An irate mother has expressed outrage after a ‘blasphemer’ pasted a crucifix on her dead baby’s memorial.
Edwina Symonds last week discovered the unwanted addition to the plaque for her son Sebastian, who tragically died in July 2018 at just 10 months old, and pleaded with the vandal that her deceased child does not need to be ‘saved’.
Saying hello to their ‘little buddy’ at Narrabeen Lagoon on Sydney’s Northern Beaches has become a family ritual for Mrs Symonds, her husband Anthony and their two children.
But the family was disgusted that someone would “scratch” their “special place.”
“To the blasphemer who destroyed our son’s plaque by gluing a cross on it!!!” Ms Symonds said in a lengthy post on a local Facebook group.
“I imagine somewhere in whatever religion you choose, there’s some sort of rule that says ‘don’t be a lowlife by destroying other people’s property…
“If not, there should be.”
Saying hello to their ‘little buddy’ at Narrabeen Lagoon on Sydney’s Northern Beaches has become a family ritual for Mrs Symonds, her husband Anthony and their two children (pictured together)
Edwina Symonds discovered the unwanted addition to the plaque for her son Sebastian, who tragically died in July 2018 aged just 10 months, and pleaded with the vandal that her deceased child does not need to be ‘saved’.
Ms Symonds went on to say that religion is a ‘beautiful ideal’ and that the person was ‘entitled to their beliefs’, but made it clear that she did not share them.
“I’m sure you had some nice thoughts sitting with Seb, like ‘God took this baby to a ‘better’ place,’ or if he ‘had a plan’ for this child; or even the classic “everything happens for a reason,” she wrote.
“Cool story, but please go away.
“Seb doesn’t need you to ‘save’ him. He already died. He can’t be saved.
“His short life was glorious and it doesn’t need your attention.”
The family lost Seb after her husband Anthony discovered the baby boy had a serious seizure while in his crib from which he never woke up, despite being rushed to hospital.
Baby Seb (pictured with mum Edwina Symonds) was just 10 months old when he suffered a fatal seizure in 2018 due to a presumed fatal ‘genetic error’
Subsequently, the couple was told that their first-born son’s death was due to a “genetic error.”
Ms. Symonds has written in articles and for a blog about how she and her family, which now include children Elodie and Dash, have come to terms with the loss of Seb. The Griely Road.
In a 2021 article for parenting website Kidspot, she described her son’s grieving process.
“Every night I light up his room and read him a bedtime story,” she wrote.
“These rituals may fade with time, but not in my heart. I will forever be his mother, reading him his favorite bedtime stories and kissing his soft, angelic face with my thoughts. My love for him will last.
‘I am a mother without. My baby is resting somewhere upstairs. I can’t hold him, but I see him in the stars and I feel him in the wind and waves lapping our beaches.’
On Saturday, Mrs. Symonds removed the cross with a paint scraper.
The Symonds family removed the offending cross from their son’s memorial plaque on Saturday
‘Order has been restored! THANK YOU wonderful community for all your messages of support, encouragement and offers to help clean up Seb’s plaque,” she wrote in a Facebook update.
“We are blown away by the reach this little story has made. We have no idea what Reddit is, but a lot more people met Seb there!”
Ms Symonds advised people to tell the council if there is anything ‘out of place’ with a known plaque.
“These places are so special to so many, and Anthony and I are honored that you all want to protect Sebby’s place as well,” she wrote.
She said those who wanted to honor Seb’s memory could do so by registering as an organ donor.
“The day Seb died, he saved someone else’s life, and that is the most precious act of community that we are so proud of,” she wrote.
‘Thanks again. It means so much to us to live in a special place like this. Nice weekend.’