A heartbroken family have paid tribute to their baby daughter after she tragically passed away in her sleep.
Kerris Mitchell, from Bathgate in West Lothian, died in her bed following what her parents described as a “completely normal night”. Mum Steph and dad Donny decided to check in on their two-year-old daughter shortly after midnight – but their world fell apart when they realised she was no longer breathing.
Pathologists believe Kerris died from Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood following an inconclusive post-mortem. The youngster died on the morning of January 4 this year and 11 months on the couple have opened up on the event they have organised in her memory and to help them get through the festive period without their daughter.
As reported by Edinburgh Live, they are determined to make sure her memory lives on and have started doing Santa visits in Wester Inch and local cemeteries. Steph said: “We had Kerris in 2021 and she was born with additional needs. She hated visiting Santa grottos and things so my husband eventually invested in a Santa suit so he could do his own grotto’s for her at home.
“This then led to a different decision and in 2022 we decided we would do a Santa event in Wester Inch. We would buy sweets and go round the street with Christmas music and things. But when Kerris passed away at the start of the year, we decided we weren’t going to do Santa and it was a thing of the past. We just didn’t think we would have the strength to do it without her.
“As the year went on we decided our minds needed something to focus on so we decided to bring it back this year and in the future we are going to continue to do it in Kerris’ name and raise funds for different charities.”
Steph and Donny soon realised they didn’t want any child to miss out once they brought their Santa visit to Kerris’ cemetery. Steph added: “I didn’t want Kerris missing out on anything so we would bring the Santa suit to her cemetery. When we were down there, we realised there was lots of kids where Kerris is and it’s not fair for any kid to miss out on Santa, so we bulk bought candy canes and decided every child under 16 at the cemeteries would get a visit from Santa this year.
“The response we got was overwhelming because the only reason we did this was because we didn’t want our daughters memory to die off. We want to keep her memory alive for as long as we live, we don’t want it to fade like she never even existed.”
The couple are hoping to carry on the Santa event in the future to raise money for charities including Ronald Macdonald House and the Edinburgh Children Hospital Charity. As it’s the family’s first Christmas without Kerris, Steph said it was a struggle for them and they weren’t sure they would manage the event.
She added: “Having our first festive period without Kerris was really hard. It has been difficult and when it came to December we had so many moments where we wanted to cancel it and we felt like we couldn’t do it. We had tears every time we did it because of the generosity we got and doing all of this without her has been very challenging.
“We knew it would be hard and it was very emotional for all of us including her siblings We have managed to bring comfort to other families at Christmas time and that’s an amazing thing.”
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