My Why – Jordyn Shawger, NILMDTS Affiliated Photographer

My name is Jordyn, and I am the aunty of an angel.

My path to volunteering with Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep began with my best friend, Amber, and her daughter, Halle.

Amber and I have shared a long friendship. What started as lab partners in eighth grade, grew into nearly twenty years of laughter, inside jokes, and a mutual protectiveness that only deepened with time. We have always shown up for one another in big and small ways, but nothing could have prepared me to walk alongside her and her husband, Joel, through the loss of their daughter.

I was a part of the gender reveal – Amber and Joel entrusted me to make them a little letter to announce “IT’S A GIRL” and photograph their reaction. In addition to that, I did her maternity photos at the beach! But in an instant, their world changed, Halle was stillborn just weeks before her due date. We had celebrated Halle and Amber at her baby shower on Saturday and were putting away mountains of clothes and toys on Sunday. A few days later, I received a call from Amber’s sister, Maddie, with the news of Halle’s passing. Amber asked for a few days simply to exist in the shock and begin figuring out how to move forward in this new life without her daughter. While our instinct was to rush to the hospital, we respected her wish to have that time with her family.