At Okanagan Pregnancy & Infant Loss Supports, our mission is clear: to provide mental health resources for individuals navigating the complexities of early pregnancy loss, infant loss, stillbirth, infertility, or termination for medical reasons within the Okanagan community.
Through our fundraising events, we aim to empower professionals with specialized training, enhancing awareness and fostering healing opportunities within our community, as well as helping fund individual counselling and support groups. Our Connecting Hearts events will serve not only as avenues for fundraising but also as vital gatherings where healing thrives, and enduring connections remind each participant that they are never alone.
Laura White
Community Resources
Laura feels drawn to participate in OPILS for both personal and professional reasons. She has experienced three pregnancy losses and the associated feelings of confusion and grief. She has a deep appreciation for her other uncomplicated pregnancies and two grown children. Through a previous career in the perinatal acute care sector, she saw how common infertility and pregnancy/infant loss are. Time and time again, affected families identified isolation and the felt need for enhancement of local specialized community supports. Laura hopes OPILS and its’ Connected Hearts supportive events will help increase awareness of perinatal loss and provide enriched connections in and among affected families.
Ali Williams
Ali and her husband Ryan welcomed a daughter in 2011 and thought adding to their family would be straight forward – they’d done it once successfully. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. In 2014, they experienced their first miscarriage due to genetic issues, followed by two more miscarriages in the following 3 years.
They weren’t aware of any specialized mental health resources, nor did they have friends who had experienced recurrent miscarriages to talk with. They felt without support or connection in this awful time in their lives.
As part of Okanagan Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support, Ali is excited to be a part of an amazing team working to raise funds to offer those supports she was lacking to those experiencing infertility and loss in the Okanagan region.
Nicole Shannon
Nicole isn’t a stranger to loss due to multiple miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies. Despite being able to conceive she is part of the 1 of 6 that experienced infertility. During Nicole’s journey through conception and loss she found a lack of easily accessible resources for herself and especially her husband at the time, when it came to navigating the mental and emotional stresses. She is committed to the Okanagan Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support’s mandate of creating a network of professional resources and developing a community of other loss parents so that no one walks this path alone.
Mel Riopelle
As a Registered Nurse working in women’s health, Mel has borne witness to the challenges families’ face when experiencing infertility and perinatal loss. She recognizes the need for greater community awareness, and an increase in supports and services across the Okanagan.
Cassy Schilt
Cassy is the mom to two wonderful little boys here in Kelowna. She is a labour and delivery nurse, supporting families through some of the most joyful moments life can bring, but also some of the darkest days. As a friend, mother, and health care worker passionate about women’s health, she feels honoured to be a part of this amazing group. Cassy looks forward to enhancing what OPILS has planned for the Okanagan community, creating much needed supports for women and families.
Katie Keegan
Katie is a mother of three children and is a loving spouse. She was born and raised in the Okanagan. She has the pleasure of working in perinatal and is passionate about supporting families experiencing pregnancy and infant loss/infertility. Her journey in becoming a mother did not start out easy. She unexpectedly became pregnant in her early twenties and experienced a devastating loss in her second trimester.
Katie experienced multiple losses before each of her rainbow babies. Even though she had the loving support of her family, she felt very alone after these losses. That was until other parents started telling her their stories of loss. Over time, she became inspired to ensure her family, friends, and clients have the space to share their stories of loss. Katie feels like no one should feel isolation after a loss and it is her hope that OPILS will help connect people to share an experience, feel held, supported, and mourn together.
Krystal Brown
Chair
After experiencing recurrent pregnancy loss, Krystal was looking for a way to honour, remember, and talk about her babies that never came to be. Searching for a way to feel more connected to others in the loss community it became apparent to her that the Okanagan needed a platform to bolster the mental health resources available to persons experiencing early pregnancy and infant loss – including TFMR, stillbirth and infertility. Thus Krystal founded the Okanagan Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support (OPILS) Community.