“The nurses wheeled me into the cold, brightly lit operating room. Two days later, I awoke in the ICU surrounded by wires, beeping machines, and a picture of my baby I hadn’t even met. The birth of our first child was also the day I almost lost my life.”
‘She’s not asleep yet,’ I heard on the operating table. A needle dug into my arm with urgency as an oxygen mask was placed over my mouth.’: Woman survives life-threatening child birth, ‘Life is too short not to show love’
‘Was there a power failure that night?’ My brother and I are close, but not to the point of sharing baby-making plans.’: Mom tells amazing story about how surprise co-pregnancies resulted in ‘twousins’
“’Guess when our baby is due?’ I remember them asking with a smirk on their faces. I couldn’t believe it when they told me. What were the chances? From that moment, the race was on.”
‘I heard, ‘One, two, three, four!’ I asked, ‘What are you counting?!’ The cord was wrapped around his neck four TIMES!’: After complicated birth, mom thankful for ‘miracle baby’
“‘You should buy a lottery ticket,’ they told me. I thought it was strange nothing was happening. The odds were definitely stacked against us. ‘Miracle baby,’ they called him.”
‘I vividly recall my phone ringing. ‘Uh, Meg is pushing out your child RIGHT NOW.’ Instead of Ethan’s dad, my sister cut the cord.’: Veteran details birth during husband’s deployment, ‘He is our proof miracles do happen’
“I tried to call my husband. No matter how many times, I got no answer. In my heart I knew his phone going straight to voicemail, which meant he was in transit from the United States to the Middle East. Jay was ready to go fight and defend our country, while his wife was giving birth on the other side of the world, to a child who was born too early.”
‘The labor staff kept asking, ‘Is Daddy on the way?’ I was carrying a dead man’s baby. It hit me like a ton of bricks.’: Woman gives birth after husband’s passing, ‘Tomorrow isn’t promised’
“We found out we were expecting. Kyle was over the moon! ‘We got this,’ he reassured me. We were 6 weeks along. A few days later, I received one of the worst texts of my life: ‘Kyle is gone.’ I didn’t believe it. I was in major DENIAL. I pretended like nothing happened for a few hours until I decided to call the hospital for confirmation. I was carrying a dead man’s baby.”
‘The ultrasound tech got quiet. He dug into my stomach. ‘We can’t find her limb. Termination is always an option.’: Special needs mom says daughter has ‘changed my life for the better’
“We were newlyweds. I took a pregnancy test, honestly not expecting it to say PREGNANT. I felt a rush of emotions. ‘What are people going to think?’ The morning after the ultrasound, the nurse said, ‘Her esophagus isn’t connected to her stomach.’ She went in for surgery at 4 days old. ‘We found something else.’ How could the doctors have missed this? ‘We need to cut both sides of her chest.'”
‘You’re still pregnant, aren’t you? Is there another one in there?’ I’d given birth 4 days prior and was expected to ‘snap back.’: Mom embraces postpartum body, ‘You’ve earned your stripes’
“I hid behind my clothes, wondering if I’d ever get my body back. Wondering if my partner looked at me the same way he did 10 months ago when we created this tiny human. Wondering if this was the same way mothers all around the world were feeling moments after their life’s greatest accomplishment: small.”
‘You’ll sit with your midwife and calmly place your order. ‘A 2-hour water birth, please,’ you’ll say, smiling toward her. The big day arrives, they’ve messed your order up, bad.’: Mom laughs at the reality of motherhood
“You realize you can’t shove them back in your womb, And there are no refunds allowed, so you gotta face up to your doom. Mother to mother, if I had to say one thing, it would be ‘buckle-up tight and stock up on the gin.”
‘I recently reached out to a medium who told me I was in a ‘religious cult’ in my past lives, forced to have kids.’: Mom details experience with medium, ‘My whole life finally made sense’
“From the very beginning, the past lives that were popping up were me in religious cults or groups. I was hooked! I needed to know more about this whole reincarnation thing. Call me crazy!”
‘I am not a doula to hold babies, I am a doula to hold mothers who so often come in last.’: Doula says ‘I will honor and serve these selfless women’
“While she focuses on her baby and the work she must do on this day, I will focus on her. I hold a crown in my hand and a tenderness in my heart that I give to her when she feels weak. But I do not worry, for she is everything that child needs.”
