Miranda Malone lost her mom when she was a baby. Now she's using her grief to inspire women across Milwaukee

 

SHOREWOOD, Wis. (CBS 58) -- "This is one of my favorite pictures, it's a photo strip of my parents when they were dating," says Miranda Malone, of Shorewood.

She's holding a series of black and white photographs taken back in the 90s.

"I think this was pre-me, so they were very young," Malone says. "My dad was probably 22 and my mom was 18."

On the table next to the pictures is a beautiful vase with a gold necklace hanging around the neck. The pendant's face has an etched-out sketch of Malone's mother, Rosalie.

These are some of the only items she has to remember her mom, who tragically passed away after a vehicle accident.

At the time, Malone was only five months old.

“I am the girl who doesn’t have a mom and that’s all that I have been my whole life," Malone told CBS 58's Ellie Nakamoto-White. “It’s been my story across my life and something I’ve lived with for three-plus decades now.”

So, she decided to take her grief and use it to uplift others in similar situations.

Now she works as a licensed therapist and owns New Moon Therapy, LLC, which specializes in trauma and loss.

“In my work as a psychotherapist in the community... I really saw a need for that in this area," Malone said. “It’s something that has felt very soul-connected for me for a very long time, and it’s therapeutic for myself too.”

In December 2023, she founded the Milwaukee Motherless Collective -- a social group aimed at connecting women of all ages who've lost their mom from death.

“It really makes me confidently feel like my mom’s death and losing her really truly happened for a purpose, and it was so that I could do the work that I do," Malone said. “I think she’s beaming from wherever she’s at.”

And with Mother's Day coming up on May 12, Malone said she hopes "every woman who has lost a mom in the Milwaukee area" knows the space exists.

“It’s this one day that’s highlighted, of the thing that you don’t have, and that can be difficult," Malone said. “Being able to be in this space and be around other women who are also that, makes me feel much less isolated in that grief.”

The collective's first public event is a brunch on Saturday, May 11, that has already sold out, highlighting the need for the work Malone does.

But it's the day after, that for the first time, she's excited for.

"He is so healing to me, more than he could probably ever know," Malone says, with a giant smile on her face.

Sitting on her lap and happily playing with toys is her son, who turns one on Sunday. 

“I finally understood what it meant for my mom to love me and just how much love a mother can have for their child, because I had a child," Malone said. “It’s been an experience that I couldn’t be more grateful for, and I think the culmination of my having him and founding the group in the same year, it happened for a purpose.”

You can connect with the Milwaukee Motherless Collective on Instagram or keep track of future events here.