“I trusted my doctor dearly, so I knew she’d have something good to say. She always did. She did not this time.”
‘There is a lot of fluid in there. I am going to get your doctor.’ My heart sank, and I debated calling my husband, but just sat there, numb, and decided to wait.’
‘I was 17 years old, one month away from graduating high school. I was hanging out with a ‘friend’ who wanted to have sex, but I did not. He chose to rape me and the condom broke.’
“I received a phone call from my cousin who had just turned 14. She was calling to tell me she was pregnant. We ended up being due 3 weeks apart. I was shocked.”
‘His breath became labored. My husband caressed his cheek and told him we’d be okay. But his eye searched ours, as if to be sure.’
“He was ours. I knew exactly where I wanted to go. I wanted our first family picture to be of our entire family. We drove straight from the hospital to the cemetery.”
‘I grabbed my belly and screamed, ‘YOU’RE WRONG MY BABY GIRL IS FINE YOU WILL SEE!’ My heart started racing. I asked again, in a panic. ‘Please let me see my baby?!’
“A month after my first ultrasound, my boyfriend started getting sick. I finally made him go to the doctor because he started puking up blood.”
‘I anxiously laid there, holding my husband’s hand with a big smile on our faces. Only this time, something was different. I frantically scanned the screen. I knew it.’
“I put on the ugly gown, the ugly socks and continue breathing techniques. My husband kisses my hand, kisses my forehead, and holds my hand the entire way. The mask goes on, and I slowly close my eyes.”
‘To the nurse who held my stillborn baby, unfazed by the appearance of a tiny child born 20 weeks too soon. You stroked those itty-bitty fingers and toes. You talked about those eyes.’
“You told me my baby was beautiful, although the rest of the world would likely have disagreed. As you placed my breathless baby into the palms of my hands, I too became breathless.”
‘This led us to a dark, silent hospital room on Halloween. We were supposed to be prepping a nursery and picking out names.’
“Instead, we hastened to name an already much-loved child that was not ours to keep. Every alarm bell in my body went off.”
‘They said, ‘You’re lucky you don’t have kids.’ I had just had my first miscarriage.’
“I went back to work the next day taking orders at a drive-in while someone was complaining about their kids. I explained to them I had just miscarried, and I WOULD gladly take their place.”
‘I drove high with my kids in the car. They would hear me lie through my teeth about pain I’d made up, just to get a script. My husband threatened to leave me, but I was so good at lying to him.’
“I wasn’t pregnant anymore technically, and those pills stopped more than just my physical pain – they numbed my emotions as well. I would hide pills around the house – on shelves behind clothes, in drawers, even in my kids’ rooms – anywhere.”
‘I woke up around midnight, soaked in a pool of blood. I immediately yelled ‘hospital!’ But Hattie was still alive.’
“I got up to go to the bathroom and I felt her. It was the first time I truly felt her move during this pregnancy. I called the nurse in and said, ‘I think I felt her fingers and toes moving – and LOW.’ Sure enough, she was at the end of my cervix.”
