“She was 6 pounds and 9 ounces of screaming, vomiting, wheezing delight. We couldn’t say yes fast enough. No one has positive news for us. Our girl had endured more in those first 3 months than most do in a lifetime.”
‘We got THE CALL. ‘Would you be willing to accept a 3-month-old baby with serious medical needs?’ We couldn’t say yes fast enough.’: Couple adopt baby with Microcephaly
‘Megan silently handed me the letter. ‘I heard urine need of a kidney.’ My immediate thought was YEAH! I opened it and read, ‘Want Mine?’ WOW. I mean WOW.’
“She was my work wife. Our #1 goal was to go home safe every night. It said, ‘Turns out we are a perfect match. Not only on the job, but in blood and organs too. You always had my back on the road and off, now you can have my kidney.’ REALLY?!”
‘Mothers don’t shower often. Especially new mothers. When we say this stuff, we are met with horror. But it is the truth.’
“I remember finally getting the energy to shower, a place where I’d feel so tired that I’d read the shower bottles and stare into space while the water hit my back. I was a zombie. My husband came in and said, ‘It’s time to feed him,’ and I cried.”
‘After losing twins, we thought we’d paid our dues. Our life’s suffering was now complete. We were wrong.’: Mom loses ‘rainbow baby’ with heart defects, knows she will meet him ‘in heaven’
“We were overjoyed at my pregnancy. New life was coming! But scans and tests told us it’d come with major heart defects, a missing chamber, faulty valves, and an aorta split into 2 pieces. Blindness. Deafness. A cleft lip and palate. Still, doctors were hopeful. Until they weren’t. ‘He’s a sick guy.’ I was told this in a ‘why the long face? didn’t you expect this?’ kinda way.”
‘We didn’t talk enough, did we?’ My Dad would never walk me down the aisle or meet my children. That’s a very odd thing to discuss with your father when you’re only 23.’
“Having no family, no money and no home after believing your life was completely normal and well adjusted for 23 years can warp your entire view of life. I spent a large amount of time after the incident questioning what was reality.”
I Gave Birth To My Son, Then Found Out I Had Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma Less Than 48 Hours Later
“Here we were, newlyweds for just 4 months with 4 children together, and now a very sudden chance I may not be around to help raise our kids to adulthood. I had too much to fight for.”
‘Hours began to pass, and still no Andy. I called him. It went to voicemail. Then I saw it. The paddleboard, empty.’: Pregnant widow still has no answers after husband drowned, ‘He will never fade from my heart’
“I was pregnant with our third child, and my hormones had gotten the best of me. I grabbed my phone and called 9-1-1. I started screaming his name, ‘ANDY, ANDY, ANDY,’ as I frantically looked on the shoreline that was covered in trees. I hear the sirens roaring, coming in my direction. My neighbor heard me repeating, ‘I don’t want to live without him, I want to die,’ as I knelt in the grass.”
‘I was homeless, suicidal. I walked into hell and found an angel. Her name is Sharon.’: Woman battling mental illness thanks strangers for saving her life
“I take the pills in my hand and go to swallow them, but something stops me. Cindy, my dog. I can’t leave her yet. For thirteen days, Cindy and I are homeless. ‘SOMEONE HELP US!’ I am coming undone. A woman steps forward, waving a flier wildly in my face. I suddenly feel HOPE.”
‘I didn’t realize how much I would miss my dad’s handwriting. Mourning handwriting? But I did. I still do.’: Daughter gets tattoo of dad’s handwriting before he passes of pancreatic cancer
“I watched him sketch out that second attempt and smile at it. He looked up and said, ‘How’s this one? I think this one is better, don’t you think?’ Maybe he was imagining it actually being tattooed on me and how that would feel, after he was gone.”
Some Children Are Just Born Feral And Can’t Be Tamed
“We have a little bit to learn from these wild at heart, freedom-filled, life-relishing little humans.”