“I was only half listening, screwing around online. It’d been a long day at work. I wanted a mental break. My wife’s lips were drawn to a tight line, her right hand on her hip. So I put my phone down and tried a different approach.”
‘I was looking at my phone when my wife asked me a question. She was obviously irritated. She’d asked me the same question twice already. I’d responded ‘sure’ to a non-yes or no question.’
‘I felt like a building was collapsing on my chest. I had sharp pains. When I got up to get my screaming baby, I fainted. I couldn’t move, so I just sat until my husband came home.’
“I went to the hospital by ambulance and apologized to the paramedics. She asked me ‘why?’ I told her, ‘Because if I wasn’t having a heart attack, I’d feel bad I was wasting people’s time.’ We both laughed at how ridiculous it sounded. But I continued to apologize to everyone.”
‘I almost didn’t go in. I knew no one. All the women had head-coverings and I didn’t. I parked my car and prayed it was the right thing to do.’
“Tentatively, and with a teary catch in my throat, I asked ‘May I leave this sign?’ ‘Are you a Muslim?’ I said … ‘No, ma’am, Christian.’ To which she said — ‘We are all the same.’ I went in a stranger with a sign, and came out with a friend; hopefully for life.”
‘Okay, so which of you is the mother? There can only be one.’ She made a face when we gave both names.’: LGBT couple urge ‘love is what makes a family’
“The minute we met the daycare director, she asked if we were sisters. I dreaded saying we weren’t. We had our hearts set on this place. It checked all our boxes. After I clarified we were married, she just said, ‘Oh.’ There wasn’t a ‘spot’ for us. Our friends went in later that day and were offered a spot. The only difference? We were gay and they were straight.”
‘My mom went all out. I remember thinking how random it seemed. She tried so hard, wanting to make this nice dinner for us. We made fun of her for it.’
“I feel bad about it to this day. What we brushed off as her ditsy-ness was actually the first signs of the disease. I hate myself for the way I acted that day. I feel so bad and so guilty. It kills me.”
‘There are police officers in the hall. ‘I want them to hurt me, mommy! I want them to kill me with their guns!’ He started crying and hitting himself in the head.’
“‘I think he’s manic,’ I say. ‘His moods are rally erratic and I’m worried.’ The nurse looks at me skeptically. Who am I to know about ‘mania?’ It was stupid to bring him here. He has been through hell.”
‘After 15 years, the phone rang on a Friday morning. It was the case worker saying she had not one, but TWO babies. 6-week-old twins. ‘Would you take two babies instead of one?’
“An even bigger surprise was in store, a few years after we were put up for adoption, our birth parents, who were not together at the time of our birth, had reunited and later married.”
‘How could this be? My ultrasound nurse told me the baby DID NOT have Down syndrome. The nurse looked at me and asked, ‘Are you going to keep her?’
“I wanted to do the whole thing by myself. No doctor, no ultrasound, no hospital, no midwife. So I did. My close friends and family were definitely not fans. My husband went along with it knowing when I make up my mind to do something, that’s it. It’s done.”
‘I found out my marriage was a lie. He was unfaithful. I had been lied to for months. I spewed venomous hate towards him. I was numb. Then, I found out I was having a miscarriage.’
“We got married! I was so happy, I truly thought we were going to be okay. I had two amazing daughters, a rocking career, a husband who wasn’t perfect, but he tried. Then my world fell apart.”
‘As soon as she checked with the doppler she knew. And deep down I knew. I just prayed I was wrong. All I could get out is ‘why isn’t it flickering?’ They just said ‘we are trying to figure that out.’ Woman shares life after stillbirth
“I screamed, asking if it was her cord that caused it over and over.”