'You're still a dad': Father turns grief into support for other families

Father turns grief into support for other grieving families Reaching the tip of Cape York was one of the proudest moments of Nick Olney's life. And yet, he couldn't stop crying. The Melbourne man had promised his unborn son, Harry, he would show him the world. But Harry never came home from hospital, dying less than two days after his birth in 2020. Nick eventually made the journey to the northernmost point of mainland Australia, carrying a small imprint of Harry's tiny feet. Before Harry was born, Nick and his wife, Olga, had made the same plans of many first-time parents, including framing their baby son's handprints to give him on his 21st birthday. Instead, the keepsake became something to hold as they faced Harry's death. "It was trauma," Nick said. "When we lost Harry, my wife almost died. For the majority of the 45 hours that Harry was alive, she was in a medically induced coma. "I was making medical decisions and welfare decisions, not just about her, but about the baby as well and somewhere in the midst of all that, trying not to go insane." Nick called a friend, who delivered a baby imprint kit to the hospital. A nurse helped preserve Harry's hand and footprints. When the couple lost their second son, PJ, 18 weeks into pregnancy in 2022, Nick knew he needed help. He spent six months trying, and failing, to find a psychologist. "Nobody wanted to talk to a dad who'd lost kids,"he said. That experience led Nick to begin talking with other grieving fathers, informally at first. But the conversations continued as Nick and Olga founded their charity No Harry to Hold in 2023. He said some of the fathers reaching out had lost babies years earlier but felt unable to tell anyone. Support can be hard to find Dedicated bereavement care exists across Australia, but access and awareness varies. In North Queensland, Townsville University Hospital is home to the region's only level six tertiary-referral centre for newborns outside south-east Queensland. It treats more than 800 premature and unwell babies each year, serving families from Mackay to Cape York and west to Mount Isa. Since 2023, perinatal loss coordinator Kirsty Swain has helped families grappling with the loss of a baby. She knows the value of tangible memories and how often fathers ask for little or nothing for themselves. "Men often concentrate on supporting their partners," she said. "They don't want to make it about them, but it is about them. It's them as a family." A survey of more than 100 Australian maternity services found only one-quarter had a designated bereavement midwife, most based in major cities. Almost 90 per cent had formal follow-up plans for mothers after the death of a baby, while fathers were largely absent from the findings, appearing only within broader references to "parents" in other measures of care. Federal and state governments have increased their focus on perinatal bereavement in recent years, through specialist coordinator roles, updated clinical guidance and specific funding for grief, loss and memory-making support. But dedicated bereavement positions remain limited in regional Australia, with recruitment, funding and broader system pressures slowing their rollout. Something to take home No Harry to Hold now donates imprint kits to neonatal intensive care units, so grieving parents can preserve something of their baby, that they can hold. "I hate the fact that [the kits] will be used. But they will be," he said. Nick's goal of having the kits at every one of the country's 23 NICUs, including in Townsville, led to his detour to the country's most northern point. Keepsakes including hand and footprints are recognised in national clinical guidelines following stillbirth and neonatal death. For Kirsty, they can give grieving parents something physical to take home, a reminder their baby "existed and mattered". "You're still a dad no matter what,"she said. For Nick, the tiny imprint he carried to Cape York helped remind him of that fact. "To do it on your own, and then do it with my boy, or my memory of him, with me … I can't think of anything that I've done that I'm more proud of."