Tonight, Austin and I went for another walk. We almost always do. If you’ve ever walked with a two-year-old, you know they’re not exactly in a hurry. Every airplane has to be pointed out. Every dog deserves a wave. Every rock absolutely has to come home with us. I used to think we were just… Read more

Austin has been having a hard time sleeping lately. He wakes up crying in the middle of the night. Sometimes he talks in his sleep. Sometimes he just wants someone nearby. Last night, all he wanted was to hold my finger. Not my hand. Just one finger. So I sat there in the dark while… Read more

Today was a good day. Austin and I went to the zoo with friends. The weather was beautiful. The boys played. We got out at the right time before everyone crossed into tired and cranky and before we had little disasters on our hands. One of those outings where you drive home thinking, “That actually… Read more

Today marks two months since Ethan’s arrival. Somehow, that feels impossible and painfully real at the same time. For a while, there were things to do. Tasks to complete. Boxes to check. Paperwork to figure out. Decisions to make. Calls to answer. Things that, in some ways, gave me something to focus on. And then… Read more

One of the books I’ve been reading recently encouraged loss moms to write a letter to friends and family to help communicate some of the things grief can feel like that are often hard to put into words. Honestly, I don’t fully know how to navigate this road yet, and I definitely don’t always know… Read more

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and my heart feels heavier than I expected it to. For so many years, Mother’s Day was hard because I longed so badly to be a mom. While everyone else celebrated, there was always a quiet ache sitting underneath the surface as we walked through infertility and wondered if that dream… Read more

The night moving into that day felt heavy from the very beginning. There was so much anticipation around leaving Ethan’s body that day. I had been just about cleared to go home, and they were just doing a few final things to make sure everything looked good for me medically. Physically, I was ready to… Read more

Sunday morning felt… quiet. Not empty. Not peaceful in a light, carefree way. But a quiet that held both rest and weight at the same time. We woke up slowly, without alarms or anywhere we needed to be. For a moment, it almost felt like a normal Sundaythe kind where you ease into the day,… Read more

(The day after Ethan was born) The night was short, and the morning came quickly. Around 4 a.m., I was woken for a blood draw to check how my numbers were doing. From there, the morning slowly began to unfold. There was some confusion about the room I would be moved into, which took a… Read more

Leaving the OR felt surreal. I remember looking over and seeing Ben and my dad talking with Dr. K, thanking her for giving us the time we had with Ethan, and for taking such good care of me. I thanked her too… for everything she had done, and for keeping me safe through it all.… Read more