Baltimore’s bereaved mothers are building a network. Don’t call it trauma bonding.

If you’re a mother who has lost a child in Baltimore City, chances are you’ve met Donna Bruce.

If you haven’t met her, she wants to meet you. Baltimore’s unofficial patron saint of grieving mothers makes it her business to envelop women into her club, the club no one wants to be in.

Cause of death — gun violence, overdose, illness — doesn’t matter. The point, Bruce said, is to show love to the bereaved mothers no one is checking on. The arrival of funeral bouquets, sympathy cards and how-are-you calls eventually ends. But Bruce knows these mothers will never be the same.

Her own son, Devon Lavar Wellington, was found unresponsive in his vehicle in July 2021. His cause of death was labeled inconclusive. Helping other women through their loss helps fill the void he left behind, she said.

“It’s a charge that I have on my life that God has given me,” Bruce said. “It’s a big charge. Sometimes I don’t know what to say. I just listen.”

Bruce has become a common thread uniting grieving mothers like pearls on a string. Out of the introductions she’s made has blossomed a network of women determined to find a way forward together. They take turns organizing fashion shows to remind each other they’ve got to get dressed in the morning, hosting slumber parties to swap stories of their struggles and throwing sip-and-paint nights to remind them that hobbies are healing.

The mothers reject the term “trauma bond.” Bruce prefers to call it resilience-building. It shows they can cope and adapt even through trying moments. She can’t explain what this kind of outreach does for her own grief, but in a way it fills a void. “I feel like I just wanna take all their pain, like ‘We’re gonna get through this,’ ” she said.

Bruce can see it on the mothers’ faces when they realize they’re not alone. Most recently, Krystal Gonzalez has started attending more events. Gonzalez lost her daughter, Aaliyah, 18, in the Brooklyn Homes mass shooting last July.

“She don’t know me from a can of paint,” Bruce said. “But she keeps showing up.”

The events are a flurry of glamorous clothing, hairpieces, makeup and sky-high shoes. Some of the moms drape themselves in wearable art and strut the catwalk. Others just like to help the models apply their war paint backstage. A few mothers prefer to sit in the audience and watch, as photos of their children appear on the big screen in memoriam.

“It [the fashion show] gives you a reason to get out,” said Erica Colbert, whose eldest grandson Bryson Hudson, 16, was fatally shot this year. “It also gives you a connection, something to look forward to, knowing that there’s hope. That there can be some kind of change that’s going to happen.”

Leaning on her Baptist faith, Bruce calls this type of outreach “ministry through the arts.”

One mother, Michelle Hines, told Bruce her fashion show was the first time she had dressed up and felt like herself since her son, Isaiah Carter, was shot and killed just outside of Patterson High School last March.

While these events give bereaved mothers a chance to get up and out, they also provide a safe space where they don’t have to pretend to be OK. No one flinched when tears started flowing at the sip-and-paint this month. Everyone working on the Christmas tree still-life understood.

“You don’t have to mask here,” said Angela Royster Rodgers, organizer of the sip-and-paint night.

The sense of community and holding space for each other is the foundation of friendship for these mothers. No religious denomination is necessary — their prayer circles give them a source of comfort and power.

Bruce’s close friend Melissa Bagley is no stranger to grief. Bagley lost her son, Kwalin Ray, on April 3, 2022, to gun violence. The final texts between Bagley and her son on that day were a simple exchange: “I love you.” Just 27 minutes later, a 911 call reported that Kwalin Ray was shot and killed. Ray died a year after Bruce’s own son, Devon.

A crisp night in December transitioned into a warm and cozy girls’ night at Melissa Bagely’s. Bagley was hosting what she called “Sis-mas,” a three-day retreat at which women who have lost a child could come together and laugh, cry and connect.

Women of varying ages trickled in, kicking off an assortment of Ugg boots, slippers, running shoes and clogs at the door. A sign that listed family rules such as “be kind,” “be honest” and “be happy” was propped against the wall. “Be happy” was something that many of these women were relearning how to do.

The women sat in a circle on the floor and one by one shared the stories of their experience of loss. Hands were held tight, tears were shed and laughs were had.

Bagley’s mantra is no mom forgotten, no mom left behind.

“People really don’t understand what this is,” she said. On the second night of “Sis-mas,” Bagley found herself sitting across from a mother who lost her child 16 years ago, and from Gonzalez, whose loss came just months ago.

“We sat here and we all were able to form a smile … talk about our children and not be beaten down,” she said. “We were all lifting each other up.”

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