Sweet baby girl,

I have made it a point over the past year or two to not apologize, to stop saying I’m sorry whenever things don’t work out. I don’t want the blame for blameless things, big or small. It’s healthier to say “Thanks for understanding” than it is to say “I’m sorry I didn’t do x, y, or z.” One of those lessons that women learn too late, apparently. 

But I’m so sorry. You grew your little heart out and I tried my best to deliver you safely to your daddies. I don’t know whose fault it was, and I know it’s probably fair to say it wasn’t mine, at least in any purposeful or conscious way. But just in case, I’m sorry. I really wish it had turned out differently, and I have so much ache in my heart for who you should have had the chance to be. You were so very wanted and so very loved. You created a team out of a handful of random people and you helped us all learn about a different kind of love; you have touched more people in your few months as a twinkle in my eye and a bump under my shirt than most people have the chance to touch in a long, full lifetime. Strangers loved you just because you were you, because you were this precious little seed grown out of love and heartbreak and technology and dedication. You were a dream come true for your dads and me, and no one will ever know how desperate we were to meet you and talk to you and tell you how much we loved you. Thank you for being all of those things to me, and to our crazy little team, and to everyone your little life touched. 

I’m glad, at least, that we all got to hold you and love those amazing little fingers and toes, and see that you were real and that you were perfect.

I don’t know how to face the world anymore, knowing that a piece of me is wherever you are and will always be missing from my heart. I don’t know how to live with all this hurt. I don’t know how to face the pity. I don’t know how to carry another baby again without always thinking of you and living in fear and reminisce. I don’t know how to live with myself without knowing why. What if it was me? What if my body didn’t want you as much as my heart did?

Birth and death don’t belong so tightly entwined, and there’s no way to reconcile the amount of pain I feel with the amount of hope I had just a few days ago. It’s too much to bear, even when split among three people. Actually, I think it’s multiplied instead of divided, which I suppose makes you even more loved and grieved than most babies. I wish you were here to feel it.