This last weekend my family experienced something that you never wish anyone has to go through. My two month old nephew was born premature and had many medical issues. My brother and sister-in-law had to make the painful decision to take their beautiful son off of life support.
I got to meet a photographer who is part of a group called Soulumination. They are volunteer photographers that come in and photograph families during this trying time. It is amazing that these photographers take the time to go in a provide beautiful photographs for the families. It is for families that have children 18 or younger. Here is their website: http://www.soulumination.org/ . I hope they don’t mind me sharing. However, this made me think about my own photography career. The woman I met was very sweet and you could tell that this way of giving service.
I had the privilege of later taking photographs of my family as they carefully cared for the infant postmortem. It was very therapeutic for me. At first I was nervous but I was able to switch between photographer mode and family mode. It was beautiful seeing the interaction between mother and son through my viewfinder. I will also have a privilege of taking photographs at his funeral.
I hope soon I can get to a point that I too may volunteer my time for an amazing organization because this is a difficult time for families and having beautiful photographs helps them with their loss.
We all love and will all miss my nephew. He touched many lives and impacted many people in his short life. Till we meet again.