Gentle. Protective.
Instinct guided the motion — not thought.
“Please,” I whispered into the quiet room.
My voice was soft.
“Let me have this one.”
My fingers pressed slightly deeper.
“Let me carry you to term.”
A tear slipped free and rolled across my temple into my hair.
“Let me hold you.”
My throat tightened.
“Let me name you.”
My breath trembled.
“Let me love you out loud this time.”
The first pregnancy had been stolen from me.
Nine months of fear.
Violence. Isolation. Prison walls.
Hunger. Stress.
And then —
Blood on a cold mattress.
A nurse wrapping my stillborn son in a stained towel like he was disposable.
Like his existence was an inconvenience.
I had screamed then.
But no sound had come out.
My voice had already been crushed from pain.
I had clawed at the sheets until my fingernails broke.
Until my hands bled.
Until exhaustion forced silence.
That memory lived inside my body.
It had shaped how I saw pregnancy.
It had made me associate motherhood with loss.
