TULSA -- A mother who gave birth to stillborn twins is providing comfort to other mothers in her position.
Eurice Rutherford started Stil Loved Bears after she gave birth to twins who died at the hospital.
"I was actually on my phone looking at maternity dresses for a photo shoot when I went into labor and I didn't even know I was going into labor," Rutherford said.
The expectant mother never got to take those maternity photos. Instead, she took memorial pictures.
Rutherford went into premature labor with her twin girls, Kaylee and Kaydence, in October when she was just five months along.
"That's Kaylee, the smaller one and that's Kaydence," Rutherford said pointing to a photo resting on two teddy bears of her holding her twins. "She's a little bigger."
Kaylee was stillborn weighing only eight ounces. Kaydence weighed 12 ounces. She lived for an hour.
Rutherford was told because it was twins and because of her age that her pregnancy was high risk. She never expected to leave the hospital empty-handed.
"When I left the hospital, it was the worst feeling ever, because I had always imagined leaving with the babies," Rutherford said.
It was devastating for this mother who was over the moon about having children of her own.
Rutherford has a box in her home with an outfit she bought for the baby, shoes, photo albums of their short lives and her pregnancy tests.
She does not have her girls, but she does have two teddy bears she was given by the girls' grandmother to hold for comfort. She said they mean the world to her. Rutherford said she will sometimes bring the bears in her bed with her at night.
"It was actually one night while I was crying with the bears and I just kept thinking of all the mothers that had angels and were not able to hold anything," Rutherford said.
The young mother is now collecting teddy bears to give to mothers who are in her same position at the hospital. She calls it Stil Loved Bears.
She has a box in her home filled with bears that have been donated to her cause.
Rutherford has given out one so far to a coworkers sister. She was told that the mother going through tragedy really cherished the bear.
"From the second that I lost them, I wanted them to be remembered," Rutherford said. "I thought it would be a great thing for moms to have them the very second their babies go on."
Rutherford is at Hunter Park in the pavilion on the first Saturday of every month if people want to drop off bears. She can be reached at StilLovedBears@gmail.com and she has a GoFundMe page. She will use those funds to purchase more bears.
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