I’ve always known motherhood was an experience I wanted for my own, as many do. I dreamed of the moment when I’d meet my child for the first time. Just like on TV or in the movies, they hand you your precious little bundle, all wrinkly and new with a strong set of lungs. I could just picture it.

When my husband and I decided the time had come for us to grow our family and try for a baby, we never imagined that we’d experience a pregnancy loss and more than 18 months of unexplained infertility before we finally conceived our sweet little rainbow baby. My pregnancy went smoothly for the most part—which is why when my water broke at 36 weeks and 6 days, I couldn’t have been more surprised. One thing anyone who knows me can attest to is that I am a planner. I have said many times that “I like to have a plan, know the plan, and know that it’s a good plan”—and that’s true. Having our baby three weeks early was lesson number one in “throw your plans out the window, now that you have a baby.” But nonetheless I focused on the vision of meeting our baby, all wrinkly and new with a strong set of lungs just like on TV and in the movies. The plan might have changed but the goal remained the same. At 37 weeks exactly, labour was induced. Throughout that day and into the evening as I laboured, the nurses commented multiple times how great baby’s heart rate was—“baby’s loving it, they’re doing great!”

Upon that final push when it felt like our baby had somehow been ejected from my body at the speed of light all of the sudden, the plan took a turn again. As I look back now almost twelve months later it’s really all a blur. What I do know is, no one handed me a little bundle, wrinkly and new with a strong set of lungs. I touched my sweet girl for the briefest second as she was lifted up from between my legs, before I heard “Code Blue.” I watched helplessly as our baby was attended to by numerous medical professionals—I was dazed, confused and completely overwhelmed. No one prepares you for the possibility of having your baby taken from you upon the moment of their birth. Don’t get me wrong, I am eternally grateful for the medical care that our baby received that night. But I will forever mourn the loss of holding my baby right away, basking in the golden hour of birth, latching her for those first drops of colostrum. Isn’t it strange to be both grateful for and grieving a singular moment? I can recognize now that overcoming our birth trauma the way we have is a success story in itself. The grief still pops up now and then, and sometimes I’m honestly quite jealous of others’ birth experiences. I didn’t get to hold our little girl until the next day. I slept in a different room, on a different floor for a few hours. I’ll never forget the moment the NICU nurse placed her in my arms and tears of overwhelming emotion and exhaustion streamed down my cheeks. Finally, I was holding our baby.

—K. McGrath