After Babys Sudden Death, Message Board Moms and Photowow.com Band Together to Raise Funds for Surgery for Mothers Chance for Another Baby

Message boards mom's attempt to ban together and win photowow.com photo art for member of group whose baby passed away from SIDS ends up receiving $6,300 tubal reversal surgery. Mother now has hopes of having another baby.

Wichita Falls, TX March 3, 2004 -- "On Friday, January 23, 2004, my world shattered. For schoolteacher, Amie Quintero, January 23, 2004, started out as a normal Friday morning preparing herself for work and feeding, dressing and taking her baby girl and young daughter to the babysitters house. Approximately a half hour after the children were dropped, I got the call that I have secretly been fearing since my first child was born in November 2000 Amie, something is wrong with Jillian. She's stopped breathing!!! I rushed over there getting stopped by a policeman on the way. When I arrived, they were working on her in the ambulance. When they wouldn't let me see her and wouldn't really tell me what was going on, I knew it was really bad. They never revived her. Her little heart never started beating again. Amies three-month old baby died for no apparent reason from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).

Since her first child was born in November 2000, Amie had been a daily participant on baby message boards on Babycenter.com. When this tragedy occurred, Amie posted messages to her internet friends, Even though these people are people I have never seen, and probably never will, they are still my friends, and I wanted to let them know what had happened to me. I don't know why, but that was one of the first things I felt I needed to do.

Unbelievable as it may seem, others had posted false reports of baby deaths on these message boards casting a doubt on Amies posting. Later, after they saw the obituary listed in our local newspaper, they finally realized their mistake. On the original post I started, there ended up being almost 400 replies. I received so many cards in the mail from people I didn't even know. All of them were my internet friends as I have come to call them. Even though I don't know them in real life, they are still close friends to me, maybe even closer than some friends I DO have in real life. Tami, a message board friend said, The devastation our board felt cannot be expressed in words. We cried, got angry, and questioned why this had to happen to Jillian. Losing Jillian made each of us realize that it could very have been our precious baby that was lost to SIDS. Jillian made us all hold our babies a little closer, love them a little deeper, and appreciate them a little more.

To show Amie their love and support, fellow message board moms decided to win a photowow.com piece of photo art by submitting a photo of Jillian in the photowow.com cutest baby photo contest. The cutest baby photo winner is determined by the highest average amount of votes received by any photo in the contest. If all the moms banded together to place votes, they were sure to win the photo art. On Wednesday, February 25, the contest started. Within two hours, the photo of Jillian had received so many 10 votes, it was winning by a landslide. In fact, there was such a large discrepancy between the amount of 10 votes and all other votes, photowow.com systems set up to detect possible vote tampering automatically withdrew the photo from the contest.

Tami said, Imagine the anger, hurt, and outrage all of us when we found out that Jillian was no longer in the contest. Also imagine the sheer volume of e-mails these same angry mothers can send out. Robert Schiff, President of photowow.com, was bombarded with e-mails from us wanting answers as to why her photo was removed. Mr. Schiff asked, Have you ever woken up to 100 plus, to say it nicely, emotionally charged woman?

From these e-mails, Mr. Schiff was informed that the baby in the photo that was withdrawn had passed away from SIDS and the message board moms where trying to win a memory for their friend. To maintain the integrity of the contest so that votes would be placed based on which photo was actually the cutest photo without regard to the circumstances of the baby in the photo, photowow.com decided not to re-enter the photo. Instead, a donation page was created in which photowow.com would match any private donations dollar for dollar for a photowow.com art piece for Amie created from a photo of Jillian. In addition, 20% of all sales at photowow.com in which the promo code SIDS was entered at checkout would be donated to the SIDS Alliance for SIDS education and research.

After this offer was made, photowow.com quickly learned all the details of Jillians birth and passing. After Jillian was born, Amie had tubular ligation surgery. I had my tubes tied at the time of Jillian's birth via c-section October 22, 2003. At the time, it was the right decision to make - she was apparently healthy, I was 31, we only wanted two children. When she died, I thought I wouldn't be able to have another. I really had no idea how much something like this would cost. All I could think about was how my perfect life had been ruined. I had always wanted two children, and for some reason, I was really excited about having two girls. Kallie loved her sister so much, she didn't ever want to be away from her. I was looking forward to dressing them alike. I was looking forward to them growing up together. I was looking forward to Jillian getting to play with her two boy cousins, one on each side, one three months older, one two months younger. I was looking forward to seeing my two girls grow up together, and love each other. Instead, I am left with memories and a few pictures of them together, and the knowledge that Kallie was right there with her little sister when she died. She was actually sitting next to her.

Upon being informed of photowow.coms offer to match donations towards a photowow.com art piece, Tami wrote, Amie decided that she no longer wanted the print, as everything seemed to snowball into a horribly hurtful situation. She requested all donations be stopped. Again, e-mails were exchanged and Mr. Schiff stepped up to the plate. photowow.com would match anything we donated, up to $6,300, to pay for a tubal ligation reversal for Amie. They would also kick in the plane ticket to get Amie to a reputable doctor if need be. Their offer was far beyond anything our birth board or Amie could have imagined.

News of the photowow.com offer to match funds for Amies tubular reversal surgery hit the message boards like wild fire. Amie wrote, I was stunned. I never, in a million years, expected anything like that. You know, there really are still some good people in this world. It is incredible the outpouring we have received, not just monetarily, but emotionally as well. Jamie, a close message board friend of Amie, wrote, You think we solicited votes (for the contest) before? You wait to see what kind of donations we solicit! We're aiming for $6,400 for the operation AND the print which she does want now.

With 169 private donations, it took less than three days to reach the $6,300 goal! Amie will now be able to receive tubular ligation reversal surgery and has renewed hopes of having another beautiful baby. Message board mom, Amanda, wrote, This story shows how powerful the bond of motherhood can be, even forged through internet bulletin boards and chat rooms. We have built an amazing foundation of friendships and have given a lot of support to a grieving mother. We also want to bring attention again to the very important issue of SIDS. This is about motherhood and about unconditional giving, friendship, and love.

Next goal? For every $.75 donated at www.photowow.com/donate, photowow.com will donate $.25 up to a goal of $100,000 for SIDS Alliance (www.sidsalliance.org). Mr. Schiff feels confident that these funds will be raised quickly. Ive never experienced a force as strong as this band of message board moms. Together, they can accomplish anything they want. And personally, I dont believe there is a better cause to support than one that saves babys lives.

Amie wrote, If there is one good thing to come out of something horrible like this, it is more research on SIDS. I want someone to find out what causes it. You see, we were doing everything we were supposed to. She slept on her back, she was breastfed, we didn't smoke. In fact, she was sleeping in her car seat at the time because she had some nasal congestion and could rest and breathe better propped up. She STILL died of SIDS. Why? I don't know. I have hope that the money we can raise through photowow and any other avenues can help answer that question.

For more information, visit www.photowow.com/donate and www.photowow.com/post and e-mail:

Amie Quintero, Jillians Mother        e-mail protected from spam bots
Jamie Dawson    , Message Board Friend    e-mail protected from spam bots
Tami Florio, Message Board Friend         e-mail protected from spam bots
Robert Schiff, President photowow.com    e-mail protected from spam bots

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