From grief to giving: How one CHRISTUS mother honors the legacy of her lost child

Determined to honor a life that never had a chance to be lived, an East Texas mother is turning her grief into a gift for children across the region.

In March 2018, Jessica Noteware’s daughter, Caroline, was stillborn at 35 weeks. Left with an overwhelming sense of grief, Noteware’s body was also left with an abundance of milk for a baby that would never nurse.

It was at that moment that Noteware decided to donate her breastmilk to a local milk bank, knowing the value to newborns and infants.

“If my body had not progressed through pregnancy and experienced a full-term delivery, I would not have been able to produce and donate breast milk,” Noteware said. “Her life helped other babies fight for theirs.”

Noteware, a clinical pharmacist with CHRISTUS Trinity Mother Frances, and her husband, Brett, a pharmacy informaticist with CHRISTUS Health, would eventually start the nonprofit, Compliments of Caroline, with a mission of raising awareness and meeting the needs of children across East Texas.

This year, the organization provided a grant to the lactation department at CHRISTUS Mother Frances Hospital for the Donor Milk to Go Program. The partnership between the hospital and Mothers’ Milk Bank of North Texas provides breastmilk for purchase to use as a bridge when medical supplementation is indicated in the first few days of life.

The grant allowed families to receive donor milk bottles at no cost.

“Those first few days can be very stressful on everyone and sometimes the breast milk supply isn’t there yet,” Noteware said. “We want to serve as the bridge for those first days, and this is our gift to that family.”

Since October 2024, when the grant was first distributed, more than 400 families have been provided donor milk through Compliments of Caroline.

Caroline Pillsbury, a registered nurse and lactation consultant at CHRISTUS Mother Frances Hospital, said that no matter the source, breastmilk is vital to early-stage development for infants.

“We know and the data supports that infants who breastfeed are drastically impacted positively in building their immune system,” she said.

For Jessica Noteware, every mother and child helped is a reminder of the impact Caroline has made.

“To me, it is so important for babies to have access to the best things in their first days, so knowing how many we have helped, it is a blessing,” she said. “Every family we help gets a little piece of Caroline and that helps keep her memory alive.”