; I never told anyone about that loss until recently. Then there was another at my 12 week scan and the baby had died at 8 weeks, but my body still believed I was pregnant.

The pain of these losses never left me but this experience felt very different. A pain that echoed, that replayed itself in images I never wanted to see. I found myself imagining my tiny boy being taken from me while I slept, my body still, unaware, while somewhere in that quiet, everything changed. His little feet. His tiny hands. The face I would never meet.

I remember seeing him on the screen, so small, so perfect and then the sonographer’s words:

“Your baby has two cystic hygromas.”

What does that even mean? I had never heard the term before. After a month of testing came the call that confirmed two rare and severe chromosomal abnormalities. We spoke with the genetics team and they advised to end the pregnancy. Nothing had prepared me for the choice I was about to make.

The drive to Leeds felt endless. I cried the entire way. At the clinic, the waiting room was full of young women and couples. I felt so much sadness. I remember putting on my gown and walking into a room full of doctors and nurses staring back at me. I completely broke down, it all began to feel so real.

There is a guilt that lives beneath everything - constant, low, and unrelenting. I understand, logically, that there was no real choice. That this was not something I caused or could control. But logic does not quiet the question that keeps rising, raw and insistent: what did I do?

I went through postpartum without a baby to hold. My bump lingered; I avoided mirrors for weeks, unable to recognise myself. I cried every day and on some days, all day.

And yet, even within the grief, there were moments of light. Friends and family sent flowers and meals. Messages arrived daily - small reminders that I was not alone. At home, the steady comfort of Al, Ovie and Eva carried me through each day.

Sonny Birks
19th February 2026 11am

24/06/2026

“Everyone we knew was getting pregnant that year.”

For years, Jess Mullins never thought she wanted children.
It wasn’t until friends lived with her and her partner for a year with their six-month-old baby that something shifted.

“That was the only time in 18 years with my partner that I realised I actually did want children.”

After that relationship ended, Jess began exploring the possibility of having a baby on her own through IVF with a donor. While some friends were supportive, others questioned the idea. One friend who was a single mum said, ‘That’s a really silly idea. No one chooses to be a single mum.’

“I swept it under the carpet and moved on.”

A few years later, Jess met a new partner. They got engaged after just a month and both knew they wanted children. At 43, with her husband aged 40, they bought a house imagining a future family of three.

But after months of trying, nothing happened. Scans revealed fibroids, and IVF offered only a slim chance of success.

After a year, they decided to stop focusing on trying for a baby and instead booked a two-week camping trip to Florida.When they returned home, Jess noticed her period was late.

“I got a pregnancy test and it was positive. In that moment, life was changing.”

One day she started spotting so went to the doctors to get a scan, she saw her baby and the little heartbeat. Jess told me she went to mothercare straight after and daydreamed about all the things she could buy.

Unfortunately, a few days later Jess miscarried at home alone.

“It was only seven and a half weeks, it wasn’t a real baby, but the emotion you go through in that time is just awful. It’s indescribable pain.”

After months of trying again without success, Jess and her husband bazil decided to stop. Support eventually came through fertility network, where Jess met others living with involuntary childlessness.

Today, Jess and Bazil have built a different life together.
“We’ve got dogs now and we’ve made peace with that.”

But grief doesn’t disappear.
“There are still things that trigger me at 61. Turning 60 really hit me. I realised I’m the last one in my line. That does make me really sad. That line will just go when I go.”

17/06/2026

‘You have absolutely no control over anything.’

I met Jenn at graves park because it is where she feels closest to her son, James. During her pregnancy, she walked and ran there imaging the future with him. It was her happy place long before it became tied to grief.

Jenn and her husband became pregnant quite quickly after their wedding, everything felt hopeful until their 20 week scan.

Doctors discovered fluid on James’ lung and suspected problems with his heart, leading to weeks of appointments and journeys back and forth to Leeds. Then, at 24 weeks, Jenn and her husband were told James had Down syndrome - despite earlier testing showing no chromosomal abnormalities.

Weeks later, Jenn began experiencing reduced fetal movement and repeatedly went to hospital because she knew something was wrong. Instead of reassurance, she says she was dismissed and one midwife even said, “are you doing this for attention.”

Finally she got her scan and the sonographer told her she couldn’t see anything going to the cord and went on to tell Jenn that her son had passed away.

She was induced that same evening and spent 5 days in labour at Jessops hospital. Even then, the reality felt impossible to grasp.

“Until it’s actually happening, this isn’t real.”

Throughout labour she initially felt supported. But the moment came for James to be born and there was no midwife. Jenn gave birth alone in the bathroom.

“I don’t know what’s just happened.”

The shock of those first few days altered her completely.

“When you go through a loss like that, you are a completely different person.”

She thought people would expect her to return to normal life.

“I’m not that person anymore. That person is dead.”

Journaling became her lifeline and she did a charity run for a month after she gave birth.

For Jenn, the grief is not only for the baby she lost, but for the entire life that disappeared with him.

“It’s a whole future you planned and you nurtured and it’s just gone.”

After James, Jenn experienced an ectopic pregnancy and another miscarriage before eventually becoming pregnant with her daughter, Zoey.

James Rushworth
8th September 2023 5.26pm

15/06/2026

‘People are blissfully unaware of how much trauma you can experience.’

Aimee always imagined she’d become a mum in her twenties. She thought she’d meet her person, have children, and that when the time came, it would just happen.

“I naively assumed that if I wanted a baby, it would just happen.”

But months passed with no positive test. After fertility investigations, Aimee and her partner Ben were told natural conception was unlikely. They began IVF, stepping into a world they knew very little about.

Their first round worked. The first embryo implanted and Aimee became pregnant. At six weeks they saw a heartbeat. Relief mixed with anxiety, but hope was finally beginning to grow.

Just before Christmas, at 12 weeks pregnant, they booked a private scan.

“I could see on the screen that the baby didn’t look very big.”

The sonographer turned the screen away. He couldn’t find a heartbeat.

“My whole world just imploded. Not only had we lost the baby, but all the hopes that came with it and we had to go back to square one with IVF.”

Aimee remembers collapsing in the hospital corridor in tears. She chose medical management at home and passed the baby herself. But the trauma didn’t end there. She began haemorrhaging heavily and was rushed back to hospital.

She says she was left bleeding for hours with little care or compassion, before eventually being transferred to another hospital where retained tissue was removed and the bleeding finally stopped.

Before leaving, she was given a memory box with a candle, teddy and poem to remember the baby.

A few weeks later, she prepared herself to start IVF again - only for Covid to hit and fertility treatment to stop.

“That was the worst period of my life.”

A second egg collection failed. Then came a third round.

“The first embryo stuck and that’s who’s upstairs now.”

Even after becoming pregnant again, fear overshadowed everything.

“Even when you get pregnant, you can’t enjoy it.”

When people mentioned baby showers, Aimee couldn’t imagine celebrating.

“I’m not celebrating anything until this baby is in my arms and she’s breathing and she’s alive.”

09/06/2026

Voices, lost and found

This project explores the quiet, often unspoken reality of baby loss and navigating the emotional landscape that follows. One in four pregnancies ends in miscarriage, yet the experience remains surrounded by silence, discomfort and misunderstanding. Many women carry feelings of guilt and shame, hesitant to speak openly for fear of judgment or of making others uncomfortable.

Unlike other forms of grief, baby loss is often deeply private - felt most intensely by the individual or couple, while the world around them continues largely unchanged. This isolation can create a sense of loneliness, as though life is moving forward without acknowledgement of what has been lost. In that that silence, many begin to question their own grief, wondering if they should ‘move on’, even when they are not ready.

Through this work, I aim to create space - for remembrance, for honesty, and for conversation. These images and stories give voice to women who are so often unheard, allowing them to share their experiences and remember their babies openly. By breaking the silence, the project challenges the stigma surrounding baby loss and highlights the need for greater understanding, support and compassion.

These losses are real, the grief is valid, and that every story deserves to be seen and heard.

Thank you to all the brave and generous women who shared their stories with me over the past few months. Your honesty, strength and willingness to speak about your experiences have made this project possible. I have nothing but admiration and gratitude for each and every one of you. ✨

I will be sharing the stories over the next few weeks so keep an eye out and maybe one to miss if you are pregnant. ❤️

27/04/2026

Little moments of comfort during the hardest months of my life. ✨

I’ve been quiet on here and away from work for a few months, and I wanted to share why.

In February, we lost our baby at 16 weeks. After weeks of tests and scans, we were given the devastating news that he had two very severe and rare chromosomal abnormalities. This led to an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking decision to end the pregnancy.
There aren’t really words to fully explain the grief that comes with this kind of loss. It’s something I’m still processing day by day.

This was my third loss, and it has hit me the hardest. We saw him on scans, I felt him move, I had a bump. During those long, sleepless nights, I searched for stories like mine, trying to feel less alone and less consumed by guilt. Those shared experiences really helped me process things and because of that, I was inspired to start a new personal project.

I’ve been connecting with women in the Sheffield community who have experienced baby loss, and they’ve bravely shared their stories with me, alongside portraits. It’s been raw, very emotional, and deeply honest.
I’ll be sharing the stories soon so keep an eye out.

I’m now beginning to return to work, so if you have a photography project in mind, I’d love to hear from you. 🙏🏻

Alexandra Wallace Photography

24/08/2026

13/07/2026

08/07/2026

24/06/2026

17/06/2026

15/06/2026

09/06/2026

27/04/2026

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