TEMPLE, Texas —
A Central Texas mother who suffered the loss of her child is working to help other parents who may find themselves in similar situations.
Anna Doherty and her husband, Kevin, lost their second child, Daisy, this past summer. Now Anna Doherty is working to honor her daughter's legacy.
"So, everything that I want to do, I want to make her proud as her mom," Anna Doherty said.
Doherty carried Daisy for eight months until one day, the unexpected happened.
"It was due to a cord accident. So it was a completely just unpreventable cruel tragedy," Doherty said.
Daisy died at 30 weeks. Then Doherty delivered her.
"When she was born, just beautiful. Perfect, adorable," Doherty said.
When Daisy was delivered, the cooling unit at Baylor Scott and White Hospital in Temple wasn't working. The cooling unit is a machine that slows down the body's decomposition.
"A lot of people don't know what that is. And there's really, you know, why would you? It's kind of an impossible situation that no parent prepares for," Doherty said.
Doherty said that as soon as she got to meet her daughter, the clock on their time together was already ticking.
"You know that, eventually, you're going to have to make the impossible decision of when it's time to hand your baby back and leave the hospital without them, which is just such an impossible situation," Doherty said.
Doherty and her husband got to capture a few moments with their daughter, but they wanted more.
"I feel so thankful that I got to meet her. I feel so thankful that, you know, she made it that far so that I got to meet her. It was just a beautiful time with me and my husband," Doherty said.
A working cooling unit would have given the Doherty family more time with their daughter. The Caring Cradle, a brand that created a special attachment for hospitals, would have allowed the Doherty family to hold Daisy for a little longer.
"I only had those few hours and all I wanted was just to hold her and rock her and sing lullabies and, you know, take pictures with her and all the things just make as many memories with her on Earth as I could," Doherty said.
After a few months passed, Doherty posted a fundraiser to buy the hospital a Caring Cradle to prevent what happened to her from happening to anyone else.
"The second that you leave the hospital without your baby, at least for me, I feel like it's, you know, hard enough to put one foot in front of the other," Doherty said. "But I just felt like I needed to do something. I wanted to find something that I could do that was going to be impactful, that was going to have her name attached to it."
Doherty's fundraiser passed its goal in less than an hour and eventually raised enough money to purchase two of the machines.
"I was just watching. And every single donation that came in, I just hope people know, like every single one I've seen, I'm so grateful and so blown away," Doherty said.
Both Caring Cradles have been delivered with this special message engraved on them:
"This cradle has been donated in loving memory and in honor of Daisy Greer Doherty."
Doherty explained that if they continue to raise money, they want to make sure more Central Texas hospitals have these machines. For Doherty, it's about paying it forward and keeping her daughter's name alive.
KVUE checked in with local hospitals to see if they have Caring Cradles.
A spokesperson for the Baylor Scott and White hospitals in the Austin region said the hospitals don't have any Caring Cradles, but the system provided the following statement:
"Our teams are working to get a few of these cradles locally and we hope to have them soon."
St. David's HealthCare facilities have what are known as "cooling units" that enable families experiencing the loss of a baby to spend more time with their child. As for the Ascension healthcare system, it has cradles at Dell Children's Medical Center, Ascension Seton in Austin and in Hays County. One was also donated by a patient and their family to the Waco location in 2021.
"I would love, you know, down the road if many, many hospitals in Texas had this. I think it shouldn't be something that hospitals have to struggle to have. So being able to fundraise for this and also just have more things that are attached to Daisey's name is just so incredible to me," Doherty said.
There are two different sizes for the machine, the original and the "mini" for early-term stillborn babies. The original costs around $6,500 and the "mini" is a little over $3,500.
The Doherty family raised enough money for one of each. Now, they are still collecting donations for more. Those who are interested in donating can visit the GoFundMe page.
If you have any questions or want more information regarding the Doherty family's cause, you can reach Anna Doherty at ForDaisyGirl@gmail.com.