“I was standing in the kitchen alone. My phone rang. Assuming it was my husband, I answered. But it wasn’t my husband. All I could do was freeze. I was in shock. I hadn’t processed his words until I heard the ‘click.’ My body shook as I collapsed.”
‘She’s just a nervous child.’ The words still burn. I was 13, about to start high school. But I was different. My life was consumed with excruciating pain, diarrhea, and the toilet.’: Woman recounts her struggle with chronic illness
‘Hi, I was 5 minutes away from calling you.’ Our baby’s heart was not sitting on the left side of her chest, but shifted to the right side. My stomach dropped with those words.’
“Silently, he began drawing on a blank piece of paper. When he was done, he turned to us, showed us his drawing, and began explaining what our future would look like. I started bawling. But we knew we needed to do it.”
‘As I wheeled away, I was squeezing the hand of a stranger. Finally, my husband was allowed in. ‘She’s beautiful,’ nurses said as they whisked her away. She never cried.’
“I will never forget going to get a pedicure on our anniversary. I thought, ‘Okay, this will be a time to relax,’ then in walks a woman, 34 weeks pregnant, due just around when I was supposed to be due. She was glowing and I was sinking… fast.”
‘Extreme people pleaser here. I’m addicted. It’s desperate, honestly. ‘Will they like me?’ ‘Do they want me?’ ‘Did I say something stupid?’
“Not in a ‘Ohhhhh, she is so sweet! She just takes care of the people around her’ kind of way. But in a ‘I’m addicted, and I don’t know how to function without it’ kind of way. It’s not good. Not for me. Not for my family. Not for my friends. I don’t want their approval. I need their approval.”
‘I met an older couple before our flight. They had the unfortunate chance of sitting next to us. Sofia is truly the devil’s child, and acted accordingly.’
“My children had never flown before. Sofia hates loud noises and is spooked easily. I was really worried.”
‘We were two girls having fun, or so we thought. We loved each other at 16-years-old.’: Young women fall in love in secret and worry about their love being ‘accepted’
“I was sick of being a secret, as if it was wrong or dirty, as if our love wasn’t acceptable. I returned home to find a sign on my gate door saying, ‘this way to happy ever after.’ I thought nothing of it. Zaynah stood there looking as pretty as a picture with a Build-A-Bear teddy and a rose which said, ‘I Love You, Will You Marry Me?’“
‘Come get her. I don’t want her. I can’t afford her,’ but she always took her back. Years went by. Then I got a phone call.’: Woman reunites with the ‘daughter’ she was meant to adopt
“I got on the bus. A pregnant woman was struggling with trash bags and 2 toddlers. After talking with me for 20 hours, she was open to me adopting her child. I was over the moon!”
‘He swears he won’t do it again. He’s broken over this. I deserved it. It’s okay. My jaw isn’t bruised that bad.’
“The two extremes of how you loved me so gently, and also tore my soul to shreds so easily. When you punched me so hard I couldn’t close my mouth. How could you be both those things in one man – and how could I love someone who healed me, and hurt me, all in the same movements.”
‘There was a catch. This boy was technically a man. At 20-years-old, our sexual relationship was illegal. After hiding our meetups, I came home to find a police officer on my couch.’: Woman learns to love herself after tumultuous relationships
“My first true love went to jail, and I became a small-town girl with an over-sexualized reputation. Teachers hit on me. Dads from the daycare I worked at stalked me. I was ridiculed, taunted, labeled easy. Enter more boys.”
‘It’s just something everyone does and I was better at it than most. It was a bandage covering a gaping wound I refused to address. Deep down, I knew.’
“Escaping anxiety, suppressing depression, avoiding life for just a few hours. But what Jessica wants to do in the end is always what Jessica is going to do.”