“I laid in the doctor’s office. Brandon stood there recording the whole thing, expecting to document the most exciting moment of our lives. She started asking me strange questions that seemed crazy at the time. It wasn’t until days later it hit me.”
‘The pain radiated from my stomach to my legs. I threw up. Finally, the fetus came out. I caught a glance of the baby in the toilet before flushing it down.’: Woman details pregnancy loss, grief advice, ‘We need to talk about hard things’
‘I didn’t know this was the last time. I miss you.’
“I didn’t know that all the days of you asking me for my time, would turn into me asking you for yours. I didn’t know how fast the years would fly by.”
‘If I drink beer, maybe they’ll like me. If I smoke this, maybe they’ll like me.’: Childhood bullying victim shares journey to self-love
“I thought the bullying would stop when my mom died of cancer, but it returned full force. I remember being yanked off my feet by my ponytail, blood running down my leg. I still wasn’t good enough, so I dropped out. When I returned to school at 31, a mother of 3 kids, I thought the same failure awaited me again. I was absolutely terrified.”
‘After the diagnosis, we found out we were pregnant. ‘We don’t have enough time! How am I supposed to raise my children without him?’: Woman honors late father-in-law after passing from tongue cancer with special name for new daughter
“We were excited and broken. For much of my pregnancy, I struggled knowing that my baby would never meet the greatest man ever. He had this thing where he nicknamed each child on delivery day. Pistol, Bullet, Slug, and Cricket. There was so much anticipation for him to walk into that delivery room and call him by his ‘name’.”
‘I BEGGED my mom to get my stepfather out of my bed. He would just ‘fall asleep’ there. How convenient for him. I started thinking my mother knew, and just didn’t care.’: Mom uses past sexual abuse to help others, starts foundation
“In third grade, we moved. I thought it was so fancy! Surely nothing bad can happen in the suburbs. I slept over at my friend’s house one night, and was woken by something startling. I froze, I didn’t know what to do. I started to silently cry. ‘Why isn’t my friend waking up? If she wakes up he will stop.'”
‘He would literally fling his arms out from his body over and over again from morning until night.’: Parents shocked to learn of son’s PANDAS diagnosis
“We had absolutely no idea what was going on. His behavior was changing. He’d been in daycare since he was 12 weeks old and LOVED his school. Now he’d cling to us at drop off and require 15 hugs before we could – with him still screaming and crying- finally leave him. We assumed he was ‘going through a phase.’ I felt like we were ‘losing’ him.”
‘There’s 1 thing NO ONE prepares you for as you enter parenthood. You feel like you’ve been pregnant 87 months. Next, that 7-pound baby you brought home is nowhere to be found.’
“The minutes creep by so slowly. You want to rush past the stage of night feedings, teething, and being so needed all the time. Then, before you know it, their childhood is slipping right through your fingers.”
‘I crashed the party my daughter was at. I rolled up to hear, ‘drink, drink!’ I had visions of my sweet girl suspended in the air as she gulped beer.’: Widow urges other parents ‘let them enjoy the beauty of just being a kid’
“I raced to the front porch, paralyzed. Do I swing open the door and just run in? Do I call the cops? As I stood with my hand up in the knocking position, the door opened.”
‘I lost one of my kids. As the crowd dispersed, two of my boys walked over to me, but my son was nowhere to be seen. I called his name, paralyzed in fear.’
“I hadn’t laid eyes on him for at least 10 minutes — or had it been 20? Immediately, everything around me swirled and blurred. The only thing in focus was the red flag flapping violently above the lifeguard station. The white-capped waves were deafening. Horrible scenarios flooded my mind.”
‘My marriage ended. I was forced to move back into my parent’s house with my daughter. I felt embarrassed being a single mom and divorcee. My happily ever after was gone.’
“I felt guilty. I felt worthless. I felt shattered. I skipped meals, lost my friends. I blamed myself for everything that happened. Then, one day I woke up and stopped feeling sorry for myself.”