Brayden Lee DeRobillard

We waited three years before we decided to finally have another baby. Living abroad with no family support we thought that this was a wise decision to have a nice gap in-between our children. When Brayden Lee was born on the 21 May 2012 we were so excited to finally have a sibling for his older brother Connor. We had two beautiful boys and life couldn’t have been better. Brayden was exactly the same weight as his brother when he was born 2.9kgs, tiny and identical looking to his older brother at birth, but as the months went on he starting looking like his own adorable self,He had beautiful big eyes full of life. From the moment we brought him home we noticed how different he was to his brother, he loved his own company and enjoyed peace and quiet. I remember how happy he was to be placed in his cot and how he would spend hours just entertaining himself.

The moment he was able to hold his own head up we got him a jumperoo which we would sit him in and and he would jump around so high, he loved his jumperoo and it brought smiles to all of us. I cherish the videos we have of him bouncing around, those little legs moving up and down. He was such a happy baby. He loved his brother so much, Connor took his brotherly roll very seriously and looked after him so well.

Brayden loved his sleep. We had never had a baby that enjoyed sleeping so well and through the night. Our eldest hardly slept and for 3 years we would get on and off 5 hours broken sleep. Brayden was our dream baby, he didn’t fight with us to go to sleep as long as we put on Adele he would be so happy. He loved Adele’s voice and all her award winning songs and as soon as I put the iPod on he would be calm and he knew it was bedtime. He was super feisty and knew what he wanted, he would stand up for himself around his brother and other children. I loved our special time together when his older brother was at play school, just mommy and Brayden time. He loved playing peekaboo and would always cover his eyes when i was changing his nappy, I still remember how much fun we had playing peekaboo. The laughter that came out of such a little person lit up our home even more. Things were just perfect and our little family was complete.

When Brayden was around 11 months old we decided to move house, we wanted a bigger place with a garden and for Brayden to have his own room. We moved into a bigger home around the end of March. We had a lovely fireplace to light fires in winter and as it was Brayden’s birthday coming up on the 21st May we bought him his own slide set to put in the garden. We had a trampoline outside which he adored. He loved being on the trampoline with his brother. Connor would bounce him around and he would laugh so much. It was so adorable to watch. We celebrated Brayden’s 1st birthday in our new home, a little party in the garden with some close friends. He had so much fun, he loved his cake and presents and you could see on his face how special he felt when everyone sang happy birthday to him. Little did we know that our precious little boy would soon no longer be with us and that those photos of him and us together would be the last family pictures we would ever have.

On the 7th of June 2013, Brayden woke as normal and had cuddles with us in bed, he seemed fine. He was due to have his 1 year injections that morning, we took him to the doctors but they wouldn’t give it to him as he had a temperature. We came home and had lunch together and he just seemed very out of sorts, he didn’t want to eat much and was so sleepy. We cuddled a little and then his older brother wanted to go outside and ride scooters. Brayden always loved being outside watching all the other children play so Connor got his wooden walker that he received for his birthday and off we went to play outside. He had so much fun walking around with his walker playing with his brother. He seemed so much better and full of energy. I am so glad that we got to spend that time together especially for Connor to have some fun with his Baby brother. We came inside at around 5:30pm and he seemed very tired. I gave him a bottle and changed him into his pj’s. He seemed very cold and i noticed that his finger nails were very blue but i just put this down to him being cold. I brought him back downstairs and we cuddled together on the couch. He fell asleep on me and when my husband got home around 6pm I gave him to his daddy to have some cuddles. Close to 7pm we decided to put him in his cot so he could be more comfortable. He happily went to sleep after i tucked him in his cot like he normally did.

We went to bed at 10pm and checked on him just before then and found him face down in his cot not breathing. We dialed 999 and the ambulance services came and started CPR, I went with him in the ambulance praying the whole time that he would breath, i remember holding his little hand the whole journey and just hoping for a miracle but at the same time I just knew that he had not been breathing for awhile now. The medical services worked on him for an 1 hour and eventually came to tell us that our baby boy had not been breathing for so long and there was nothing more they could do. Its so hard to explain that moment your whole world just falls underneath you, you can literally feel the blood draining from your body. Its such a foggy and out of body moment that I don’t think anyone can understand it unless they have been there. The hardest part was having to tell his older Brother the next morning that his baby brother isn’t coming back. Connor just cried when we told him, Connor was 4 at the time but understood exactly what we were telling him. It broke our hearts to see how much pain this caused Connor as he had waited to so long for a sibling.

We miss our baby so much words can never express how much. To lose our little boy to unexplained death is the worst thing ever, no answers as to what happened to him besides he stopped breathing/ thankfully didn’t suffocate just stopped breathing and died in his sleep. Its been a long 9 months since we lost our baby and the pain doesn’t get any easier. Life has to carry on though for the remaining siblings. I am just so grateful to have found the SUDC support group, without the other mums and dads all over the world to rely on for some normality i don’t think we would be able to get up every morning and face a new day.