“I was anxious to make my way to the NICU. I walked into the very room our daughter had been in and instantly knew our situation was much different than before. The doctor didn’t waste a minute of my time trying to sugar coat the situation.”
‘There are only 34 cases ever on record. He is as rare as they come.’: Mother shares son’s harrowing journey with congenital heart disease
‘They can’t do anything else? That’s the only option?,’ people asked me shocked, wide eyes. Making the decision to saw off a part of my body wasn’t something I planned on.’
“I took a bad tumble off a horse when I was a kid. My greatest fear was that I’d awaken from anesthesia – and realize with sinking certainty I had made a horrible, irreversible mistake.”
‘I remember the doctor asking, ‘Where’s your husband? He’s not going to be here to pick you up after you faint when I tell you, you’re having twins?!’ ’Wait, WHAT?!’: Mom has triplets after IVF
“Then we saw it up on the ultrasound screen – clear as day. THREE babies. She told us to consider reduction, a thought we couldn’t imagine. I couldn’t believe we had gone through so much to get to this point, and now a doctor was telling me to throw it all away.”
‘I remember that day so vividly. You called me, asked me very calmly to come home so we could talk as a family. I knew.’
“I ran to my best friend down the street, collapsed in their driveway, and part of me never got up.”
‘I dropped my baby into the water and flushed. My baby was gone. It was too late.’: Woman overcomes miscarriages to have beautiful rainbow baby
“It was 2 a.m. I needed to pee. I got out of the bed and knew something wasn’t right. I sat down on the toilet and I felt it. It slipped right out. I didn’t want to look. I knew what had just happened. I had to look. I reached down and picked my baby up out of the water. I panicked.”
‘It appears I have everything under control and life is a breeze. That ‘breeze’ is actually 80 mph hurricane winds, and I’m hanging on for dear life.’
“I cry. I WEEP into my cold coffee. The mom guilt consumes me and I feel like I’m failing my kids. I was also unaware that hemorrhoids can last for months at a time. I’m scared.”
‘I saw you hand over your note with sadness in your eyes. You looked at the pharmacist with fear as she read your details. You replied with the most defeated ‘no’ I’d ever heard.’
“I saw your knuckles turn white on that stroller handle bar. I saw you look down on your baby while it was starting to stir. ‘Please don’t cry,’ you whispered.”
‘It sounded like a freight train coming towards us. I swung open my door and began to run. When I finally broke out of the fire, I saw my crewmates were not behind me. I woke up a month later.’
“I ran up to one of the fire engines to look at myself in the mirror, but a firefighter pulled me away. They wouldn’t allow me to look at myself. I knew right then it must have been bad. Soon after that, it all went black.”
‘Jenn, you can do this!’ He was admitted to the hospital just 3 months before my due date.’: Husband supports wife through twin pregnancy despite cancer battle
“Our goal for that final month was to help him walk longer distances and get his strength up so that he could be at the birth. Even though he was sick and I knew that him dying was a possibility, I never thought it would actually happen.”
‘It’s all in your head. You just need to be happier. Go take a walk, be a ‘normal’ 20-something.’ I had just woken up, still bleary-eyed from anesthesia. These were the words my doctor said to me.’
“I laid there and sobbed, how could it have come back normal? After hearing enough doctors downplay my symptoms, watching them roll their eyes as they told me it was ‘just gas,’ I stopped telling anyone how miserable I was.”