“Ever seen a woman who’s just been raped, just had a 3-hour forensic exam, had every surface of her battered body swabbed, photographed, and inventoried for the police walk out of a hospital wearing oversized hospital scrubs and postpartum hospital underwear, her arms wrapped tightly around her chest, ashamed, because she doesn’t have a bra to wear? I have. And I absolutely refuse to ever see it again.”
‘This is $150 of underwear. My team and I are no longer willing to let our survivors go home without a bra, or decent pair of underwear.’: Sexual assault nurse examiner shares act of kindness for rape survivors
‘What if I never love my child? I hate being a mom.’ The day she was born, I became a different person.’: New mother suffers severe postpartum depression, ‘I was on the brink of suicide’
“The moment after her birth I had so longed for – the intense emotion I was supposed to have, never happened. The feeling I was supposed to get when she first cried, never happened. The love I was ‘supposed’ to have seeing Dan hold our daughter, never happened. The day she was born, I became a different person. I started hearing and seeing things. These images and voices would pop into my head.”
‘We have a sibling set of 3.’ Our lives were about to change. ‘THREE???’ Jared’s voice reassured me. ‘Let’s do it!’: Couple take in 3 siblings from foster care, ‘we were instantly in love’
“Three hours later, we became legal guardians for 2 adorable little toddlers. The first month, I felt like a horrible parent. ‘How did we end up here?’ Everything changed when news broke that our 2 littles were going to be placed with another family willing to take in all 3. My heart broke as the reality of foster care hit. I remember looking at Jared and saying, ‘I’m not ready to lose them.’ 0 to 4 kids in a year and a half? Why not??? We needed to take them all!”
‘I’m under the impression you already know your baby is missing its left hand.’ The doctor looked mortified.’: Couple learns of daughter’s limb difference, ‘angry’ after doctor suggests termination
“I can still smell the pungent cleaner that room smelled so strongly of. My gut told me he wasn’t telling me something. I immediately saw red. Oh the tears I cried. Nothing can prepare you for news like that, nothing. I wanted to protect her. She was perfect.”
‘There’s nothing you could have done. It wasn’t your fault,’ my nurse said. I started sobbing on the phone.’: Woman’s finds healing after ‘agonizing’ miscarriage, ‘I promise you, there is LIFE after loss’
“I remember sitting in the doctor’s office at age 17, wondering if having my own kids was ever a possibility for me. I’d been diagnosed with PCOS at a young age. He put me on birth control and it hardly affected my life. Until I started seriously dating. I felt like dating me came with a warning label – a precursor: ‘Watch out, no guarantee I can have kids.’ And what if someone didn’t want to marry me because of it?”
‘When you marry a nurse, you marry their job. She gives 100% day in and day out.’: Man writes sweet tribute to nurse wife, ‘this is her calling’
“As my nurse sleeps, I quietly clean the house, do the dishes, prepare meals, do laundry. When she’s leaving, she has a clean home, clean scrubs, somewhat sane children, and a meal ready to go. 5 hours after her shift should’ve ended, she calls. I let her talk, I let her vent. She just wants to stay awake. I let her know she’s an amazing mother, nurse, wife. It’s the little things that matter. They all count.”
‘I was an ‘accident.’ My birth mom ‘tried to get rid of me,’ but couldn’t. She didn’t even want to name me.’: Orphan named by stranger in hospital room finally adopted at 26, ‘I longed to belong’
“To this day, I’m still not sure which random stranger named me in that hospital room. I was sent to a hospital for a full screening. They documented all the marks on my body with hours of questioning. I trembled in fear. In a dark hallway, a nurse – who took her job because her husband was also a survivor of child abuse – spoke these words to me. I can still hear her strong yet gentle voice. ‘Annie, the cycle ends with you.’ I finally know now, my parents aren’t going anywhere.”
‘We come home empty. We don’t want to talk. The hardest work you’ll ever do is love a nurse.’: Nurse pens ‘thank you’ letter to those who ‘love us and let us do this work’
“We get up early, no time to drink coffee over the newspaper. We come home late, too tired to cook. We work extra because we know there’s sick people who need us. We miss events, holidays, birthdays. It may seem we’ve left all our caring, heart, and love at work, and come home to you empty. We probably have. But we need your understanding. We need to know you ‘get it.'”
‘Are you sure he isn’t cold?’ His swim instructor constantly asks, concerned over his very blue lips.’: Mom emotionally recalls son’s severe heart disease operation, ‘I know every angel was watching over him’
“I had planned my son’s funeral. I had cried brutally painful tears which turned to moans because I had none left. That day, my life changed. I thought I had witnessed miracles in the past, but those were just test runs and rehearsals for this moment. I know when the anesthesiologist said, ‘We’ll treat him as our own,’ she meant it.”
‘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.”
