Jacob Mulligan

My name is Jordan Mulligan. Eight years ago, I went through one of the toughest experiences of my life—I lost my son Jacob to stillbirth. It's a pain no parent should ever have to endure, but sadly, it's more common than you might think, affecting about 4 in every 1000 births here in the UK.

During that time I had struggled to financially provide a headstone for my son. The process of providing a funeral in such a vulnerable position also left me feeling that there may be families out there being exploited in this moment of tragedy. I knew I wanted to help people in this moment of difficulty.

The event:

6 months ago whilst in the Scottish Highlands I found a stone that was the perfect shape to cut a headstone from. It is a natural stone granodiorite weighing 100kg / 220 lbs.

The idea came to me to carry the stone back to Nottingham around 450 miles to raise money and awareness around still birth and the cost associated with providing a headstone.

Stage 1 (The World’s Heaviest Marathon)

The stone will be carried 26.2 miles strapped onto my back. The full weight will be carried and no trailers or assistance will be used. This will be the heaviest weight carried for a marathon distance on a persons back. The stone will be cut to its final size which is expected to weigh 60-70 lbs.

Stage 2 (*The World’s heaviest ultra marathon x 10)

There are incredible people out there who have carried weight for the ultra marathon distance already, so this is to be confirmed. But the record for singular ultra marathon may not be official. But over 10 days we will cover an average of 42 miles per day. Making it the longest distance by far/ to carry substantial weight on the back.

The charity:

The Jacob Mulligan Charity aims to provide headstones for bereaved parents who lost their babies to still birth. Currently the UK government provides funding to help cover the costs of a funeral for your baby. The headstone is not currently covered under this fund.

Baby and child headstones are currently have the highest profit margins for funeral providers on average which results in many families unable to provide headstone for their child.

“No parent should bury their child” - We have all heard this quote, certainly no parent should be exploited after the death of their baby.

We hope to take that power away from the funeral providers with three approaches.

Approach 1 - Work with ethical headstone providers and create a fund that we can draw on to purchase headstones for bereaved families. We already have commitment from a company to provide the headstone at cost price.

Approach 2 - Manufacture headstones with volunteers within Nottingham. Mulligan Brothers has committed commercial space free of charge to run the manufacturing of the headstones. A portion of the funds raised will purchase equipment and materials to manufacture a simple yet classic headstone.

A baby headstone is smaller in size due to most cemetery’s guidelines. This means production of these headstone is relatively cheap and costs for raw materials are also low. Working with volunteers and the Mulligan Brothers family and team we are able to produce for free to families.

We also want to open opportunities to parents effected by stillbirth a place to create headstones for other families and use the creative process as an outlet.

Approach 3 - Get the government to commit to including headstones within the fund. If a basic headstone is included in the budget it takes away the power funeral providers have in upselling bereaved parents. Throughout the campaign we will start taking signatures to have this seen in parliament.