Life as We Knew It

by Tess Alfonsin

She lay in the sterile bed counting the dots on the ceiling tiles, while the doctor and nurse frantically examined her swollen belly for any good news. Searching their worried faces, she knew what was coming next. "Your baby is gone," he said. Letting out a gutteral cry that drove the nurse from the room, she didn't hear the doctor say that his concern was now for her and not for them both. He tried to reassure her that delivery of a full-term stillborn would be difficult but that they would get through it together. All she saw were the dots on the ceiling tile - and her life take a much different turn.

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Tess Alfonsin is the proud mom of three healthy boys, a fifth grade reading teacher, a wife of sixteen years to her college sweetheart, and a survivor.