“‘Well,’ she paused. ‘Five days is a long time. If it were me, I’d want to know.’ I could not get her words out of my head. I purchased the finest pregnancy tests 8 quarters could buy.”
‘Mommy! I’m going to ask Santa for a baby in your belly!’ Doing all I could to keep it together, I replied, ‘That may be a hard promise for him to keep.’
‘Molly, I am sick again. I promise I’m going to get better this time.’ I hang up, but she is all I can think about. How can I love her so much, and be such a constant source of disappointment?’
“I don’t want to catch a glimpse of her beautiful face in my mind. It hurts too much. She is so perfect. How can she still utter the words, ‘It’s okay mom, I love you’? I don’t deserve her love or her forgiveness.”
‘The baby suddenly gagged and then violently vomited what seemed to be a weeks’ worth of breast milk. I held her up and she was lifeless. She was unresponsive.’
“I immediately told my oldest to dial 9-1-1. She was trembling. I was trying to figure out if the baby was breathing. I realized my oldest was unable to call; she dialed 1-9-9 in utter fear.”
‘You’re so damn tired you don’t want to be touched. When it came to sleep or sex, sleep always won.’
“Our first year as parents, we had sex maybe 5 times. I was neck deep in my postpartum depression and anxiety, which didn’t help.”
‘Realizing I was gay gave me feelings I was trying to numb. I felt like I was doing something wrong and if people found out, I wouldn’t be loved. I spent 15 years in a downward spiral.’
“I hated drugs, but I also couldn’t be away from them. My family had no idea what to do. You name it, they tried it in hopes of getting their son back – but it got a lot worse before it got better.”
‘Today is a monumental day. A few months ago I wrote about my son’s struggle with addiction. A miracle came from that post.’
“I received a message from a stranger in Missouri who said she could help us if we were interested. Not being one to ask for help, I was really hesitant to respond.”
‘Nobody thought I had a problem, I was just the life of the party. I was reaching out for help, but doctors didn’t believe me. I was even suicidal on my wedding day.’
“I knew something was terribly wrong. I was in law school about to collapse on the floor of my dorm room when I realized my life would never be the same again. It was like an all-night-long strobe light party in my brain.”
‘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 was ejected and thrown 50 feet from my car. I died that day. I knew I couldn’t feel my legs, but I didn’t know why. I was told I would never walk again.’
“I think every girl dreams of walking down the aisle to her husband. I had pictured it in my head since I was a little girl. I didn’t want that picture to play out differently just because of my accident. So I chased my dream.”
‘Doctors said my surgery would be smooth, and all would go well. To my surprise, I woke up in the ICU with tubes coming out of me, double vision, and not able to walk.’
“In an instant, my whole world came crashing down. I knew I needed to call my mom. I had no idea how to break the news to her though. That’s a parent’s worst nightmare.”
