“I began to feel nauseous and fatigued beyond belief. ‘Wait, am I pregnant?!’ I decided to take a test, probably the 100th one I’d taken at that point. I laid it to the side and left the room, knowing I’d see the same negative I’d seen for 5 years. Except I didn’t. It was positive. All FIVE of them. My husband and I were shocked. After years of trying, a dozen failed fertility interventions, and an ongoing adoption process, I was pregnant completely by surprise!”
“The technician noticed something wrong with my legs. They were shaped like a boomerang. I only had 3 toes on each foot. My feet were turned inwards and pointed down, and my ankles couldn’t rotate. The doctors gave my parents a choice: ‘Amputate her legs or never let her walk.’ When I got pregnant, I wasn’t physically prepared for what was to come. I had no idea how it would affect my body, let alone my prosthetics. I was terrified.”
“I’d tried to ‘diet’ like everyone else, but it just never worked. I ate and over-ate for every reason: to celebrate, to mourn, in boredom, in spite. I was insulin resistant, one Coke away from diabetes, had sleep apnea, PCOS, and lived in chronic pain. I was living life overweight and completely miserable. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.”
“While my son was sick in the NICU, I bonded with another mom whose daughter was born severely premature. The prognosis was grim. When the time came to take her daughter home, she had one thing to say: ‘Thank you God for saving my daughter’s life. I know this was all your doing.’ Bloodshot-eyed nurses gazed across the room. I couldn’t help but feel a pang in my chest. She didn’t thank them, she didn’t look at them. She simply swaddled her baby, and left.”
“‘Finally’ you said under your breath as I said ‘excuse me’ so we could exit the bleachers. You didn’t know my 4-year-old son has autism. You didn’t know about all of the ear infections and hearing loss. You weren’t there the day we discovered his new sensitivity to loud noises. I’ll never forget the way you made my family feel. I will make sure no one ever feels like that.”
“20 years from now, your kids won’t care whether you were the most successful person at work. They won’t care whether or not you always made the most responsible choices. The days are long but the years are short. Make them count. Take the trip. Do all the things. Every hope and dream we had for our future together died with him that day.”
“I got the phone call that would change our lives forever. ‘Her mother was found deceased this morning.’ We asked, ‘How would y’all feel if A.J. stayed with us forever?’ The two girls’ bond is like I have never seen. She doesn’t see A.J as ‘different,’ she just sees her baby sister. I don’t think any of us could imagine life without her.”
“‘Hi Riley, see you in the yard.’ This one sentence made me beam from ear to ear. At that moment, I knew that my little boy was OK. My little boy had a friend, one who finally took the time to learn his name.”
“We are told ‘You can be whatever you want to be! You don’t have to live in a 1950’s mindset! You can be a CEO!’ What they don’t tell you is the pit in your stomach you feel when you get a notice about a 6 p.m. conference on the day of your kids practice or activity. The panic when your kid’s school calls and asks you to pick them up because they are sick and you don’t want your bosses to be upset.”
“My best friend’s wedding was only 3 weeks away. As we got closer to the date, I realized I needed to get my sh*t together if I didn’t want to look like a hot mess at the altar. After all, I’d just had a 9-pound baby boy cut from my uterus. I headed to my local spray tan salon. Milk was squirting onto the sides of the booth. I was leaking, BAD.”
