On a serious note

I am heartbroken over one of my SPALS friend's horrible news about the little girl she is carrying. Her first baby, a boy, was born with cardiomyopathy as well as a rare metabolic disorder, the same year Julian was born. She went on to have a healthy baby girl last year, and gave her a variation of her son's name as a middle name, like we did. She is currently 27 weeks pregnant and found out last week that her little girl, whose name they have now shared with our community, has the same condition that her son died of in 2004. Sadly, the baby's heart is deteriorating, and her chances for survival in utero for more than a few more days are slim, so labor will be induced tomorrow and the family is preparing to say goodbye to yet another loved and wanted child.

This makes me incredibly sad, as we have much in common with this family, and this could have so easily been us, with the scares about Natalie's heart in my second trimester. The world is an incredibly unfair place. I have left SPALS for the time being, although I have conflicting feelings about it, and know that I will miss being a part of a community that has supported me and which I have supported for the past 2 years, but I think it's time for me to move forward. Now that Natalie is here, I feel so incredibly lucky and find the thought of another high-risk pregnancy and another possible loss that much more horrifyingly unbearable.

Whether you meditate, pray, shop, do yoga, breathe, or whatever, please keep this family in your thoughts.