“The park was a packed with kids. Without hesitation, I see him walk up to a crowd of 7 and 8-year-olds. ‘Hi, what’s your name?,’ Jude asks. The girls ran off to play together. Leaving Jude behind, confused. After a half hour of rejection, his head was down. He was defeated.”
‘You okay, buddy?’ He looked into my soul with those big blue teary eyes and started crying on my shoulder. He was defeated. ‘What’s the purpose of life?’ It’s a difficult question.’
‘My husband and I decided during his deployment we would try to get pregnant as soon as he got home. I got pregnant the first try. But, I wasn’t supposed to mother this baby.’
“It was hell. My doctor removed it and sent me on my way. And then I was alone.”
‘Baby, when I hear you say you’re pregnant what I actually hear is ‘life destroyed.’ He was right. The Universe had been playing this cruel joke on me for 4 years.’
“Surprisingly, the doctor pulled me into her arms, ignoring professionalism and boundaries, and held me. She whispered in my ear, ‘I heard you talking in the change room. I know how badly you wanted this. Don’t give up yet.’”
‘Then came the email that changed everything. ‘I have an oven that has never been used. Do you need it?’ We laughed. We didn’t know why she was offering us an ‘oven.’ Ours was in perfectly good condition!’
“The tension was palpable. Within seconds, the room was completely empty except for us. No explanation from anyone. In that moment, we both embraced each other and sobbed. Was Kimberly going to be ok? What about our son? Nothing prepared us for this unexpected event.”
‘I received suspicious looks for being a grown man at the park at 2 p.m. with his kids. ‘It’s nice of you to do your wife’s job,’ is what they were really saying.’
“I ran into friends at the grocery store, and they asked me if I’d lost my job. All of it was maddening.”
‘Massive day at work today. We have our senior leadership meeting. I have to travel 5 hours by car and train. And what’s my wife doing? Not much really.’
“All she has to do is get two boys up, dressed and fed while breastfeeding the third.”
‘September 17th is the day I had a clear plan to end my life. I had at least 3 different ways I could commit suicide.’
“I was sure I was having a heart attack. They asked me if something had stressed me. I said, ‘no, I was preparing dinner.'”
‘Co-sleeping and bed sharing are wonderful. If you feel worried about these things because people make you feel this way, don’t.’
“These people don’t come home with you, don’t sleep in your bed, and they aren’t your baby, so their opinion is invalid.”
‘We needed to find a surrogate after my cervical cancer. My mom offered to carry my babies. She risked her own life to give birth to my children.’
“Not feeling them inside me was a roller coaster of emotions. At times I felt as if this was not even happening. Having these two bundles finally lay on my chest for skin to skin contact allowed me to feel that connection with them I had missed.”
‘Our child’s personality changed overnight at the age of 15 months. A once happy, easy going child suddenly turned aggressive, irritable and OCD’ish.’
“He would be physical with people, throw toys, completely lose it. This wasn’t just the normal tantrum; he was in his own world. It is so frustrating that medical professionals don’t know about it, and some even deny its existence.”