Fifteen years ago, I became a mother.
And three months and three days later, I became an angel mom.
My son Dallas Lamar was born on July 17, 2011. He was beautiful, loved and full of light. To many people, stories like mine begin with tragedy, but for me, the beginning was love. Dallas gave me the most meaningful three months of my life. He made me a mother; he changed how I understood purpose and unconditional love.
On Oct. 20, 2011, Dallas passed away unexpectedly from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). My life changed forever after that.
After losing Dallas, I was surrounded by love from my family and friends, and I will always be grateful for that support. But I also began to recognize how little space existed within many Black, brown, and Caribbean communities to openly talk about grief, mental health, and child loss. As a Guyanese-American woman who spent the first 15 years of my life in Guyana before moving to the U.S., I understand how grief and emotional pain are often handled quietly within our cultures. Many of us are taught to remain strong, continue functioning, and carry pain in private. Vulnerability is often viewed as weakness, and conversations around child loss are avoided because they are considered too painful or uncomfortable.
But grief does not disappear because we refuse to talk about it.
In the years after losing Dallas, I searched for support. While resources existed, many of the spaces I entered did not feel safe or culturally aligned for me. I often felt unseen in my grief. I found myself in rooms where I had to explain my culture, my experiences, and even the way grief showed up in my life before I could begin the healing process. I remember people checking in during the first few weeks, and then life moved on while mine stood still.
That experience stayed with me for years. Eventually, it became the foundation and building blocks for the Dallas Lamar Project, Inc.
The Dallas Lamar Project, Inc. is a community-centered nonprofit organization rooted in compassion, connected to the community, and guided toward healing. Our mission is to support families navigating pregnancy and infant loss through accessible, culturally responsive support and community-centered resources intentionally designed for Black, brown, and Caribbean communities. This organization is about making sure that families do not have to suffer in silence.
As we prepare for our launch this summer, we are intentionally building a centralized space where families can begin their healing journey through grief support therapy and community support services. Our vision is to create a care pipeline. Families will be able to access grief support groups within our space while also being connected to trusted community partners and providers with whom we have intentionally built relationships. That includes therapists, psychologists, doulas, maternal health professionals, and organizations that understand the emotional, mental, and physical impact that child loss can have on an individual’s overall well-being, and the importance of culturally informed and trauma-aware care throughout the healing journey.
For many families, grief is not experienced in isolation. It impacts mental health, relationships, work, parenting, identity, and well-being. Families are grieving while still trying to figure out therapy, bills, work, insurance, and how to survive emotionally. I know that reality because I lived it.
This organization is deeply personal for me because I understand when grief has nowhere to go. I understand what it feels like to carry unanswered questions and pain while the world continues moving around you. I also understand how healing becomes possible when people finally feel safe enough to be seen, heard, and supported without judgment. We need more space like that.
We need to normalize conversations around grief and mental health within our communities. We need to normalize therapy, support groups, and community care. And we need to stop expecting grieving families to carry unimaginable pain in silence simply because discomfort makes others look away.
Brooklyn has always been built on community. We show up for one another in times of joy, hardship and transition. My hope is that the Dallas Lamar Project, Inc., becomes an extension of that spirit for families carrying the invisible pain.
Shiyonne Chester is a Brooklyn resident and the founder of Dallas Lamar Project, Inc.
