When new mother, Tessa, reaches her breaking point, a quiet night shatters everything she thought she knew about love, support, and sacrifice. As exhaustion deepens and silence grows louder, unexpected voices rise to defend her… and a woman pushed to the edge begins to remember who she is.
When I think about those early weeks, I don’t remember much of the nights — only fragments, really.
The soft, rhythmic breathing of the baby beside me. The sound of the bassinet creaking when I leaned over it. And the ache in my body that never seemed to fade.
I became a mother two months ago, and though my daughter, Lily, is the best thing that’s ever happened to me, the weeks since have been nothing short of brutal.
My C-section wasn’t planned — one minute I was breathing through contractions, and the next, I was flat on a table, numb from the chest down, praying she would cry when they lifted her out.
And she did. My darling little girl did.
But no one prepares you for what happens after that. Not really.
I’m healing, slowly.
Some days I still can’t stand upright without wincing. My sleep comes in broken pieces, and I rarely get more than two or three hours at a time. I eat when I remember, which is usually when Lily’s asleep or when I realize it’s three in the afternoon and I haven’t showered yet.
Still, I wouldn’t trade a second of it.
What hurts more than my incision is how different Evan has become.
Before Lily was born, he’d talk to her every night, resting his head on my belly.
“She’s going to have your eyes, Tessa,” he said once, kissing the stretch marks near my hip. “And your stubbornness.”
“Lord, help us both,” I said, laughing then.
When we brought her home, we agreed she’d sleep in the bassinet beside our bed. I thought it would be comforting — the three of us together.
“I’ll get up if you need anything,” he promised.
But I did need him.
And he didn’t care enough.
And “we” quickly became “me.”
Every time Lily stirred, it was my body that responded. No matter how heavy my limbs felt, no matter how badly my scar ached or how desperate I was to stay in bed just a little longer, I was the one who sat up.
The tug of stitches along my abdomen never failed to remind me I wasn’t healed. But that didn’t matter, not when my baby needed me.
I’d carefully shift Lily into my arms and begin the routine — nursing her in the silence, changing her diaper by the dim light of my phone screen, burping her against my shoulder until she gave that soft, relieved sigh and melted back into sleep.
The story doesn’t end here — it continues on the next page.
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