Our Mission
To provide specialized bereavement care to families who are devastated by perinatal death, and promote healing to those who care for them.
There is no mandated training for doctors, nurses, sonographers, etc. for perinatal palliative care, leaving most health care workers feeling uncomfortable and unequipped to provide quality bereavement care. Our charity is designed to allow access to perinatal palliative care, one-on-one & family counseling as well as support groups, regardless of their ability to pay.
We incorporate community education through conferences & specialized training programs to those who care for these special babies & their parents, and encourage certification for this type of specialized care for all health care workers that work with this population.
A CPLC (Certified in Perinatal Loss Care) certification is available through HPCC (Hospice and Palliative Credentialing Center).
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Learn more about the counseling, bereavement and child play therapy services we offer at SilverLeaf Counseling.
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The bells went off for him. This was it. This is what he wanted to do.
A Letter from Bill's Wife & Children
Bill Sweeney didn’t really know what he wanted to be when he was growing up in Western New York. School wasn’t his favorite thing. While working at the local grocery store as a night manager, he met his future wife, Mary. It was then that he knew he “wanted to do something with his life," his words. So he enlisted in the Air Force. It was during this time that he was assigned to be an OR Tech. The bells went off for him. This was it. This is what he wanted to do.
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He went on to undergrad at University of Wyoming. He completed medical school and residency at Creighton University, where he won two Golden Apples for his teaching. It was from there that he pursued a fellowship in Maternal-Fetal Medicine at the University of Carolina Chapel Hill. In 2001, Bill moved to Annapolis to start the Center for Maternal-Fetal Medicine. He was a member of AOA and ACOG, worked with Isabella’s Gift & at the Pregnancy Aide center, and he gave of his time to several other organizations in the area.
While all of that is lovely and indicative of his hard work, it was only the surface of what was really driving him. What really drove him was to be able to provide the highest standard of care to anyone who needed it. It didn’t matter who you were, what you were going through, what you had or didn’t have. If he could help, medically or personally, he was there with no questions asked. He had no office hours. He kept his phone on all of the time. He really just wanted everyone to be as healthy and assured as possible.
It was in the toughest cases, the ones where there are often no answers or explanations as to why, that he felt the resources available to the bereft were just too few. It was through this that he came to work and trust Heather Silver who owns and runs SilverLeaf Counseling.
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Bill and Mary knew personally how the unexpected loss of a child changes your whole world. Bill was the father of 4 children and doting Boppa to one very lucky little girl. He is dearly missed and we're proud of the legacy he left behind in The Bill Sweeney Perinatal Fund.
