“I had just gotten ‘the phone call’ no parent ever wants to get. I flew out the door, not knowing what happened, how bad it was, or even if my son was alive. Josh had been on his way home from work when a car made a right turn in front of him. It happened so fast. I tried to prepare myself for when I saw him. When he spoke, it wasn’t his voice. ‘Who is he?’ He was only 21 years old. He was in and out of consciousness. I felt nauseous.”
‘Get to the ER! Now!’ was all my husband blurted out. My son lay crumpled on the side of a road.’: Man makes miracle recovery after motorcycle accident, ‘It’s a blessing to have him back’
‘Don’t say, ‘When can I see the baby?’ Say, ‘Let me know when you’re ready for visitors.’: Post-labor mom reminds us ‘there is nothing more vulnerable than a freshly postpartum momma’
“Truth is, she’s labored NAKED in front of an audience of nurses and doctors. She’s had eyes and hands all over her lady bits. She literally just expelled another human being from her body through her vagina or from being cut open. She carried this little being for 9 long months and probably isn’t eager to have others just come in and sweep him/her away as soon as they take their first breath. If you are a friend or family member of a new mom, don’t just EXPECT to pop in at YOUR convenience.”
‘You show up when you’re tired. You hug me when I cry and don’t back down when things look bleak. I am on sacred ground with you.’: Mom shares touching ode to pediatric nurses
“When people ask me, ‘What is it like to live in the hospital?’ the first images that come to my mind are your faces and your hands. You listen and teach. You take the time to help us understand. You bring me coffee and chocolate. You look me in the eye when you give good or bad news. I have never been more honored to witness anyone fulfill their calling in life. I am on sacred ground with you.”
‘Did you know I was there? I greeted you in a comforting voice. ‘We’ve done all we can do,’ the doctor said. I didn’t want you to go.’: Nurse pens emotional ‘thank you’ to dying patient as she struggled to ‘hold back tears’
“They said it was time… I was scared, could you tell? My hands were trembling. Did you see how I kept looking up at the ceiling to hold back tears? I couldn’t breathe. I rolled you to your side and you let the last of the air out from your lungs. As I combed your hair, did you hear me whisper to you that ‘YOU are truly loved’? I don’t understand how I could have this kind of love for someone I barely even knew. I can’t explain it.”
‘I picked up my Kindergartener from school. But her class was held in the cafeteria, not in her usual classroom. None of us will forget.’: Mom remembers Sandy Hook victims on 7-year anniversary
“Her brown curls bounced as she ran up to me with a smile on her face. She eagerly handed me a picture she drew that day. It was a colorful winter scene with penguins skating on a pond with the date 12/14. When my husband returned, he passed by the drawing, stopped and started counting. ‘Did you see what I saw?’ He pointed to the stars in the sky she had drawn. I counted them. Exactly 26.”
‘She took her last breath. Over 400 people showed at her funeral, even on the busiest day of the week. That is the legacy she had.’: Woman pens sweet tribute to mother, ‘we will never stop hoping to see you again’
“After losing my mom, I once again feel like that lost little girl in the department store, like the whole world has collapsed. Only this time, no amount of screaming, crying, begging will bring her back. Not a day goes by I don’t recall her. A taste, a smell, a word, a touch. When all else fails, I turn to the memories. But I literally cannot cry, cannot shed a single tear, without also smiling. THAT is the kind of love she left behind.”
‘It’s bad, they have her on life support.’ I cried out to keep my sister earth side, not to take her from us.’: Young woman recalls sister’s harrowing car accident, how she overcame her ‘impossible’ recovery
“It was just after 11 a.m. on a Saturday morning when I received the phone call from my mom. ‘Your sister has been in a car accident.’ She was headed to the hospital. I’ll never forget the pain in my dad’s voice and anguish in my mother’s cry’s echoing in the background. I decided in that room of 7 doctors that my sister had already showed us she wants to live!”
‘You’d look like me, I was sure. Curly blonde hair, blue eyes, chubby cheeks. I was lucky.’: Mom pens emotional tribute to daughter she miscarried, ‘I needed to lose you to find me’
“I flushed with my eyes sealed shut. I cried more tears than I knew possible. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. What kind of mother flushes her baby? I hoped I was wrong. I hoped you were still there. But I knew. A mother always knows. Everyone kept apologizing. I didn’t know why because it wasn’t their fault. It was mine. I had one job, to protect you, and I couldn’t even do that.”
‘Get here quick.’ My husband was sitting in a truck with a black eye swollen shut, trembling. ‘What happened to me?’: Woman recounts the lessons her farming family learned during unexpected hardships
“I wasn’t quite prepared for what I was about to see. They told us his wrist was shattered and he had amnesia. Two weeks before his surgery, I had a prophylactic double mastectomy. Sounds crazy, right? This past summer, the radiologist made a mistake and didn’t compare my scans and basically stated that I had cancer. I decided to go flat. The anxiety was real.”
‘Jess, call 911,’ he gasped before the phone went dead. I arrived home to discover my husband laid out on a stretcher.’: Woman loses husband to brain cancer, marries again after receiving ‘message from a complete stranger’
“‘Oh God no. Please no…’ I whispered that night, my legs numb from sitting motionless. I stared straight into the eyes of the young doctor, trying to digest the news I’d just heard. Brain cancer. Earlier that evening, within 5 seconds of pulling into the driveway, I received a frantic call from my husband. ‘No, no, no,’ the only coherent thought I was able to form.”
